Phil's Reviews — Stuff I Read and Put Back #57

Justice Society of America #12 — Writer: Geoff Johns;  Penciller: Dale Eaglesham;  Inker: Ruy Jose
Continuing the “get aspects of Kingdom Come into the mainstream DCU” story. Not a bad read, but the cast of ongoing characters in this book has become huge (there are 18 little character boxes on the splash page, and they add another three or four to the cast this issue), so it’s at the point where I see, say, Damage in his new costume, and spend five minutes thinking, “Now, who the hell is that?”  Add a large “who cares about Kingdom Come?” quotient, and the book becomes more trouble than it’s worth; “not bad” isn’t good enough to justify keeping it.

Batman Confidential #12 — Writer: Michael green;  Art: Denys Cowan and John Floyd
Well, this has gone on forever, hasn’t it? The end of the Joker origin, and from the surpassingly ugly cover (there’s a fine line between “interesting artistic experiment” and “hideous slapdash art,” and Cowan and Floyd seem to have jumped right over it — I mean, just look at those teeth) to the makes-no-sense story, this has been a doomed project from the start. OK, so DC editorial probably said “We need a Joker trade for when the movie comes out,” but, gaah, any casual fan who ends up paying $15 for the collected version of this mess is going to reject comics for life. Insert your own bad-taste Heath Ledger reference here, and let’s never speak of this comic again.

Ubu Bubu #1 (of 4) — Creator: Jamie Smart
Kind of the bastard child of Hello Kitty and Johnny the Homicidal Maniac. The title character is a cute widdle cat possessed by the Demon of the Apocalypse, and the two kids who own it keep trying to convince the grown-ups that they’re all going to die horribly, with little success.  Nice art, in its cartoony-manga-indy way, and there are a reasonable number of funny bits, but it looks like the kind of thing that was done in installments for some alternative weekly or something (it’s in little self-contained four- and five-page sections), and there’s a making-it-up-as-we-go-along quality to it that makes it hard to actually get into the story. Worth a look, though, especially for the JTHM crowd.

Speed Racer: Chronicles of the Racer #1 — Writer: Arie Kaplan;  Art: Robby Musso and German Torres
In which we find out that Speed and his brother, Racer X, are actually part of a millenium-long line of Racers, and that Speed is this generation’s Chosen One, the embodiment of speed, “someone with the inherent superhuman speed and agility to outrun the evils of this world.”  No, I’m not kidding. Stop laughing!  It’s sort of an Alan Moore makeover of the concept, if Moore couldn’t actually write that well, and was saddled with really mediocre artists. File this under “Ruinous Retcons,” back away from it slowly, and go spend your $4 somewhere else.

Countdown to Final Crisis #12 — Writers: Paul Dini with Justin Gray & Jimmy Palmiotti (and Keith Giffen);  Pencillers: Jesus Saiz and Tom Derenick;  Inker: Jimmy Palmiotti
More boom tubes than you can shake Jack Kirby at, as all the storylines and characters converge on Apokolips… and that’s about all that happens. Oh, yeah: this series has traditionally offered at least one Really Stupid Scene per issue, and here it’s the “Monitor and Darkseid play chess with the characters” bit ; tune in next issue to see where they go from there.

The Twelve #2 (of 12) — Writer: J. Michael Straczynski;  Penciller: Chris Weston;  Inker: Garry Leach
The WW2 mystery men of the title struggle to come to terms with the modern-era Marvel Universe. The creators are going for a pulp feel, from the covers to the first-person narration, but unfortunately they’ve also seemed to pick up the formulaic nature of most pulps: there’s a real by-the-numbers quality to this issue, as everything happens just about the way you’d expect it to. We’re only about 15% of the way through the story, so there’s plenty of time to turn it around, but so far there just hasn’t been anything to get excited about here.

Teen Titans: Year One #2 (of 6) — Writer: Amy Wolfram;  Art: Karl Kerschl, Serge Lapointe & Steph Peru
The good news is, the Batman’s-acting-like-a-dick stuff from last issue was a plot point, not bad characterization, because this issue all the mentors are acting like dicks (well, presumably Wonder Woman’s acting like a clitoris or something, but we haven’t seen her yet, although Wonder Girl drops by right at the end). OK, and kid-friendly; it should appeal to fans of the cartoon, especially with its weird alienated-scaredy-cat take on Aqualad. The grownups-on-the-rampage plot’s been done to death, though, so readers over twelve likely won’t find a lot to recommend it.

Phil Mateer