Comic Mini-Reviews Week of February 29th, 2012

This week...was a fifth week so barely anything came out. Click to read about Batman Beyond, Justice League and The Shade!


Batman Beyond Unlimited #1 – Based on the popular TV show of the same name, this new ongoing series details the near-future adventures of Terry McGinnis and a futuristic Justice League. It was a solid first issue, and McGinnis is always a fun character to read. Aside from Dustin Nguyen's art, there's nothing terribly special about the series so far. I feel that fans of the show will enjoy this series, especially as it will hopefully get a chance to flesh out Batman's fellow Justice League members. Perhaps the most intriguing thing about BBU #1 is that this is the first DC superhero comic to feature a digital only first release. The issue is split into two stories, one starring only Batman and another already available digitally story story starring the Justice League. It is an interesting experiment and it will be interesting to see if it pays off.

Justice League #6 – Geoff Johns and Jim Lee's first storyarc comes to merciful end. Look, it wasn't terrible—just kind of confusing. Don't get me wrong, it was quite easy to follow. The question is: how do you analyze it in the context of the New 52? Honestly, I am not sure. After six issues, I am fairly certain that Justice League was meant to be a road map for new readers to enter the DCnU, but, even taking that into account, the series strikes me as overly simplistic. The rising action takes almost 5 and a half issues and then suddenly comes to an end in a short manner of pages. Darksied, poised to be the first big bad of the New 52, was menacing for about ten pages, did almost nothing, and then gets punched back into a boom tube. I am really hoping the next storyline is better. It will feature the modern Justice League, so hopefully it can also feature a better story.

Legion: Secret Origin #5 – Look, I love these characters and I like Chris Batista's art but I have no idea what is actually going on in this book. There is no atmosphere or story flow. The book is just a series of scenes filled with characters. It feels as if Paul Levitz has some sort of mystery going that we are supposed to be interested in but, for the life of me, I can't figure out what it is. With more characters joining the story on every page, it's only going to get worse. The thing is, Legion: Secret Origin is a mess, but its kind of an earnest, endearing mess. It may read better from beginning to end, but I kind of doubt it. We'll see next month when issue six hits the shelves.

The Shade #5 – The Shade's extraordinarily long life has given James Robinson quite the sandbox to play in. This allows him to really exercise one of his best abilities—creating and developing fun, quirky characters. This issue focuses mostly on the origin story of a Barcelona-based vampire superhero named La Sangre and her connections to the Shade. She first appeared back in Robinson's Superman run but this is the first real in-depth examination of her history. The writing in the issue is very good but the real stand out is Javier Pulido's art. Heavily stylized and kind of cartoon-y, Pulido reminds me of Marcos Martin (which, right now, is one of the biggest compliments I can give to an artist).

Spaceman #4 – Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso's dystopian future continues to wow. The kidnapping story/mystery/near-future-tale-of-a-bioengineered-space-monkey is one of my favorite books on the stands. It's a gritty and fascinating page turner that effectively creates a world for its characters to inhabit. The characters—from the title character, Orson, to the street urchins that befriend him—are entirely believable despite being creations completely fantastical, fictional world. Risso's artistic storytelling has been stellar so far.