X-Men: Legacy #225
Written By Mike Carey
Art By Phil Briones
It occurs to me that before Mike Carey started writing this title he wrote Lucifer which was a comic about the devil wandering around and doing vague things in order to further his long-term plan. As opposed to this title, which involves Charles Xavier wandering around and doing vague things to further his long-term plan, but with tons of continuity weighing it all down.
I suppose if you really enjoyed the X-Books of the '90s, you're probably thrilled to see Exodus and a new version of the Acolytes, but if you aren't...well, that's a shame. Now personally, I'm not a huge fan of the X-Men, so I can't help but feel like the finer points of this title are lost on me. My reading of the book was essentially Xavier shows up to tell some low-level league of evil mutants to disperse, and, after a bit of explanation, they do.
But hey, if Marvel's publishing a half-dozen ongoing X-Men titles, there's nothing wrong with one of them being whole-heartedly devoted to the hardcore fans, and in that spirit, this book definitely appeals to someone.
Superman/Batman #61
Written By Michael Green and Mike Johnson
Art By Francis Manapul
I'm actually kind of amazed that this title is still running, if only because it seemed like the whole idea of Batman and Superman teaming up would have a somewhat limited amount of stories to tell. Like, eventually you'd end writing a story where, you know, all of Batman's villains got merged with Superman's villains and they had to fight them, but all of their friends were all mixed-up too.
In fairness, they managed to go for five years of story before reaching that level of desperation, and I suppose that this is about as well-produced a version of that kind of story as you're apt to find.
You could do worse, although it wouldn't be hard to do better either.
Supergirl (v5) #42
Written By Sterling Gates
Art By Jamal Igle
On the plus side, the 'Who is Superwoman' arc is almost certainly the best story of this entire volume. On the minus side, the volume of Supergirl has been composed of stories that have mainly ranged from mediocre to soul-crushingly bad, so that doesn't really mean much of anything.
But this is an okay issue. It basically sums up what happened and sets the stage for Kara going back home to New Krypton. It's pretty well-written, but nothing too special. Still, you have to give Gates credit for making Kara into a character that is not totally unlikable, and since before he came to the book it was written by Jeph Loeb and then Joe Kelly, that's a pretty fucking spectacular accomplishment.
The biggest problem with this book is its contest, but to discuss that, let's bring in an example of what gone wrong on the Superman books:
Action Comics Annual #12
Written By Greg Rucka
Art By Pere Perez
John Byrne is basically a washed-up creator who hasn't done anything good in almost twenty years. But, before his talent mysterioulsy vanished, he leave an important legacy that shaped Superman books for well over a decade; Superman was absolutely the only survivor of Krypton, and thus was unique in the universe.
Now, Byrne did that because over the course of the Silver and Bronze Age there'd been a proliferation of Kryptonians who, through various means, had escaped the destruction of their planet, and had somewhat diluted the character and meaning of Superman. In his mind, Superman should be a singular creature unlike everyone else.
Of course, nowadays there's a 'New Krypton' and thousands of Kryptonians running around. I would guess that eventually that's going to be fixed, but in the meantime, Superman, instead of being a morally and physically transcendent being is just the nicest one of a surviving race of near-gods.
But the problem with this issue is that I could care less about the origin of Nightwing and Firebird, and I don't really think too many other people were clamoring to pay $5 to hear about their origin either. Still, I suppose this issue does answer the most important question: is Kryptonian religion more like Hinduism or Catholicism? It's not a particularly exiciting or interesting issue, though Rucka doesn't do a bad job of scripting it.
Mini-Reviews: Now with even less thought than before:
Captain Britain and MI-13 #14: We should all be grateful it lasted as long as it did.
War Machine #7: War Machine blows some more shit up...for justice! Actually I think the mid-90s volume of War Machine was more intelligent than this.
Punisher #6: No, I'm sorry Marvel, I know you're trying to sell The Hood just as hard as you can, but I'm not buying.
Savage She-Hulk #3: Well, I certainly didn't see that ending coming.
Streets of Gotham #1: Because you demanded it, a Batman ongoing with 10% more supporting cast!
Dark Reign - Young Avengers #2: It would take some sort of super-powered statistician or perhaps a genetically modified actuary to explain how the Young Avengers have gotten another miniseries.
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