Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye #16 – Review

By: James Roberts (Writer), Agustin Padilla, Jose Aviles (Artists), Josh Burcham (Colorist)

The Story: People reacts in different ways to the fact that Overlord had been on the Lost Light as blames get pushed on someone. Meanwhile, Chromedome has to live with the fact that his most important person has just died.

The Review: I have no words.

Okay, that’s not entirely true, I have a good lot of things to say about this issue, but I feel like nothing I will say shall do justice to what I have just read. To say that this is an emotional issue would be underselling it. To say that the character work here is majestic would be just superfluous as it is something that I do believe should be experienced before anything else is said or written about it. With all the huge stuff that just happened in the last issues, with characters dying, being beaten to near death, with all the chaos just laid down on the cast and the book, we now see the fallout of all that.

Flashpoint: Wonder Woman and the Furies #3 – Review

By: Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning (writers), Agustin Padilla (penciller), Jose Aviles (inker), Andrew Dalhouse (colorist)

The Story: Anything Arthur and Diana do, Orm and Penthesilea can do better.

The Review: Batman may be a man of mystery, but Wonder Woman and Aquaman, for all their fame and stature, are easily the most enigmatic characters in the Justice League.  They have a devoted following, and no one doubts their status as icons, but you don’t really have a handle on who they are or what they really stand for.  You can know everything to know about their origins, ideals, and powers, but you still won’t catch a glimpse into their hearts, minds, or souls.

So it makes perfect sense that even with a major Event whose storyline is half-built around these two characters, it turns out their every action has been strung along by others.  In fact, by the end of this issue, you’ll know way more about Penthesilea and Orm’s goals, and the attitudes that drive them, than you do about their starring kin.

Not that getting an understanding of these Machiavellian schemers poses that much difficulty.  Both only care about preserving the traditions of their respective cultures, mostly by making sure the outside/surface world’s ridiculous ideas of progress (e.g., peace and diplomacy) never catch on.  They offer an interesting, though vastly divergent, parallel to Arthur and Diana.  The passion of their beliefs draws them together; whatever romance they feel for one another seems largely incidental, almost irrelevant.

Flashpoint: Wonder Woman and the Furies #2 – Review

By: Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning (writers), Augustin Padilla (penciller), Jose Aviles (inker), Val Staples (colorist)

The Story: Boy, that decision to not sign a pre-nup sure takes on new meaning now, doesn’t it?

The Review: In the thick of war, neither party can claim to be innocent of wrongdoing, which is often the same case when trying to piece out who started it.  But in the Flashpoint world, with the aggressors on either side including characters we normally see as heroic to the core, you have to be a little interested to see what kind of incident can provoke them into all-out ruthlessness.

DnA do a very good job making the war a tragic chain of events beyond either Wonder Woman or Aquaman’s control, making them sympathetic figures even as they commit some fairly unconscionable acts.  On the one hand, you can’t help feeling like Diana gets the truly rough of the stick, losing first her mother, then her best friend and homeland, but knowing what you do about who’s really pulling the strings here, it’s impossible to blame Arthur.

In fact, you’ll have just as much pity for him after seeing his genuine dismay and horror at the damage inflicted upon Diana’s family and home, and his desperate attempt to make things right even his efforts are futile (“Diana!  We’re all being deceived!  Diana!”).  Again, I marvel at the difference in Tony Bedard’s totally hardcore portrayal of Arthur over in Flashpoint: Emperor Aquaman, and DnA’s loving, trusting, and peaceful (at first) version of the character here.