Justice League of America (vol.2) #48 (2010)

Justice League of America (vol.2) #48 (October, 2010)
"The Dark Things, Part Five"
"Cogs, Part 3"
Writer - James Robinson
Pencillers - Mark Bagley & Pow Rodix
Inkers - Rob Hunter, Norm Rapmund, Don Ho, Derek Fridolfs, Rich Perrotta & Ruy Jose
Colors - Ulises Arreola & Zarathus
Letterer - Rob Leigh
Assistant Editor - Rex Ogle
Associate Editor - Adam Schlagman
Editor - Eddie Berganza
Cover Price: $3.99

Remember when your parents would wake you up for school in the morning?  Remember pleading with them for "five more minutes"?  

That's kinda how I'm feeling right now.

--

We open on the Moon with Alan Scott and the amalgamated Jade-sidian threatening our heroes.  We then jump to Earth where Mr. Terrific has Supergirl and Power Girl "science" their way into a schematic to counter the Starheart.  Karen understands "the science" and Kara....'s mother was part of the Science Guild, so that's good enough.

Back on the Moon, Dr. Mid-Nite returns the chest-gem to Mikaal Tomas.

On the battlefield, Dr. Fate casts the spell of restraint on Jade-sidian, and successfully separates the siblings.

And then...

Ohhhhh yeah, this is a Brightest Day crossover.  Jennie stays all White Lanterny for a moment... but it fades pretty quickly, at which point... Obsidian suggest that they combine again.  Before it gets too weird, Jade recharges Kyle's ring... who then snags Todd, and takes him as far away from Jennie as possible.

Then... more constructs.  Six (more) pages of construct battling.  Worth noting, that Power Girl and Supergirl cracked the schematic... and have brought the Earth-bound heroes into battle.  As the battle rages, we get that one scene we knew was coming the entire time.  Jennie is able to draw the darkness from Alan... who finally begins to realize who he really is.

Who he really is, is... Green Lantern.  Duh.

Hoo-hah, everything's cool again... and we jump into our "epilogue"... well, the epilogue of the issue.  There's an issue-long "The Dark Things, Epilogue" issue in our future.

We wrap up with Supergirl wondering why she was never corrupted.  She suggests she just "got lucky"... but she should really know better, nobody involved with this story... readers included (and especially), can be considered "lucky".

There's also the back-up... which I'm going to give as little thought as the Robinson seemed to.  Cyborg is able to bring Red Tornado back from the brink... and doesn't even have to resort to the big "risk" we were cliffhung with last issue.

--

We've covered our share of stinkers here at the blog, but this one might just be the stinkiest.  I really want to apologize for perhaps a less thorough/pleasant than usual "outing" here... but really, it was all I could do to push through.  Odd, I don't remember hating this quite so much back in 2010.  I must've just been in comics nirvana or something.

You know when you're cramming for a test... and you reread the same pages of text over and over again... and each time, it becomes more and more muddled?  That's how this arc has felt for the past few days.  I had to read... and reread, because there was just nothing there to keep me entertained and engaged.  Don't even get me stah'ted on the back-up either.

For the past week the blog has become something of an assignment.  Something I "had to" do, rather than something I had some fun doing... and I can't promise that that didn't come through in my writing.  That is not what this site is all about... and, from this point on... if we start an arc that absolutely sucks, we're not going to force through it.  I think we'll all be happier that way.

For the issue itself... Supergirl and Power Girl use "the science" to counteract the Starheart... kinda?  Then, just like we've all seen coming for the past few days, Jade draws the darkness from her father... who is finally able to break through.  Yawn.

There's a sort of interesting (and creepy) deal between Jade and Obsidian.  It ends pretty quickly... and leaves us in a position where... I don't think we want to know what happens next?  When Kyle dragged Todd away, I'd have been happy never to see him again.

I haven't mentioned it, but for this entire arc anytime Jesse Quick or Hourman were on panel, there would be a narrative caption about how much they love one another.  I didn't mention it because, really... there isn't all that much more to say about it.  We could look at it as a feverish codependency... or we could contrast the lack of "love" in everyone else's narrative captions and see just how alone/unlucky in love the rest of their teammates are.  Either way... it's not terribly interesting.

Did we really need this many issues to tell this story?  Hell, did we even need one entire issue to tell it?  Like I said the other day, this story would struggle to fill an annual, much less eight whole issues.  We all saw the ending coming from a mile away... the whole magilla could've been sorted out in the amount of pages the Cyborg/Red Tornado backups got.

I think I actually had more fun with Superman: Grounded... at least I could muster the interest to get mad at that piece of garbage.  This was just an exercise in boredom... an insanity test, which I'm not sure I passed!

Overall... you don't need this arc in your life.  I have trouble reconciling in my mind that this is that James Robinson.  The James Robinson who captivated a generation of DC Comics readers over the course of 80 issues of Starman.  Bagley's art is still quite good... though the fact that there were like 30 inkers on this issue made things look rather uneven.  I'm gonna freestyle that the inkers just kept falling asleep on the job.  And if that was the case, I can't say that I'd blame them one bit.

We'll epilogue this one tomorrow... then put it behind us forever.

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Justice Society of America (vol.3) #42 (2010)

Justice Society of America (vol.3) #42 (October, 2010)
"The Dark Things, Part Four"
Writer - James Robinson
Penciller - Mark Bagley
Inker - Norm Rapmund
Colorist - Allen Passalaqua
Letterer - Rob Leigh
Associate Editor - Rachel Gluckstern
Editor - Mike Carlin
Cover Price: $2.99

Gather 'round friends, it's time for a scary story.  Picture it, there's a young-ish man who makes daily "discussion and review" posts about some silly thing or another... and lately, it would appear that he's been trapped in within the dullest of subjects.

With sweat on his brow, he thinks to himself, "it's okay... there are only two days left."  Slump-shouldered, he reluctantly ventures into the cardboard metropolis that he'd allowed his front room to become... and reaches in for his next taste of his medicine, which would be bitter... if it weren't so dull.

The number 42 flashes before him... but that's not the story.  Behind #42 features a familiar "brand"... the Brightest Day continues?

Curious.

Fingers trembling, he gets a closer look at #43... and sees the four words that will forever be imprinted on his soul...

The

Dark

Things

Epilogue

So yeah... we went from a five-part story... to a seven-part one, counting the prelude issues... to now, an eight-part story!  Remember, that "decompressed" storytelling?  All in our heads, friends.  Doesn't exist.

--

We open with Kyle Rayner... and he's already singing a very different tune.  Remember how we wrapped up with him saying he was there to kill Alan Scott?  Well, now he's claiming that that's only a "last measure".  That's how real people talk, right?  Fly in, threaten to kill a guy... then be all "whoa, whoa... why are you all freaking out?".  Panicked, Jennie decides to take Obsidian's hand... and really, at this point, can we even blame her?

The heroes are suddenly surrounded by constructs... and then, well...

From here, (stop me if you heard this one) there are several pages of heroes fighting constructs.  Worth noting, Kyle's ring seems to be getting sapped of energy with the quickness.

We shift scenes to rejoin Dr. Mid-Nite and Mikaal.  They get a page of hot walking-down-a-hallway action, before the former leaves the latter in order to find help.

Next stop, the throne room.  Faust continues to prove that he's one of the more annoying characters around as he prods Starheart about his powers.  It's riveting stuff.  It's confirmed that Dr. Fate is the one keeping them bound, which I thought we'd already known.  Anyhoo, Dr. Mid-Nite sneaks up behind Fate, and removes his helmet.  This frees the captives.  In the confusion, Jay nyoinks the Starheart from Alan's hand.  Wildcat hauls off and socks Alan... causing him to shatter into teeny tiny green pieces.

So, where's the real Alan Scott?  Well, he's on Earth fighting Girls' Super and Power.  He's having a great time experiencing pain for the first time.  It's a twisted idea, that would be fun... if it wasn't wrapped in so much boredom.  Power Girl is then "affected" again... and starts to fight Supergirl... again.  Is Vince Russo booking this?  Do we really need to waste more pages at this point?!  Karen manages to fight off the possession... and Alan Scott vamooses.

We shift scenes back to the big ol' group of heroes... and they're, c'mon... fighting an army of constructs.  Still... for pages and pages.  Kyle's ring is still being sapped.  They are eventually joined by Dr. Fate and the formerly captive heroes (and Faust).  We wrap up with Alan Scott arriving... again.

--

You guys.

I haven't felt like this since we covered Millennium all those months ago.  This is just such a boring story... and, if we look at it... it has no right to be!  I mean, by all accounts this ought to be an action-packed JLA/JSA romp.  Instead we get a story that would struggle to stay interesting if it were only an over-sized Annual.

To be honest, if I realized this was going to be an eight-part "epic", and that it was going to be this aggressively dull, I wouldn't have started it.  Negativity isn't what this blog is all about and I really mean that... I'm not just saying that in order to keep getting free swag from DC (and no, I don't get any free swag from DC).

We find out last issue's cliffhanger was a bit of a bait-and-switch.  Nothing really new about something like that, I guess.  You'd figure with Jennie and Kyle's (and Donna's, even) past, there'd be a bit more drama here... but no, it's all very surface level.  Just a couple of "I loved you"s... which is kinda lame... and kind of a missed opportunity.

I guess I'll just put it plainly.  This arc is unfun, and if not for the Bagley art... I'd tell ya it has no reason to exist... or occupy any space in your comics library.  It's repetitive... the pacing (and stakes) are all over the place.  Just a mess that insists on taking up as much space as possible.

I feel like we've reached the point of no return... so, we kinda have to finish it up... right?  I mean, we've come so far.  Ehh, I guess we'll see how I'm feeling after I read the next chapter.

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Justice League of America (vol.2) #47 (2010)

Justice League of America (vol.2) #47 (September, 2010)
"The Dark Things, Part Three"
"Cogs, Part 2"
Writer - James Robinson
Pencillers - Mark Bagley & Pow Rodix
Inkers - Rob Hunter & Ruy Jose
Colors - Ulises Arreola & Zaratus
Letterer - Rob Leigh
Assistant Editor - Rex Ogle
Associate Editor - Adam Schlagman
Editor - Eddie Berganza
Cover Price: $3.99

Read "The Dark Things".  It's only five-parts, I says to myself... not realizing that there is also a two-part prelude.  Seven-parts ain't no thang, so long as the story is interesting...

... Guess the joke's on us.

--

We open at the Hoover Dam, where Congorilla is holding the entire magilla up while the area is evacuated.  During this, he unfortunately falls victim to the Starheart madness.  All around the world, things are just going nuts... even with our Justice League: Generation Lost pals.

The makeshift Seven Soldiers arrive on the dark side of the Moon, and after checking in with the All-Stars (who have their hands full with a lot of emerald energy) they enter a strange "five-sided room".  Everything goes sideways (literally), while Shiloh attempts to solve the situation.

It takes a few pages, but he finally cracks the code... only for the group to be attacked by a pack of rabid constructs.  Mister Miracle takes rather a whupping... and has to resort to Mother Boxxx (with three x's, yes) technology to be healed.

Unfortunately, this leaves the League one soldier short when s'more (super-villain themed) constructs attack.

We shift scenes over to the throne room of Alan Scott.  He is flanked on either side by Obsidian and Dr. Fate... and his former teammates, Jay Garrick and Wildcat (along with Faust) are knelt before him.  Alan sends Obsidian to "deal with" their visitors.  Very pretty page... it's really quite a shame that this art is being wasted on this story.

The captives try and chat Alan up... attempt to maybe encourage whatever's left of the man to fight off the Starheart madness.  Alan's reply implies that there is no more Alan Scott... all there is, is Zuul the Starheart.

Then Faust decides to chime in.  He asks Starheart what he wants with the world now that it's within his grasp... to which, Starheart hasn't the foggiest.  Faust then gets a bit pushy... he asks why the all-powerful Starheart has to resort to using Dr. Fate in order to keep them bound.

Before he can answer... we shift scenes, and rejoin Dr. Mid-Nite.  If you recall (and I can't blame you if you don't), Mid-Nite voluntarily jumped into Obsidian's portal in an earlier chapter.  What he finds is... Mikaal Tomas!

We rejoin the Soldiers for several pages of hot-n-heavy construct fightin'... which, well... it's something, I guess.  Looks pretty!  Anyhoo, Obsidian shows up and tries to convince Jade to join with him and their father.

Before she can decide... there is a burst of emerald light.  When it clears, we see... not Alan Scott... hell, not even Hal Jordan, but Kyle Rayner!  Jennie is happy to see him, after all, they could use his help.  He then informs her that he's not here to help... he's been sent by the Guardians to kill Alan Scott.

Well, that would've been one helluva cliffhanger... if it weren't for the damned backup story.  We're back at S.T.A.R. Labs-Houston with Cyborg.  Dr. Light (the good one) offers him a job as head of S.T.A.R. Robotics!  Did Vic earn his Doctorate and I missed it?

We then jump into a flashback, which... in fairness, ties this story together with The Dark Things... elementals are going nuts, and if you recall (and again, I wouldn't blame you if you didn't) we wrapped up the last one of these with Vic going toe-to-toe with Red Tornado.  Vic laments that due to the improvements he himself made to Red Tornado, it's impossible to "turn him off"... unless he make a certain high-stakes risk.

--

I'm sorry guys, I feel like my heart's just not in this one.  Hmm, ya don't think... nah, couldn't be that I'm suffering the effects of the Starheart, could it?  Well, no... what I'm suffering is the effects of a very dull story.

To be completely honest, if it weren't for the Kyle Rayner-flavored cliffhanger (that I'd totally forgotten about), I can say with confidence that we would'a "tapped out" on The Dark Things with this issue.  We've only ever done that once here... but, ya know... if I'm not having fun... what's the point?  I mean, it can't be much fun for anyone reading this (if, in fact, anyone is) to read the ramblings of an obviously bored blogger.

This isn't even so bad where I can get comically angry at it.  It's just a poorly-paced, and wildly dull affair.  Maybe Robinson is trying to evoke the frenetic "vignette" style of the main Brightest Day series?  Because, if we really look at it... that's all we're really getting here.

You ever play the Uncharted games?  Or really, any third-person shooter, I guess.  You spend some time exploring beautiful scenery... then all of a sudden you enter into a clearing, with a whole lot of convenient formations to take cover behind.  That's when you know there's going to be a firefight.  That's how this arc is starting to feel.  We get lost in the art for a moment... then fight.  It's very formulaic... and, by the seventh or eighth time, it begins to feel like more of a grind than anything.

When I become more interested in counting how many pages are being wasted fighting "constructs" than actually enjoying the battle scene, that might be a problem.  In fairness, that might just be my problem, but... it's a problem none the less.

So, what did we learn here?  The Starheart has fully taken over Alan Scott (which will likely end precisely the way we imagine it will).  Mikaal Tomas is hooked up to some sort of construct cropping.  Dr. Fate is the one keeping Flash, Wildcat and Faust captive.  And Kyle Rayner has been sent to... kill Alan Scott.  Oh, and Mother Boxxx now has three x's (probably a Morrisonian touch, though I wouldn't swear to it).

The backup also "happened", but this time it feels more tied in with the lead-off story.  It's still not all that interesting... but has some fun visuals.

I'm guessing this is a far more satisfying read in collected format... though, that's also something I wouldn't swear to.  These Brightest Day stories don't get all that much lip-service... and maybe there's some non-New-52! reasoning for that.  I couldn't recommend rushing out any grabbing this at anywhere near cover price ($3.99).  If you find it on the cheap... well, the art is very nice.

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Justice Society of America (vol.3) #41 (2010)

Justice Society of America (vol.3) #41 (September, 2010)
"The Dark Things, Part Two"
Writer - James Robinson
Penciller - Mark Bagley
Inker - Norm Rapmund
Colorist - Allen Passalaqua
Letterer - Rob Leigh
Associate Editor - Rachel Gluckstern
Editor - Mike Carlin
Cover Price: $2.99

The Dark Things rolls on... and, well... that's about all we can really say.

How many days does May have in it?

--

We open with... Miss Martian reporting in that she doesn't think she'll live much longer.  Hmm... well, that's random.  Don't worry it'll all make sense soon enough... I can't promise it'll be interesting, but we will wrap back around.  We then shift to Dr. Mid-Nite, Sebastian Faust and Jay Garrick in Opal City.  Ya know, since this is a James Robinson comic.  They're here to chat up the Shade... again, since this is a James Robinson comic.  What they find instead, however, is the corrupted pair of Dr. Fate and Obsidian!

After four pages of fighting, the heroes are abducted and taken into a portal.  Dr. Mid-Nite, who managed to sidestep the fracas voluntarily hops into the black portal.

From here we get a few more vignettes of our heroes combating corrupted magis and elementals... including Devastation, JSA All-Star Cyclone, Livewire, and... Yellow Peri?!  How 'bout that!  I've missed her.  Another great pull from the past!

We shift over to Alcatraz, which has apparently been reopened in order to contain super-powered baddies.  Not sure when that happened... and, I'm not sure it matters.  Anyhoo, inside... several more JSA All-Stars Lightning and Mr. America (and no, that's not me sarcastically referring to them as "All-Stars", that was the name of their team) are fighting off a prison guard named Burke.  Just an ordinary dude who has been corrupted by the Starheart situation.  This serves to illustrate that it isn't only a "meta problem".

Anyhoo, they fight off this prison guard for four pages before being jettisoned from "the Rock".  Lightning grabs Mr. America and helps him safely land on a chunk of rock jutting out of the bay.  It would appear that there might be some romance a'brewin'.

We jump ahead to the demolished Justice League Watchtower, where the amalgamated League plans their next move.  Turns out Miss Martian was enlisted in order to telepathically relay Mikaal's thoughts to the group.  This is where they learn about our gem-nyoinking cliffhanger. 

And so, Miss Martian continues to relay Starman's thoughts... and this is where we circle back to the open, where she says "I don't think I'll live much longer".  See, told ya it'd make sense... I didn't promise it would be interesting or satisfying... just that it would make sense.  Suddenly, Miss Martian transforms into a terrible beast, who threatens the heroes... for a single panel before being kayoed by Power Girl.  Why was she corrupted?  Is Mars an element now?

Anyhoo, as we draw to a close, Dick then splits the group assembling a team of six heroes who are the least likely to fall to the Starheart's corruption... Donna Troy, Jade, Mr. America, Jesse Quick, Hourman, and himself... Batman.  They'll be the ones headed to the other side of the Moon.

Well, you know as well as I do that you can't march into danger with only SIX soldiers... and so, we close out with the introduction of our Seventh... Mister Miracle, Shiloh Norman.  Because... ya know, Seven Soldiers... that was a clear reference, no?

--

Not gonna lie... this is pretty dull.  In fairness (I guess), this is very clearly being written "for the trade", which means... we've got pages to kill!

We get not one, but two four-page fight scenes... which really, we could've done in one.  If the Stargirl/Yellow Peri fight only gets a single panel, Mr. America and Lightning fighting a possessed prison guard didn't require much more than that.

Robinson, like many writers, has his habits... some, I love... like digging up and utilizing obscure characters (Yellow Peri!).  Others, I tolerate... like over-using The Shade.  We get it, the Robinson run on Starman (vol.2) is legendary.  Ask any DC Comics fan to name some of their favorite all-time runs, Starman will very likely be on it.  But dude, enough with the Shade.  Especially if you're only using him to job him out.

Now some important (and progression-facilitating) things did happen here.  We learned that humans (or lower-metas) can be corrupted by the Starheart, which raises the stakes exponentially.  It's still not interesting, but it is more dangerous.  We learned that Mikaal Tomas can survive having his gem forcibly removed from his chest.  And we introduced Shiloh Norman as the Seventh Soldier of Starheartory.

Overall... well, it still looks pretty great.  The story, however, is moving way too slowly to keep my interest... and we still have three more chapters to go!  Love Robinson as a writer, but I'm thinking that he and the Justice League just weren't a good fit.

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DC Nation:

Hints about "what the future holds for the DCU"
Conspicuous by their absence... Fifty-Two new #1's!

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For once the poor focus isn't my fault!

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