Jeff’s Comic Reviews, 6/10/09 releases, Conclusion

Irredeemable 3: I accidentally left this out last week. The opening bedroom scene is disturbing enough to make me worry about Mark Waid a little, and then in the rest of the story we meet some of the “villains” for the first time. At the rate the main character is killing the other characters in this book, I wonder how long it’s sustainable but it’s still very good so far.

Flash: Rebirth 3: Lots of great scenes leading up to the (not surprising in retrospect) villain reveal. I loved Bart’s first meeting with Barry, the “race” with Superman that had a purpose for once, and even the explanation of why Barry used to wear bow ties. Ethan Van Sciver goes above and beyond – the speed force scenes at the end look like nothing I’ve ever seen before. My ultimate opinion of this series is going to depend a lot on the ending, but so far I’m still liking it a lot.

Green Lantern Corps 37: Shaping up nicely to be a major part of the “Blackest Night” saga instead of just “the book where other stuff happens”. There’s a sacrifice at the beginning that readers of Legion of Three Worlds will know is a fake-out, and the ending is pretty major. I was surprised to see that Scar, the Guardian of the Black Lanterns, actually lives under the surface of Oa. I’m not sure if that was new information, or if I just didn’t realize it before.

Titans 14: This feels like someone’s sequel to the recent Cyborg miniseries, but all crammed into one issue. The ending is somewhat unclear, but it seems that they may have written Cyborg out for now. If so, it would be odd timing considering that for the foreseeable future Nightwing is going to be off being Batman and Wally is going to be off wherever he winds up at the end of Flash: Rebirth.

Uncanny X-Men 511: Fraction obviously thinks the girl-on-girl fights are cleverer than I do, but there are some good scenes. I like the conflict between Logan and Scott, it’s nice that Psylocke is back, and I love that Hank knows that Scott and Emma are keeping secrets and plans to expose them. (Leading to the Dark Avengers crossover, presumably.) Favorite caption of the issue: “Ali Blaire – Dazzler. Transforms sound into light. Seven top-forty hits. Really wants to direct.”

War of Kings: Savage World of Skaar One-Shot 1: (Yes, it’s actually called “One-Shot #1”.) A good, but not essential, “Enemy Mine” riff where a Kree (Gorgon) and a Shi’ar (Starbolt) accidentally get trapped on Sakaar (while Skaar is still there) and have to work together to survive. Ends with both sides in the war vowing to possess the power of planet Sakaar, which doesn’t make sense considering its current status.

Amazing Spider-Man 597: Peter’s plan to infiltrate the Dark Avengers goes horribly wrong. It’s in character for him to be in this mess, because he was driven by (misplaced) guilt, but it would have been nice to have seen him think it through just a little more because his plan didn’t really have much chance of working.

JSA Vs. Kobra 1: This is kind of the spiritual successor to the recent Checkmate series, as the JSA gets involved with Kobra because of Mr. Terrific’s connection to Checkmate. Kobra’s actually using suicide bombers now, which I have to admit is something I never thought I’d see in a DC comic.

Booster Gold 21: I’m not sure how thrilled I am about Booster extending his honest relationship with Batman to include Dick-as-Batman instead of just Bruce, but at least the ongoing story arc seems to be moving again.

Deadpool 11: I get that this book is supposed to be funny, of course, and I laughed a lot at this issue. I’m just having trouble with the “serious” Marvel U events bleeding in. In Dark Avengers and Dark Reign: Hawkeye we have scary killer Bullseye and here he’s more like a cartoon character, which doesn’t work for me that well. Thinking about it some more, it’s not so much that I don’t think this book should be lampooning current events – I didn’t have a problem with Deadpool goofing on Skrulls during “Secret Invasion”, for example -- it’s just that “Dark Reign” depends on a delicate tone of paranoia that I don’t think should be punctured.

Sherlock Holmes 2: It’s a nice idea to spend the time while Holmes is in jail getting to know the supporting cast, it’s just a shame that they’re all bloody useless.