The OMAC Project

The OMAC Project 

By Greg Rucka, Jesus Saiz & Cliff Richards (DC Comics/Titan Books)
ISBN 1-84576-229-0

One of the many publishing projects that lead into DC’s Infinite Crisis, the Omac Project is a surveillance satellite built by Batman when he realised that he could not fully trust his fellow superheroes.

Using it to gather intelligence is one thing, but when the covert organisation Checkmate not only co-opts it but adds a nano-technology weapon that can transform ordinary citizens into cyborg warriors programmed to destroy superheroes, The Caped Crusader and other do-gooders find themselves fighting for their very survival against the very people they usually fight for.

Although the book has its moments of drama and is very competently illustrated, ultimately it’s just another strand of a larger story, and consequently does not deliver a satisfactory resolution but only sets the scene for yet another book. This story should not be read in isolation – and sadly, perhaps that is what the publisher intended from the get-go.

© 2005 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Prelude to Infinite Crisis

Prelude to Infinite Crisis 

By various (DC Comics)
ISBN 1-84576-209-6

This quick, cheap compilation reprints some of the various stories from around the DC Universe, with salient extracts and bridging text from others, to act as an introduction to the massive company cross-over event Infinite Crisis.

The most extravagant and ambitious comics spectacular since Crisis on Infinite Earths the 1986 series that literally turned around the fortunes of a company that most in the industry considered a spent force, this anniversary bash is a direct sequel to that tale, via the groundbreaking Identity Crisis with seeds sewn throughout most of DC’s monthly titles.

This slim tome features Superman Secret files and Origins 2004, Flash #214 and Wonder Woman #219, as well as snippets from various Batman titles, Teen Titans, Adam Strange, JLA and a bunch of others, and although it doesn’t read particularly well in this format, I suspect that if you are going attempt the saga that ran as a further nine (counting the aforementioned Identity Crisis) inter-related graphic novels, you might want to pick this up as a cheaper bet than all those pesky back-issue comics. Don’t say that you haven’t been warned.

© 2004, 2005 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved

Superman: For Tomorrow Vols 1 & 2

 Superman: For Tomorrow Vol 1

By Brian Azzarello, Jim Lee & Scott Williams (DC Comics)
ISBN 1-4012-0351-5 hardcover 1-84576-145-6 softcover Volume 1
ISBN 1-4012-0715-4 hardcover 1-4012-0448-1 softcover Volume 2

A major part of modern comic publishing is publicity-seeking and — hopefully — sales enhancing “events”. These are either braided mega-crossovers that involve a large number of individual titles in one big story (Gotta get ’em all!) or extended storylines by celebrity creators. Occasionally you get both at once. Occasionally you strike gold.

Hot from his success with Batman in Hush, Jim Lee teamed with writer Brian Azzarello for just such an event with For Tomorrow which ran in Superman issues #204-215 in 2004 and 2005. For one year these star creators got to play with DC’s biggest gun.

Set notionally apart from the rest of the company’s continuity, although still packed with enough guest stars to sink a battleship, this story sees a Superman at odds with himself and looking for all kinds of answers as he consults a priest following the world wide catastrophe dubbed ‘The Vanishing’. Whilst the Man of Steel is away on a space mission a wave of energy washes over the Earth causing the evaporation of one million souls. As if that’s not tragedy enough, one of them was his beloved wife Lois.

Increasingly isolated, guilty and fixated, he becomes involved in a civil war, and by disarming the combatants causes an escalation to genocide. His quest becoming ever more desperate, he alienates his Justice League colleagues and discovers that governmental super-spooks are behind some if not all of his problems. Everywhere he turns there’s someone – or thing – itching for a fight. By the end of volume 1 he is aloof, stressed, almost monomaniacal in his determination to solve the riddle. But he does now possess the mysterious device that caused the Vanishing…

Superman: For Tomorrow Vol 2

Ramping up the action, the second book sees Superman find the missing humans by ‘vanishing’ himself. This only deepens the mystery, and his struggle to regain perspective and return the victims to Earth leads to a catastrophic battle with a dreaded foe and the destruction of a virtual paradise. Meanwhile in Metropolis, the unlucky priest has fallen to technological temptation courtesy of those super-spooks and he must pay a heavy price before he can find his own peace.

This is not a terrible Superman story and it is always good to see creators try something ambitious, but as is often the case with these event spectaculars, the result just can’t live up to the intent or the hype. And there are so many unanswered questions.

Why didn’t the entire planet go bonkers when a million citizens vanished in an eye-blink? Surely Superman isn’t the only one to notice or care? Wouldn’t even American media still be talking about it one year later? Wouldn’t some Governments mobilise, or at least form a committee?

Our hero is by turns smug and hapless, and his aggression towards his friends can’t be rationalised by his loss. Why would he turn to a priest when he has access to so many different sorts of spiritual and indeed supernatural guides? Where are his parents in all this? And why even bother with the clichéd war of liberation/government interventionists if you’re not going to deal with them coherently? Plot foibles aside, there’s also too much dependence on the well drawn and ubiquitous fight scenes to carry the narrative, but if you can swallow all that and simply want a gratuitous –if perhaps flawed – rollercoaster ride, these two books are a solid bronze read.

© 2006 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

JLA: Trial By Fire

JLA: Trial By Fire 

By Joe Kelly, Doug Mahnke and Tom Nguyen
ISBN 1-84023-928-X

More super histrionics featuring the Justice League as an alien telepathic presence apparently subverts the will of the mighty Martian Manhunter, leading to lots of fighting and destruction. The JLA has a long history in all its incarnations of starting strong and losing focus, and for extended periods coasting by on past glories – which usually ends with a desperate rush of ancillary series, a crash, cancellation and a relaunch with major creators. Reading this compilation of issues 84-89 I sense fresh first issues in our immediate future.

© 2004 DC Comics

Green Arrow: The Archer’s Quest

Green Arrow: The Archer's Quest 

By Brad Meltzer, Phil Hester and Ande Parks (DC Comics)
ISBN 1-84023-781-3

This one’s a cool treat for inveterate superhero fans as author Brad Meltzer joins artists Hester and Parks for a touching and exciting run through the history of a character who’s been fighting crime, pretty much uninterrupted, since the beginning of the 1940’s.

If you’re a newcomer to the minutiae of the super-guy’s world there’s something you need to accept. Dead is dead, but not always and not forever. It is a fact acknowledged by the empowered community – if not the world at large – that you can occasionally come back from Heaven without starting your own religion.

Such a returnee is Oliver Queen, Green Arrow. He got blown to shreds saving Superman’s hometown from an airborne bomb and went to his reward. If you want more on that part of the tale I suggest you track down the collections Quiver and Sounds of Violence, both written by movie maker Kevin Smith, as they’re pretty entertaining too.

The hook here is that as the Arrow is back, what happened after his funeral? Using the concept of a “Porn Buddy” – a friend who gets to your home first when you die and clears up the stuff you’d rather not have discovered about you – Meltzer crafts a compelling tale of family ties and the steps a hero would take to protect his loved ones from beyond the grave. A welcome bonus is that he manages to do so in a way that balances narrative redundancy for old-time fans with introductory exposition for the newcomer to create a sharp one-off read. Great stuff done well!

© 2002, 2003 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Green Arrow: City Walls

Green Arrow: City Walls 

By Judd Winick, Phil Hester, Manuel Garcia, Ande Parks & Steve Bird (DC Comics)
ISBN 1-84576-039-5

Green Arrow is the kind of character, with the right kind of supporting cast, that readily lends himself to book-length epics. So it’s strange that this volume (reprinting issues #32 and #34-39) kicks off with a stand-alone buddy story featuring the ‘we’re just guys’ antics of his son Connor and long-time sidekick Roy (Speedy/Arsenal) rather than a tale of the Emerald Archer himself, but it works as a character piece to highlight the similarities and differences of these second generation hero-archers and acts as a jolly warm-up for the drama to come. Besides, gags about what oafs guys are never go astray in modern society.

The major portion of the book is a dark action-fest with the entire dynasty of bowmen stretched to their limits to capture the Riddler, whose conundrum-crimes are simply a prelude to the subjugation of the entire city by giant, flaming demons tasked with keeping the absolute and total letter of the law. This canny tribute to Assault on Precinct 13 has heroes, cops and criminals working together to liberate their home as it slowly starves, and descends into grotesquely suppressed chaos.

There’s no big message, just a solid thrill-ride that’s stuffed with invention, snappy patter, mood and menace, with the usual understated Hester and Co. picture quality. Here’s the kind of graphic novel you can give to ordinary people if you’re looking for comic converts. How come no-one’s making movies about this bunch?

© 2005 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Crisis on Multiple Earths Volume 3

Crisis on Multiple Earths Volume 3 

By Various (DC Comics)
ISBN 1-84023-946-8

I’m going to “cop a plea” on this book. Like any other comic book geek who grew up in the 1960’s and early 1970’s I was captivated by gaudy costumes and the outrageous battles to save the city, the country, the world, the universe, the multiverse, et al, ad nauseam. I loved all this stuff. I loved the funny animals, the comedies, suspense and horror stories, the Sci-Fi. Newspaper strips, Annuals, Albums, American, British, whatever. I even liked the romance stories which usually demanded a much higher standard of drawing than all other types of comic strip.

In regard to comic material from this period I cannot declare myself an impartial critic. That counts doubly so for the Julie Schwartz edited Justice League of America and its annual summer tradition of teaming up with its progenitor organisation, the Justice Society of America. If that sounds a tad confusing there are many places to look for clarifying details. If you’re interested in superheroes and their histories you’ll even enjoy the search. But this is not the place for that.

This volume reprints get-togethers from 1971 through 1974, tightly plotted tales comfortably rendered by the tragically under-rated Dick Dillin, although perhaps sometimes uncomfortably scripted in the vernacular of the day (“Right on brother,” says one white superhero to another white superhero!). There are adventures featuring inter-dimensional alien symbiotes and swamp monster Solomon Grundy (JLA #91-92), evil geniuses and the time-marooned team of 1940’s superheroes called the Seven Soldiers of Victory (JLA #100-102), an accidental detour to a parallel Earth where the Nazis won the second World War and the meeting with yet another team of 1940’s characters, the Freedom Fighters (JLA#107-108), and a genuinely poignant tale of good intentions gone awry featuring the Golden Age Sandman (JLA# 114).

In terms of “super” genre the writing consists of two bunches of heroes who get together to deal with extra-extraordinary problems. In hindsight, it’s obviously also about sales and the attempted revival of more super characters during a period of intense sales rivalry between DC Comics and Marvel. But for those who love costume heroes, who crave these carefully constructed modern mythologies and care, it is simply a grand parade of simple action, great causes and momentous victories.

I love ’em, not because they’re the best of their kind, but because I did then and they haven’t changed even if I have. Do you fancy trying to find your Inner Kid again?

© 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 2004 DC Comics. All rights reserved.

Bizarro World

Bizarro World

By various (DC Comics)
ISBN 1-84576-085-9

What do you get if you give seventy-two alternative comics creators carte blanche and a broad brief?

This follow up to the surprisingly successful Bizarro Comics again invites a coterie of small press and alternative comics creators to make sport of various hallowed DC icons. Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and all the lesser gods appear in a collection of tales humorous, dolorous and just plain peculiar, drawn in an eye-wrenching range of styles. Many of those involved display a disturbing knowledge of, if not respect for, the DC continuity of the 1960s whilst others seem to centre on the TV and Movie interpretations, but the fondness for times gone by is readily apparent throughout.

Watch especially for “The Batman Operetta” by Paul Grist, Hunt Emerson and Phil Elliot, “Personal Shopper” by Kyle Baker (with Elizabeth Glass), “Legion.com” by Ariel Bordeaux and Rick Altergott, “Krypto the Superdog” by Paul Dini and Carol Lay, “The Red Bee Returns” by Peter Bagge and Gilbert Hernandez, “Bizarro Shmizarro” by Harvey Pekar and Dean Haspiel and “Where’s Proty?” by Abe Foreu and James Kochalka among the thirty-five little gems on 200 plus colourful pages wedged between thick card covers. Stand out stories for this reviewer are “Batman: Upgrade 5.0” by Dean Haglund and Peter Murrieta, illustrated by Megaton Man creator Don Simpson and the pant-drenchingly funny “Batman Smells” by Patton Oswalt and Bob Fingerman.

What do you get if you give seventy-two alternative comics creators carte blanche and a broad brief? You should get this.

© 2005 DC Comics. All rights reserved.

Bizarro Comics

Bizarro Comics 

By various (DC Comics)
ISBN 1-56389-779-2

I’ll happily go on record and say that all of the fun and true creativity in comics comes out of the ‘alternative’ or non-mainstream writers and artists these days. To prove my point I’d list a bunch of things, and very near the top of that list would be this book.

In its seventy-five odd (some, ever so) years in publishing, DC Comics produced many of the most memorable, most engaging and most peculiar comic characters and concepts you could imagine. They also managed to create a deep and abiding affection in the hearts and minds of some of the most creative people on the planet.

Within the hilarious framing sequence of a monstrous creature attempting to conquer Mr Mxyzptlk’s 5th dimensional home, Chris Duffy and Stephen DeStefano tell a weird and wonderful tale of the outlandish failed Superman clone Bizarro. As the appointed champion of the endangered dimensional our ‘hero’ resorts to his ultimate power, producing comic strips featuring unfamiliar adventures of DC’s most recognizable heroes…

Cue a veritable who’s who of the cool and wonderful of modern comics creating a plethora of wacky, dreamy, funny, wistful and just plain un-put-downable strips that would delight any kid who read comics but then accidentally grew up.

If you’re a fan of Jessica Abel, Kyle Baker, Gregory Benton, Nick Bertozzi, Ariel Bordeaux, Ivan Brunetti, Eddie Campbell, Dave Cooper, Mark Crilley, Jef Czekaj, Brian David-Marshall, D’Israeli, Evan Dorkin, Sarah Dyer, Hunt Emerson, Bob Fingerman, Abe Foreu, Ellen Forney, Liz Glass, Matt Groening, Tom Hart, Dean Haspiel, Sam Henderson, Gilbert Hernandez, Matt Hollingsworth, Dylan Horrocks, Nathan Kane, John Kerschbaum, Chip Kidd, James Kochalka, Roger Langridge, Carol Lay, Jason Little, Lee Loughridge, Matt Madden, Tom McCraw, Pat McEown, Andy Merrill, Tony Millionaire, Will Pfeifer, Paul Pope, Brian Ralph, Alvin Schwartz, Marie Severin, Jeff Smith, Jay Stephens, Rick Taylor, Craig Thompson, Jill Thompson, Andi Watson, Steven Weissman or Bill Wray you’ll see them at heir best. If you haven’t heard of anybody on that overwhelming list then get Googling. Then get this book and get enjoying.

© 2005 DC Comics. All rights reserved.

Supergirl: Candor

Supergirl: Candor 

By Joe Kelly, Greg Rucka, Ian Churchill & Ed Benes and others (DC Comics)
ISBN 1-84576-354-8

Comics isn’t baking. The theory goes that with the right ingredients and the correct recipe you get perfect results every time. Sadly we’re not talking about baps but the new incarnation of Supergirl. Hang on though…

Supergirl first gained popularity as the back-up feature in Action Comics, as a tag-along (and trademark protection device) to her more illustrious cousin. After many years of faithful service, she was killed as a sales device in the groundbreaking Crisis on Infinite Earths maxi-series in 1985. Since then there have been a number of characters using the name – but none with the class, nor the durability of the original (and it’s always useful to have a trademark protection device).

The latest incarnation has much of original’s trappings – Superman’s cousin, close variation of the suit and symbol – but a much more modern attitude and edgier origin as suits today’s readership (and modern kids understand the value of a trademark protection device).

Candor is a dreadful mish-mash. It starts with Power Girl (herself once a Supergirl substitute) in a story from JSA Confidential #2 (and recently reprinted in Power Girl’s own trade paperback), and a selection of pages from JLA #122-123 which had Supergirl on them (no cohesive narrative, just the bits with her in). Then a team-up with her cousin from Superman #223 and a Power Girl/Huntress team up from their Earth 2 days originally seen in Superman/Batman #27.

Confused? If you’re not a comic collector then I’ll just bet you are. Such out-takes and shavings might fill up the book, but they have no real relevance to the narrative. Some depictions – all culled from before DC continuity ‘re-set’ in the Infinite Crisis storyline – actively contradict their later characters. So let’s be straight here: Either these books are a way to get more and new people reading comics or they are just another way to get extra cash out of the same poor suckers who buy the monthly pamphlets. If it is the former then a lot more editorial planning is necessary. These convolutions frankly baffle the casual reader.

After the never-ending calamity of the DC Infinite Crisis event, the company re-set the time line of all their publications to begin One Year Later. This enabled them to refit their characters as they saw fit, provide a jumping on point for new converts and also give themselves some narrative wiggle-room.

One year later, Supergirl and Power Girl are in Kandor, a miniaturised city full of assorted aliens, trapped in a bottle in Superman’s Fortress of Solitude. Krypton worshipping supremacists are instigating a species-pogrom, using Superman’s likeness as the basis for a hate-based religion. Our heroines are part of the resistance, taking the identities of legendary heroes Nightwing and Flamebird. But a hidden villain is behind all the horror and Supergirl is drawn to the dark side by…

Candor is a mess. There’s no real hook or bite – just aimless flailing about, trying to fill pages with pitifully uninspired stock scenarios pilfered from dozens of other stories, and someone, someday, is going to have to acknowledge the difference between Graphic Novels and periodical comic publishing. You just can’t have ‘big reveals’ of mystery villains in ‘proper’ books – and simply assume your audience recognises them because they buy all the books you publish. That’s purely an astonishing – but increasingly diminishing – facet of comic-book readership. It’s no way to grow the sales base. And even in comics it is SUCH a cliché.

So what can I say about this book? I wish I could be more positive. I’m here to make comic reading more popular, not to warn potential readers off. You can see the largest breasts on a super-heroine? There are many great artists producing cheesy, prurient puberty-porn? It’s all blithering nonsense and a there’s total disregard for the reader’s intelligence plus a truly harrowing reliance on the modern fashion for story resets whenever things start getting too complex to solve with a well illustrated punch? There’s certainly all that and less…

I’ll always try to say something nice or positive. Taken out of the book’s context, the Power Girl solo tale is very good – so you should buy the Power Girl collection and read it in its entirety. The Huntress/Power Girl story from Superman/Batman #27 is funny and beautifully illustrated by Kevin McGuire. The final story of the volume, wherein the inexplicably returned to Earth Supergirl goes clubbing and reminiscing with a coterie of fellow youngbloods is both poignant and amusing, so kudos to Kelly, Churchill and Norm Rapmund for that at least.

Otherwise? This is rubbish. I’m absolutely positive. Only get this if you’re blessed with a very short attention span, or haven’t had a girlfriend yet.

© 2005-2006 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved