Grayson #2 – Review

By: Tim Seeley (writer), Tim Seeley and Tom King (plot), Mikel Janin; Guillermo Ortega; and Juan Castro (art), Jeromy Cox (colorist)

The Story: Agent 27’s first mission with Spyral was a big success. Dick Grayson is playing the spy game now and you can’t deny that he has the skills for it. The question now is does he have the stomach for it.

…If you’ve read the issue you’ll know why I’m sorry about that last statement.

The Review: Apparently Spyral is operating out of St. Hadrian’s Finishing School and has taken over Leviathan’s task of teaching the next generation of young women to be prim, proper assassins. While the comic says Grayson on the cover, it’s clearly Matron Bertinelli who runs this school.

After running interference last time, Helena gets some time in the limelight this issue. In some ways she’s limited by the confines of her role, there’s a right way to do her job after all, but Tim Seeley does an admirable job of demonstrating Bertinelli’s competence and outlook on the job.

It does feel this month that Dick Grayson is a little overwhelmed by the sheer number of ideas in his title. Dick is a fine point of reference and allows Seeley to introduce some welcome levity into the story. Dick’s quips occasionally feel a little generic, like they would fit any character so inclined rather than being tuned to Dick’s personality, but at times it seems as though that’s intentional. In fact, the one great element of this issue that features Dick is the very real sense of Dick’s identity being challenged. Perhaps indicative of Tom King’s influence, Grayson #2 shows Dick’s sense of isolation beautifully. The final scene can read a little flat if you’re not in the mood to empathize, but in the right space it’s rather touching.

We also get a new character, if one whose personality is somewhat sublimated to the plot, as well as appearances from nearly all of the supporting characters from issue #1. Most interesting of these is Midnighter, who is apparently going to be a recurring antagonist for Agent 27 now that he’s fallen in with an organization called the God Garden.

It’s also very worth noting that your experience of this issue will likely differ dramatically based on your interest in the areas of the DCU King and Seeley are exploring. Those longing for more of the weird and wonderful present in Batman Incorporated will be happy to find that Seeley can’t hide his enthusiasm for it, but if you’re getting sick of unelaborated-upon organizations and awkward backronyms, I’m not sure that this will bring you around.

Grayson #1 – Review

By: Tim Seeley & Tom King (story), Mikel Janín (art), Jeromy Cox (colors)

The Story: Grayson—Dick Grayson.

The Review: I’m no comic book history expert, so I can’t tell you about the actual origin of superheroes according to such niceties as facts. But I like to believe that among their closest ancestors is the spy. The idea of a person meting justice while living an apparently normal life is such an integral part of both that it’s not hard to think of them as arising from a common nucleus. So if one decides costumed vigilantism isn’t one’s thing, spywork seems like a natural alternative.

It’s thus not entirely surprising to find Dick muttering into earpieces and adopting codenames now that his public outing has made being Nightwing impossible. Besides, playing secret agent seems right up his alley. Not only is he more than qualified, skill-wise, he’s got the daredevil charm that’s so essential to the modern spy. As he dons a blond wig,* tries out his Russian, and acts out the douchey American tourist to perfection, you can tell that he’s thoroughly enjoying himself, so maybe you should, too.

Young Romance #1 – Review

By: Too many to list—check out the review.

The Story: Superhero love is a many-splendored thing…

The Review: Young Romance is one of those titles that a proper reviewer probably should feel a little bit of embarrassment about reading, given its hopelessly gimmicky nature.  Even so, I do kind of like the grab-bag format of these things, and I appreciate that DC has enough of a sense of humor to do something this cheesy.  Besides, with the mix of talent involved, you never know if you might run into a gem of a feature, promising better things from the creators involved.

Stormwatch #7 – Review

By: Paul Jenkins (writer), Ignacio Calero (penciller), Sean Parsons & Julio Ferreira (inkers), Pete Pantazis (colorist)

The Story: Add one more item to the “Nuclear Risks” list: alien beacon.

The Review: I’m just gonna put this out there: I believe Paul Cornell is one of the burgeoning great comic book writers out there.  Sure, he doesn’t have nearly the recognition that Grant Morrison, Matt Fraction, or Geoff Johns do, but I’d argue he can pen a script with the best of them.  Like all the greats, he has a very recognizable storytelling style completely idiosyncratic to him, which from the start made Stormwatch a totally distinctive series of its own.

In a way, such strong and inimitable writing is a double-edged sword; you really feel the painful end of it when once the writer departs and someone takes his place.  It’s not that the new guy (or gal) is necessarily deficient or ineffective in any way; it’s just not the same without the original around.  Unfortunately, that was always going to be the case with this title once Cornell left.

Then again, you can make the argument that Jenkins simply doesn’t have what it takes to follow in his predecessor’s footsteps.  If you have any experience with Jenkins’ writing from DC Universe Presents, you already have a good idea of the range of his ability: competent, wordy, and mostly blunt in the way he tackles theme and meaning.  Hence you have the personification of Pripyat (the Soviet Union town emptied by the Chernobyl disaster) hacking and wheezing into an oxygen mask as suffers the spread of his cancer.

Truthfully, Jenkins’ work would be serviceable enough if not for his completely bland take on the characters, characters whose voices have developed tremendous personality over the course of six issues, only for it all to be abandoned here.  All the wit, intelligence, and boldness you’ve grown to love have gone.  Perfect example: Jenny Quantum used to sport the perfect blend of precociousness, youthful malaise (“Okay.  I vote for you.  Whatever.”—one of her best lines, from #6), and pep.  Jenkins has reduced her to a default “action-exposition” dialogue and a running gag about wanting a puppy (“Pleeeaase?”).

Stormwatch #6 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Miguel Sepulveda (artist), Alex Sinclair & Pete Pantazis (colorists)

The Story: Just ‘cause you’re dying in space doesn’t mean you can’t get a little flirting on!

The Review: Ahh…nothing like a bunch of creative shake-ups to get the emotions flowing, huh?  By now, DC’s first wave of cancellations, replacements, and switcheroos is old news, but I’m sure the heated and anxious talk about it will go on even after the actual changes take place.  For the most part, I think DC made wise decisions across the board about what goes and what stays and who gets on or gets off which title.

Of all these, Cornell’s departure from Stormwatch signals much uncertainty for this title’s fate.  I don’t know if his leaving was a choice he made or one made for him, but whatever the case, it doesn’t bode well.  No offense to his replacement, Paul Jenkins, but after reading his largely pedestrian material on DC Universe Presents, I don’t have much confidence he has what it takes to follow in Cornell’s distinctive footsteps.

Over the course of a half-dozen issues, Cornell has established a very specific style and tone to Stormwatch, a potent mixture of lofty, breezy, and erudite which, you might imagine, very few writers can pull off.  Then there’s the sheer brilliance of his imagination.  Suppose someone other than Cornell—Jenkins, perhaps—had launched this title.  Would he have conceived of an alien city-space station hidden in Earth’s hyperspace, or a man for whom lying is a superpower, or moons that threaten planets with outstretched claws?  I tend to doubt it.

Very few other writers could have handled the developing attraction between Apollo and Midnighter with the respect and taste it needs to be taken seriously.  Too easily do people get caught up in the sensationalism or political implications of such a relationship.  Cornell shrugs all that off, letting the spark between the two heroes smolder until it finally comes out (so to speak) at a very sensible point, though “God, you’re hot” does throw subtlety out the window.

Stormwatch #5 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Miguel Sepulveda (artist), Allen Passalaqua (colorist)

The Story: You won’t believe what a liar he can be.

The Review: Sooner or later, Cornell had to address one of Stormwatch’s pet conceits: the premise that it’s been around since time immemorial, protecting Earth from all manner of threats from beyond the planet itself, resourced and funded by a mysterious, all-knowing group.  If Cornell really wants to sell this to us, he has to make the folks behind Stormwatch as impressive as he rumors them to be, otherwise Stormwatch as a whole loses credibility.

You see, the team itself is so chock-full of strong, take-no-nonsense personalities that whoever calls the shots on them has to be pretty powerful, both in ability and manner, to be taken seriously.  So it makes perfect sense when from out of nowhere, a supposed Cabinet man arrives, takes the team to task, and reorganizes them within the span of a few pages, with nary a care to their protests.

He doesn’t throw his weight around with just words, however.  Though we only get a glimpse of him in action, he seems capable of performing physics-bending feats almost negligently (“Let’s see, do I remember–?  Death pit, death pit…”), as when he sentences Adam One to death.  Don’t worry—as it turns out, death in the Stormwatch world is considered a kind of promotional stepping stone, a fact which tells you quite a lot about the exact nature of the Shadow Cabinet.

In assigning new leadership to the team, the Cabinet man spends some time musing over each member’s background.  While most of this is an annoying summation of everyone’s powers and abilities, which we’re pretty well-acquainted with by now, we do get some novel bits of info, some more useful (“[Jenny Quantum’s] father is a high-ranking military man, who still thinks she was murdered by terrorists.”) than others (“[Jack Hawksmoor] has sex with wells.”).

The most brilliant twist in the issue is the choice of who will ultimately be Stormwatch’s new leader: spoiler alert—Projectionist.  There’s poetry in this development for a lot of reasons.  Since #1, she’s bemoaned how no one appreciates her, and how all she wants is recognition, which may explain her rather dramatic past (“…there was the life of crime, the suicide attempts, the murders—”).  Now that she has all the attention she can hope for, it’s entertaining to see her overwhelmed in her new position (“…an emergency?!  Already?!”).  Great choice.

Stormwatch #4 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Miguel Sepulveda (artist), Alex Sinclair (colorist)

The Story: This alien apparently never learned not to scarf its food.

The Review: In my mind, the big appeal of Stormwatch is their incredible scope.  Between their ages-old mandate and their huge variety of abilities, nothing seems off limits to them, not even the boundaries of time and space (that tends to be the case when one of your members comes into existence at the start of the universe and is destined to end it as well).

So having the team defeat a massive extraterrestrial creature by resurrecting an ancient city beneath the surface of Colorado and using its alchemical powers to transform the creature into glass?  That seems to be a typical day for Stormwatch, but thrilling reading for us.  Initial issues hinted at the kind of power this team possesses, but here, for the first time, they really come together and deliver some fairly epic feats—not too shabby for the first story arc.

This rallying of the team comes at a cost, though.  Adam’s erratic behavior renders him completely impotent at the climax of the crisis, and Engineer finally takes lead in his stead.  But she also reveals her actions aren’t truly motivated by a thirst for power: “…I’m an engineer.  I fix things.  And this was so not working.”  It’s unclear if she’ll take point permanently, but from the looks of things, she seems perfectly suited to do so, even earning street cred with Midnighter.

And getting that dark knight’s approval is no easy feat, since he apparently only gives it to those who reach his high standards (“Good,” he remarks of Engineer’s orders, “That’s how I’d have called it.”).  Despite earlier claims of being a lone wolf, he quickly insinuates into the team as a master tactician, singlehandedly devising a strategy to free the absorbed members of Stormwatch from the creature, with a bit of legwork from Projectionist and Apollo.

Speaking of which, Midnighter and Apollo share a fairly significant moment in this issue when they find that it’s up to the two of them to save the day.  Cornell doesn’t go overboard with it, but when he has Midnighter place his hand on Apollo’s face, asking, “Do you trust me?” and the other man replies, “I—yes,” the exchange has a tenderness that definitely represents more than just a rapport between fighting partners.

Stormwatch #3 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Miguel Sepulveda (artist), Alex Sinclair & Pete Pantazis (colorists)

The Story: Cloudy, with a chance of meteors that may devastate the planet.  Bundle up!

The Review: Whenever you have a band of super-powered individuals banding together to fight evil, comparisons to the Justice League are inevitable.  Since the League is universally regarded as the primo superhero team in the DCU, and often includes the most recognizable icons, every other team has to not only distinguish its mission statement, but its members as well.  It’s a challenge, all right: how do you beat characters like Superman or Batman?

Stormwatch doesn’t make it easier on itself with such obvious analogues to the World’s Finest in Apollo and Midnighter.  This issue has Apollo flying into space, where direct exposure to the solar radiation that fuels him puts him into overdrive mode.  Good thing, since he does the heavy lifting, destroying a massive asteroid singlehandedly.  Meanwhile, Midnighter has to get over his loner methods to work with a whole gaggle of extraordinarily empowered people, and he feels out of place fighting space creatures when the only thing he can really bring to the table is his tactical mind (“I know how to kill anything.”).  Sound familiar?

That said, we also get plenty of evidence Stormwatch is nothing like the League, especially where power sets are concerned.  Here, you finally get a better understanding of how some of the team’s more bizarre gifts work, like Jack Hawksmoor’s.  As it turns out, when he says he talks to cities, it means he literally sits down among them—elegant Paris, modern It-girl Metropolis, and demonic, rambling Gotham—and has a pleasant chat (“Paris sends her love.”).

Stormwatch #2 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Miguel Sepulveda & Al Barrionuevo (artists), Alex Sinclair (colorist)

The Story: I’m guessing none of these people played “Follow the Leader” very well as kids.

The Review: Paul Cornell has certainly set aside for himself a quirky territory in the world of comics.  Almost everything he writes has a sincerely strange flavor, but one that can also be strangely sincere.  Whether you’re dealing with Skrulls disguised as the Beatles, a bar where heroes and villains of varying quality rub shoulders and share a hot toddy, or a genius with a fetching robot companion, you can always count on Cornell to deliver the very odd goods.

It doesn’t get much odder than opening on the beginning of all beginnings, the Big Bang, and finding a member of Stormwatch already there.  Adam One appears as befuddled to discover himself in existence as we are, as well as a bit disgruntled at his craving for a “pint,” though “pints” haven’t been invented yet.  An off-panel voice observes, “Ah, so this is the moment you age backwards from the start of the universe!  One day you’re going to try to kill me.”

Cut to a little over a dozen billion years later, and we find Harry looking quite dapper in his middle ages (relatively), but also harried from the multiple demands of his team.  Any group that gathers for a higher calling rather than kinship will have its conflicts, and Stormwatch has plenty, with Engineer brazenly vying for leadership, and Harry Tanner referring to his team in quotes.

Harry becomes increasingly compelling over the course of the issue.  In comparison to the more expansive abilities of his teammates (Jenny Quantum: “Hey, I can do force fields!”  Engineer: “Yes, your dark matter DNA means you can do anything at the moment.”), he doesn’t come off as the most valuable Stormwatcher.  But as Engineer perceptively remarks, “…he’s the greatest at misdirection.  That’s his main power—he’s the prince of lies.”  And so it seems, as he pulls the wool over even the big giant eye of the lunar monster who’s got its tentacles inside his brain.

Stormwatch #1 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Miguel Sepulveda (artist), Allen Passalaqua (colorist)

The Story: Call me superstitious, but that moon gives me the creeps.

The Review: In one of my reviews for S.H.I.E.L.D., I spoke about the appeal of secret societies, the shadowy group of specially selected individuals who watch over us from afar and chuckle at our ignorance.  It seems DC wants its new universe to have an ancient, secret league of heroes right from the get-go, and so we have Stormwatch, one of many Wildstorm properties the publisher assumed a while back and only just now has found a use for.

Stormwatch certainly has the right makeup to handle the job of being DC’s premier team of unknown worldly guardians.  Here’s a sample: the Engineer, a lady-android with a sarcastic streak; Jack Hawksmoor, controller of cities; Projectionist, mistress media manipulator; and Jenny Quantum, the spirit of the twenty-first century—whatever that means.  That’s before we get to Apollo and Midnighter (Superman and Batman analogues), and good ol’ Martian Manhunter, who rocks a much more aggressive manner than the Zen psychic we’re used to.

But an interesting mix of characters and powers does not a great comic make.  For that, you’ll need a writer who can craft plots capable of actually challenging such a formidable set of beings, and what better man to do so than Cornell?  Anyone who read his run on Action Comics (prior to Reign of the Doomsdays, it goes without saying) knows this man can definitely whip up some serious sci-fi action in epic, mind-bending fashion.

And right from the first page, he puts our team in over their heads.  Somehow, they get spread so thin that Harry Tanner, master swordsman (“I can slice cold fusion from the air, cut my signature on a retina.”), winds up having to fend against the entire living surface of the moon by himself.  If that’s the kind of thing I can expect from this title on a monthly basis, consider me onboard.

Then you discover that whatever massive scourge is about to descend upon the planet, it’s not actually the foe we have to worry about.  This creature itself has fled from an even more knee-shaking entity, and its sole mission now is to prepare other worlds for the inevitable doom to follow.  Don’t hold out hope that it intends to do so with a gentle hand, though.  You don’t write in a giant, intelligent, matter-animating eyeball just to let it hide in the moon.

Wolverine Fights We’d Like To See

With Wolverine taking Hollywood by storm the past weekend, a few of our editors got together and chose who we would like to see him battle in a future comic. Here are some fight scenes that’ll make you wish Marvel would’ve pulled some power move and just rip the X-license from Fox.

Rob G.’s Pick: Drax the Destroyer

When recently rereading Anhilation, I was once again drawn into Drax the Destroyer and his methodical and brutal fighting style. As I journeyed with Drax as he mowed down negative zone bugs with his two knives in his pursuit of Thanos, it dawned on me that he was like a cosmic Wolverine. So, I thought: wouldn’t it be cool to see these two, Woverine and Drax, duke it out. I have no idea who would win as they both are near indestructible and although Drax might have more strength, Wolverine could easily compensate for the deficit with some good ol’ fashion berserker fury.

Kyle Posluszny’s Pick: Kratos (From God of War)

Adamantium Claws Vs. Chain Blades.  Weapon X. vs. The Ghost of Sparta. Berserker Rage Vs. The Rage of a God. I really can’t think of a better opponent for Wolverine than Kratos from the videogame series God of War. They match up incredibly well as far as skill/power set is concerned. In addition, they both possess an incomparable knack for brutality and bloodshed that would take the battle to unprecedented heights.

Ray Hilario’s Pick: Midnighter (From The Authority)

It’s the X-men most dangerous weapon vs. the Authority’s most sadistic member. Honestly, what more can you ask for from a fight between two guys that are vastly skilled and that have the healing factor. Wolverine’s got the feral nature, and the various martial arts skills that allows him to keep fighting until he has won the battle. Midnighter on the other hand, also has the enhanced speed and fighting skills like Wolverine, but also the ability to predict the unfolding of a battle before it starts. It would be a classic battle between two indestructible forces duking it out till the end.

DS Arsenault’s Pick: The Brood

Wolverine is about four things: (A) “He’s the best there is at what I do,” (B) He follows a code of honor, (C) He’s a loner, and (D) He’s got a deep, savage side.  So the perfect Wolverine fight would have to be physical, visceral and savage.  It would have to be him alone, with no one able to help him against the overwhelming odds.  And the stakes would have to be for all the marbles.  Who can push Wolverine to the limit?  The Brood.  Giant flying insects with poisoned stingers, armored plate skin, razor sharp teeth and a taste for flesh.

So, who would you guys like to see Weapon X tear into? Post your picks in our comment section!