Earth Two: Futures End #1 – Review

By: Daniel H. Wilson (story), Eddy Barrows (pencils), Eber Ferreira (inks), Pete Pantazis (colors)

The Story: The third-smartest man versus the two smartest men. See the problem?

The Review: I believe the common rationale for tie-ins is to expand and flesh out an already big storyline into one that truly feels all-encompassing. At my most cynical, I see tie-ins as obvious grabs for more cash. Having lived through many, many Big Events, I can tell you that the number of tie-in issues that actually added anything to their source plot is few; even fewer is the number of issues that had any effect on their respective titles. Tie-in stories are treated more like inconveniences than anything else.

That’s been the case for most of the Futures End titles so far, though I had more hope for Earth Two. Since the war and integration of the two Earths have been such an integral part of Futures End, you’d think this title would have more weight than others. Apparently not. The most puzzling thing about this issue is that its protagonist isn’t even a resident of Earth-2, and none of the major Earth-2 characters even feature in supporting roles.

Earth Two #26 – Review

By: Tom Taylor (story), Nicola Scott (pencils), Trevor Scott (inks), Pete Pantazis (colors)

A good twist is hard to come by in superhero comics. We’ve seen so many of the same kinds over and over—the long-dead character suddenly revealed alive, a major superhero ends up dead or kills someone, someone we trusted turns traitor—that even when you’re surprised, you’re not particularly affected.* The other kind of twist we frequently encounter is the kind that drops out of a clear blue sky. There’s not much craft to it; it’s purely WTF-worthy (which is not a compliment, DC).

It’s rare to get a twist that’s simultaneously surprising and enjoyable, where you realize the clues have been there all along. Taylor pulls off exactly that in this issue, which would make it rec-worthy even if he had accomplished nothing else. Over the past few months, he managed to convince us that Clark had finally been broken into a murder machine, that any hope of him being an imposter was merely wishful thinking. [Spoiler alert!] The revelation that he is actually a Bizarro (“Me am…Superman.”) is not only a great twist, it’s one we could’ve seen coming had we put the hints together: the chains hooked to his crest, the cracks around his eyes.

Earth Two #21 – Review

By: Tom Taylor (story), Nicola Scott (pencils), Trevor Scott (inks), Pete Pantazis (colors)

The Story: When even the one percent are doomed, you know things are really bad.

The Review: There’s a running pattern that Taylor has fallen into ever since he took over this series, or at least a number of obligatory beats that must be included in every issue: World Army forces take desperate last stand, get decimated, fall back; Superman kills a bunch of people or causes a crapload of damage; one (or more) of the Wonders gets taken down a notch.  It’s a pretty grim formula, to say the least.

To its credit—if you can call it a credit—this issue hits every beat to a tee: its last outpost devastated, the World Army flees as Superman arrives, ripping off the Atom’s arm and beating him with it.  Frankly, I’m surprised Superman lets him live, or at least leaves him to bleed out in peace.  It’s this relatively more lenient treatment of the Wonders that makes you feel that the violence visited on the World Army is gratuitous.

Earth Two #7 – Review

By: James Robinson (story), Yildiray Cinar (pencils), Trevor Scott (inks), Alex Sinclair, Dave McCaig, Allen Passalaqua, Lee Loughridge (colors)

The Story: What a waste of a beautiful woman with wings suddenly appearing on the balcony.

The Review: I’ve never understood the superheroes who go out with their heads uncovered or their faces exposed.  It’s just begging to draw the readers’ attention to unexplainable narrative gaps.  Take Alan Scott.  What?  Like no one’s going to get a good look at that lustrous blond hair, the chiseled jaw, and his hoarse whispers of “Sam, oh, my Sam,” and not make the connection?  But this, of course, is one of the basic indulgences we give to comics.

So usually, I would never spend a moment nitpicking at such a contrivance because once you start pulling at that loose thread, suddenly the entire world of the superhero comic starts coming apart at the seams.  That’s why I find it puzzling that Robinson would actually point out how easy it is to figure out the identity of this newest Green Lantern.  It’s not as if it took Kendra a series of mental gymnastics to figure it out:

Earth Two #6 – Review

By: James Robinson (story), Nicola Scott (pencils), Trevor Scott (inks), Alex Sinclair (colors)

The Story: If you want to know how the man of the moon got there, ask Green Lantern.

The Review: Even though now I look back on my inglorious days as a college fiction writer with a lot of fondness, when I focus the lens a little tighter on those individual days, mostly I recall a lot of flop sweat.  I think history will say that I was a much greater appreciator of writing than a writer, because I remember nothing I wrote satisfied me.  Truth be told, I was probably harder on myself than anyone, which meant I was more sensitive to the missteps of others.

And that’s why when Green Lantern scoffs at the Grey, “You honestly thought my sadness at my lover’s death would be the opiate of my defeat?” it’s hard for me to resist a shudder.  It has all the marks of—let’s not call it bad writing, but rather, overexcited.  If you’re a new writer, it’s the kind of thing you’d put to paper, thinking in your head it’s lovely and dramatic, without once saying it out loud and hearing how awkward and so very, very lame it is.

Earth Two #5 – Review

By: James Robinson (story), Nicola Scott (pencils), Trevor Scott (inks), Alex Sinclair (colors)

The Story: Hiring a perpetrator of genocide as crisis consultant?  Desperate times…

The Review: The more I read this title, the more I admire Robinson’s approach to making Earth Two a true parallel world.  This Earth clearly has elements inspired by the one bearing most of the current DC features, but they don’t have any direct counterparts to each other.  In some cases, Robinson amalgamates concepts together (Alan Scott as both Green Lantern and a Superman-type figure); in others, Robinson puts in so much of his own ideas, they’re only barely familiar.

The Grey and the Green obviously fall in the amalgam category, being fusions of Green Lantern and Animal Man/Swamp Thing mythology.  Coincidentally (or not), the Grey is making a play for the whole planet just as the Rot is doing in “Rotworld.”  The big difference is the Grey isn’t letting the grass grow under its feet—so to speak—in the process; Earth Two faces its demise at the hands of Grundy in less than a day.

Earth Two #0 – Review

By: James Robinson (story), Tomás Giorello (art), Nathan Eyring (colors)

The Story: Does it really take the smartest guy on the planet to suggest blowing everything up as a solution?

The Review: Of all the titles that could really use a mandated origin issue, Earth Two probably needed it the most.  True, the current arc is an ongoing origin story of a kind, but obviously, the history of this parallel Earth predates Alan Scott, Jay Garrick, and Al Pratt.  We know the Age of Wonders began on this world as a response to the Apokoliptian invasion, but we don’t know much of the details.

Unfortunately, Terry Sloan, originally the prototype for Mr. Terrific and now known as “‘Mr. 8’—the eighth and final wonder,” seems more interested in the sound of his own voice than actually enlightening us on much of anything.  No one denies that Robinson has a gift for words, and writes some pretty phrases from time to time, but at his worst, he just rambles with dry commentary and exposition.  No other writer churns out language that sounds like it comes from a clinical dissertation: “And since then, my partners in resistance (in this instance Wonder Woman, Superman, and Batman) and myself have been, I think by now, to every country in the world carrying out counterattacks and assaults to keep the invaders at bay.”  Sheesh.