ACW #637 – Superman
Action Comics Weekly #637 (Superman)
“The Power of Darkseid!”
Writer – Roger Stern
Pencils – Curt Swan
Inks – Murphy Anderson
Letters – Bill Oakley
Colors – Tom Ziuko
Editor – Mike Carlin
Welp, after last week’s big reveal… something’s gotta start happening here, right?!
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Ba-Boom… it’s Darkseid. See ya tomorrow, everybody!
Okay, okay… Darkseid is revealed as the mastermind of this “Holy War” between the Fellowship of Superman and the Consortium. After a brief expository introduction for the rocky Apokoliptan ruler, we learn a little bit more about our present situation.
Ya see, Darkseid put all of this together as sort of a social experiment. He was intrigued with the concept of “fanaticism” and wondered just how far humans would go to show their devotion. Turns out, they’ll go pretty far… especially when bestowed with amazing powers.
Superman asks how many lives have been lost in the name of Darkseid’s twisted “science project”… to which, D-Side calmly replies, “thirty-four”. Love that.
The baddie then turns his attention to the Consortium… and after giving them their due props for orchestrating much of this Holy War, he… uh… banishes them to the Scream-Centers of Apokolips. Heckuva “gold watch” retirement, I must say!
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Alright… here we finally go!
It’s fitting, in a way, that this whole magilla comes down to Darkseid just being kind of bored, and while waiting for the right opportunity to, ya know, take over the Earth… is killing time conducting a little social experiment. This whole story, to this point, has been a non-event… and learning that it’s born out of something similarly mundane… I dunno, actually kinda makes it work? Sorta? On a meta “Chris is projecting his feelings into this story” kind of way?
Really not much more to say though… I mean, no matter how good it is (and it’s worlds better than what we usually get), it’s still like… a dozen talky panels. They’re good panels… but, unfortunately, they don’t give me too terribly much to blather on about.
Tomorrow: The second-cringiest costume reveal in all of Action Comics Weekly?
