Final Crisis: Revelations #4 – Review

By Greg Rucka (writer), Philip Tan (pencils), Jonathan Glapion (inks) and Hei Ruffino (colors)

The Story: Following the momentum of last issue, the slugfest between Vandal Sage a.k.a. Cain and the Spectre concludes in the utter defeat of the latter.  Savage than turns his wrath towards the Radiant, the Question, and the rest of the anti-life survivors holed up in a church.  After a successful rescue attempt by the Huntress, the survivors discuss the convoluted history of the Spear of Destiny.  Then, a last minute attempt of reconciliation by the Radiant results in a disastrous response by Savage who utilizes the Spectre’s power to deliver humanity to a new level of suffering.

What’s Good: As usual, Greg Rucka does an excellent job of capturing the personalities and emotions surrounding the various characters in this story.  The dialogue comes off as natural and authentic.  However, although perhaps a little too simplistic, the inherent religiosity of this issue compliments the Final Crisis event nicely. These religious themes are interesting and not overwhelming or preachy.

What’s Not So Good: Not a lot actually transpires in this issue and I’m not really sure if what the Spectre unleashes at the end of the issue actually changes anything. It was revealed in the most recent issue of Final Crisis that some people are naturally immune to the anti-life equation. This fact needs to be mentioned in this series because it looks very inconsistent that there are still individuals running around with free will.

Perhaps it is unfair to do this, but I feel inclined to briefly compare this series to Alan Moore’s Crisis on Infinite Earths (the first Crisis) tie-in during his epic Swamp Thing run.  The reason I feel this comparison is warranted is because both of these arcs are religious/spiritual back-stories to a Crisis events.

The jury is still out as this series hasn’t concluded, but as it stands, Moore’s story is clearly the better of the two. I believe the major reason for this is Rucka’s handling of religious themes comes off as a bit superficial because of an overtly materialistic interpretation of spirituality (I’m not reading into or positing anything at all about Rucka’s personal beliefs, just how his story is presented). At different times in the story, specifically when discussing Darkseid’s war against God, it seems that Rucka is casting this battle as two guys in a fist fight. The transcendental nature of God that Moore worked with that allowed for so much creativity and depth is unfortunately absent.  Moore’s godly muse was an energy force that channeled through all creation and the villain was an essential part of its existence. In the pages of Final Crisis Revelation, I get the impression that Rucka’s godly muse is an old man with a white beard, sitting atop a cloud somewhere concerned that Darkseid might come and drop-kick him.

Perhaps this issue stems from the fact that Moore incorporated many different spiritual and religious nuances and ideas, while Rucka seems to be only working solely from a Christian perspective.

Conclusion: This is a very good series that works well on its own and also compliments the main event. If you have been following these characters since 52, this series will be even more enjoyable. However, this issue stalls the momentum that Rucka has been building since the first issue. That being said, I look forward to the conclusion next issue. I am cautiously optimistic that the plot will be resolved in this series rather than being left open to be dealt with in the pages of Final Crisis.

Grade: B-

-Rob G