Now, the Scarlet Spider ID has been used previously since the clone saga, turning up in Avengers: The Initiative where an elite unit of 3 Scarlet Spiders were discovered to be a secret part of the Initiative (and appropriately enough, clones of another character), as well as in the MC2 universe.  However this is the first time the identity is making a big return to the main Spider-Man franchise itself since the Clone Saga wrapped up (to the best of my knowledge).

This time, in a bizarre twist of fate, its Kaine that’s under the mask.  Having been cured of his degeneration (and subsequent mutations) during the events of Spider Island, he’s relocating and finding himself with his first honest chance at a normal life since he was first created.   However, while he may not possess Peter’s memories, the spirit of Peter Parker looms large in his life, and its not long before he finds himself donning a costume of his own.

I must admit, despite the fact that I’d really love to see Ben Reilly back (it’ll never happen), I really like the idea of Kaine taking over the role.   And the setup actually harks back to the old “Lost Years” era of Ben Reilly, which was such a big hit at the time.   Like Ben at that time, Kaine finds himself on the road, and struggling with who he is.  Both are clones, and both live in the shadow of Peter Parker.   But while Ben was on the road purely to escape Peter and avoid Peter’s life, Kaine is genuinely on the run since he was previously arrested for various murders he committed both before and during the Clone Saga.

Its a setup that seems to be borrowing heavily from what made Ben successful as a character, so I’ve got high hopes for the series.  The fact that it seems to be specifically targetting that “Lost Years” vibe really appeals to me, as does the idea of Kaine trying to figure out who he is.  He’s definitely been played as a more sympathetic character since his origins as a clone were revealed, despite his murderous tendancies during the years he tormented Ben, so it’ll be interesting to see how they address that side of the character.  With the degeneration gone though, its a real fresh start for the character.

The only thing I have to say against the series so far, is that I’m not a big fan of the new costume.  I do really like the black mask with red eyes, but I’m on keen on the fingers being a different colour to the rest of the gloves, and I do kind’ve miss the hoodie Ben wore (a nice nod to it in the Point One book though, pity they didn’t keep that look).  However its not nearly enough to kill my excitement for the book.

Roll on issue 1.  Can’t wait

However, for me, without a doubt Spider Island has been the event of the year.  Heck, to be honest I found it the most enjoyable comics event I’ve read since the Sinestro Corps War.  For me it was pretty much perfect.  And as someone who fell out of love with the main Spider-Man books years ago, it really felt brilliant to be picking them up again and enjoying them that much.  So be warned, what follows is a bit gushing.

Ok, I’ll admit, as someone who got into regularly collecting comics during the Clone Saga, in many ways Spider Island felt like a love letter to fans like me who got into Spider-Man during that time.  Ever since the Clone Saga ended, and Marvel adopted its “lalala we’re pretending it never happened” policy, it had always felt like they were ignoring the good elements of that story.  Throwing the baby out with the bath water.   And as I’ve talked about before on this blog, over the last few years, its been a joy to see that policy slowly be reversed.

And its affects were no more apparent than in Spider Island, with the Jackal returning to orchestrate events, infecting the inhabitants of Manhattan with a virus that gives them all spider-powers.  Throw into the mix Kaine, recently further mutated by the events of the Grim Hunt and the Jackal into a spider monster called Tarantula, and there’s a lot to appeal to those fans of the clone saga.   Especially in the final issues, when Kaine is finally cured and joins the fight by borrowing Peter’s stealth suit (before leaving town to head towards his own new series, as the new Scarlet Spider).

But despite all this, this story wasn’t about Dan Slott showing some love to the Clone Saga.  Not at all.  This was about him celebrating the character and his history.   All of Spider-Man’s friends turn up to help contain the situation in Manhattan, as criminals are also gaining powers, and later, as the population start mutating into monsters.  Peter’s scientific mind is at the fore-front of the story as his new job at Horizon Labs finds him in the middle of trying to find solutions to the plague (and infact, Peter eventually saves the day without throwing a single punch).  Its about Peter being free to use his powers publicly without fear of recriminations.  To let him be himself without hiding behind a mask (although, in true Spider-Man style, it does eventually backfire on him).  More recent stories play heavily into things as well, when the main villain who the Jackal is working for is revealed as the Spider Queen, and of course, it wouldn’t be a Spider-Man story if the old Parker luck wasn’t around to kick Peter just as things are going great.

And as a fan who was never impressed by the One More Day thing (to be honest, its something that I suspect will be more successful over at DC, due to it being a line-wide reboot, rather than the more specific changes Marvel brought on Spider-Man – also the reasoning works better without damaging any of the characters in the same way), seeing Mary Jane get a big role was a thrill as well.  Initially stuck on the side lines as everyone around her gets powers, the issue where her own powers finally kick in was a lot of fun.  While they may still be split up,seeing the two characters working together in the story, and drawing on that past relationship strikes me as exactly how things should be handled.  Despite not being a fan of the break up, and having previously tried an failed to get into the Spider-books post One More Day, their relationship here really worked for me.

Of course, being a cross over, the other Spider-characters all have their own part to play in the story.  I must admit, I was a bit light on picking up the other tie ins to this story line.  I haven’t much interest in the current Spider-girl, or the Cloak and Dagger stuff, but I did like Julia Carpenter as the new Madame Web in the story itself.  However one book I have been picking up was Rick Remender’s Venom series which has been excellent.   Thrown into the middle of the Spider Island events.  Remender still managed to stay focused on the character arcs he’s been telling, especially in terms of Flash and Betty’s relationship.  I’ve been greatly enjoying this new take on Venom, and thought the big role he ended up playing in Spider Island was great.   Likewise Eddie Brock became an important part of the story and events in Spider Island make me wonder what they’re planning next for the character.

So, as I said, pretty gushing.  But then, I did really love the storyline.  Unlike many of the longer stories I’ve read over the past few years, it kept up the pace throughout, with no real filler jumping out at me.   The love to the history of Spider-Man felt great, with Jameson, Spider slayers, and the Clone Saga all playing their part, and there’s loads of interesting setup in place, while still feeling like the last issue was more concerned about wrapping up the storyline (a particular complaint I’ve had with DC events).  Dan Slott’s always been a writer whose work I’ve enjoyed, but reading this has made me keen to not just keep collecting Amazing Spider-Man, but also to go back and grab the issues of his run I’ve missed.  Great stuff.

I’ve talked before about how I didn’t really understand the decision to launch the Red Lanterns over the other Corps into their own book. Instead here, we get a member of each of the other Corps getting involved. I really like the idea that this book will allow a spotlight across the different Lanterns. What’s happened with the Blue Lanterns since they lost their Guardians? Likewise the Star Sapphires since their power source went kaboom?  That’s the kind of thing this book will hopefully address. I’ve also talked about how the Corps have slowly become less distinct in their powers since their introduction, and that’s also something Tony Bedard has talked about wanting to address here. There’s already a hint of it in the first issue, as Fatality’s constructs always appear to be made out of crystal rather than just energy.

And, of course, I think its great that Kyle’s the main star and Green Lantern of the title. To be honest, I’ve never particularly felt Kyle was left by the side once Hal came back, as many suggested (he’s never been close to the way Wally’s been airbrushed out of the Flash franchise) and enjoyed the Rann-Thanagar appearances, the Ion series and finally him being in Green Lantern Corps.

Now granted, I wasn’t necessarily a massive fan of how Kyle was used in Tony Bedard’s Green Lantern run. The combination of him and John Stewart was never one I particularly felt Bedard had a handle on, up until the final Aftermath issues, in which I really thought he did a great job on the characters. This series gets off a great start, with a nice recap of Kyle’s origin, showing long term readers how its been tweaked to compensate for the removal of the JSA from continuity. Rather than Alan appearing after Alex’s death to tell Kyle about the Corps, Ganthet is the one who gives Kyle a brief background to the ring and the Corps before he vanishes off.  Its a nice, logical tweak that I imagine will play in later to the run, as it establishes the relationship between Kyle and Ganthet nicely (one thing that I think has been ignored since Hal came back – so nice to see its use here).

The various Lanterns picked to fill out the cast work well too.  Bleez makes a lot of sense, as one of the most prominent Red Lanterns, and likewise Saint Walker is an obvious pick (although personally I prefer the character of Warth for Blue Lanterns).  I did really like in issue 2 how Tony Bedard started building up the relationship between Kyle and Walker, based on their mutual respect for Ganthet.  That was a really nice touch.  Arkillo is again, a good choice as possibly second only to Sinestro in terms of prominence in his Corps, and I loved the trick Tony Bedard uses with Arkillo’s ring having to speak for him.  Its nice to see his tongue being removed wasn’t forgotten or undone in the reboot.  Something I was really pleased to see, was Fatality being the Star Sapphire who turns up.  Characters introduced in Kyle’s run on GL have slowly been wiped out since Hal came back, whereas Fatality managed to hang around thanks to the John Stewart/Xanshi connection (although to be honest, that went kind’ve nowhere).   So the fact that a recurring foe from Kyle’s GL run is being used here is a great back nod to Kyle’s 10 years in the main role.

Tony Bedard’s direction for Kyle seems interesting as well, with him speaking in interviews about how he’s wanting to try and carve out a more unique role for Kyle within the franchise.  Hal is often held up as the best GL ever (as is common for whoever happens to be leading the book at the time – see The Flash and whoever is best with the Speedforce), Guy has his role as the premier troubleshooter in the GLC (and probably the main rival to Hal’s position).  How John fits into things is perhaps less distinct since his more thoughtful, introspective Mosiac-era persona has given way to his new Marine background, but the focus here is on Kyle.   And building on what Tony Bedard tried to do during War of the Green Lanterns, it seems the idea is for Kyle to be more generally adept across the emotional spectrum, rather than being an uber-GL or anything like that.  Its an interesting idea, and I’m keen to see how it works out.  Presumably we’re going to see Kyle using the other Corps rings more throughout the book.

There’s also the mystery of why all these rings are suddenly targetting Kyle.  And my guess is that this is where his relationship with Ganthet may come into play.   That background is being bigged up again, and the rings have just targetted Kyle, as the Guardians have forceably stripped Ganthet of his emotions and his personality (see my previous complaints about the Guardians being borderline villains in the franchise these days – and this act seems stunningly unforgivable even by their standards).  It would make sense to me that this is some sort of backup plan of Ganthet’s, although as to why, I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Overall, despite my burnout on the other Corps towards the end of the last volume, I think having them in their own focused book is the right idea, and I look forward to Tony Bedard hopefully starting to play more with the differences between their powers, and how their rings affect them (I loved the out-of-control Miri stuff towards the end of his GLC run).  The Kyle focus was always going to be a big win for me, and so far Tony Bedard seems to be getting on better, with a singular main character as his focus.

While I criticised Green Lantern #1 for not coming across as much of a first issue, to me Green Lantern Corps manages to toe that line well, while also not feeling like its written solely for new readers.

From the off, a (presumably) new threat is established, when a pair of Lanterns (and their prisoner) in a sector house are slaughtered by someone who is largely kept off-panel.  Aside from a distinctive green glove, all we’re really left knowing is that they seem to be impervious to the power of a Green Lantern.

From there, its very much a shift, and one that works well as a reintroduction of the main characters.  We jump back to Earth, where both Guy and John are trying, and struggling to re-establish some kind of normal life outwith the Corps.   It was a nice move, to use their public identities in different ways.  Despite his normal bluster, Guy is actually the more reserved of the two, desperately trying to play down his role as a Green Lantern just so he can land a job interview as a high school coach (a nice nod to how the character started out).  Of course, he’s swarmed by the other candidates all desperate for pictures and hounding him with questions, which provides a neat outlet for Peter Tomasi to quickly establish the basic information any new reader needs about the setup of the Corps.

Eventually, Guy gets his interview, but is forced to concede that as a Green Lantern, he’d be too much of a trouble-magnet to risk being around the school kids.  Its a real gut-punch moment as the principle (who is pretty nice about the whole thing), forces Guy to acknowledge that he just can’t have a normal job and be a public Green Lantern.  John on the other hand, is quick to use his powers in his architecture job, using his ring to display designs of the building.  He’s also the one that flies off the handle a bit more readily.  When the clients complain about his building in safety measures that aren’t in the contract he’s suddenly flying them up into the air and accusing them of bribing for planning permission.  To be honest, I’ll admit that scene played a little weird to me.  John pulled the bribery angle out of nowhere.  That aside though, I did find the differences between the characters a bit interesting.  It played Guy very much against type, but I think in a good way.

Of course, its not long before both Guy and John are summoned back to Oa, and tasked to investigate the murders that opened the issue.  To be honest, at this point the story reminded me a lot of some of the one-shot issues of Emerald Warriors we had, with Guy (and John) putting together their team of kick ass Lanterns to go take out some interstellar threat when normal sector Lanterns just won’t cut it.  Not that that’s really a bad thing in this instance though, as it allows Peter Tomasi to reintroduce some Lanterns that are, of course, familiar to long term readers.  Especially with the cast being changed around again, with the book falling back into Tomasi’s hands.

Out of all the Green Lantern books in the new 52, I have to say this was undoubtledly my favourite of the four in its first issue.  It kept things firmly grounded on its two main characters, and the trick of having them trying to settle on Earth as a way to work in a primer to the GL Corps mythos worked really well.  Peter Tomasi has long been a safe pair of hands (aside from the initial Emerald Warriors storyline not clicking into place – and now seemingly abandoned anyway in the reboot), with his GLC run at times considered the superior book to Geoff Johns’ work on the main title.

That said, the second issue wasn’t quite as successful for me.  The mysterious enemies seem to be another group, trapped on a dead world after being wronged by the Guardians and are now out for revenge.  Something we’ve seen perhaps a bit too often lately, with all the focus Atrocitous has enjoyed.  The idea of them stealing elements from other worlds to restore their own though, was an interesting angle.  Less successful for me though, was the fact that much of the issue was essentially a fight scene, as Guy and John’s group attempt to intercept them at their next target.  For me, the art, and possibly more so the colouring started to let things down a bit, as the issue descended into a sea of green that started to make each panel seem like the last.  Granted, not having that happen, when you’ve got a bunch of Green Lanterns in a fight for their lives is pretty tricky, but in this issue it just lept out at me.

That said, I still feel this is probably the strongest of the four GL books coming out of the new 52.  New Guardians may grab my attention more as things go on, but Peter Tomasi bought a heck of a lot of good will off me, with a perfectly judged first issue.  And I’m really intrigued to see how he continues to handle John and Guy.  For me, Peter Tomasi has long been the GL writer who’s come across as having the best overall handle on the different Earth Lanterns (which is not to say Geoff hasn’t given them all some great moments over the last few years), and seeing how he tackles John and Guy working as a team, a pairing that’s perhaps one of the least explored out of the Earth Lanterns, is something that greatly intrigues me.

And unfortunately on reading the book, I found little to change my mind.  This was probably my first “drop” of the books I’ve picked up in the new 52. As I feared, they’re diluting/tweaking the concept, so the influence of the rings, turning their bearers into rabid animals doesn’t seem as potent as it once was, with Atrocitus finds himself in a moral quandry after Krona’s death, as the target of his millenia-long vengeance is finally gone.  Given that the red ring is the only thing keeping him alive, I’d have thought that even if he did lose his rage, he’d end up dead as a result.   To me, having this introspective Atrocitus, eventually deciding to become and anti-hero, bringing justice to the oppressed just takes away from the Red Lanterns as a whole.   Here we have Atrocitus making cute one-liners about people hurting his cat. I also notice the redesign takes away some of his more monstrous features, making him more of a human-like alien.  In their original introduction, the Red Lanterns were nigh-unstoppable killers.  A force of nature, tearing through Sinestro Corps and Green Lanterns alike to get to Sinestro himself, with only the timely appearance of Saint Walker saving the lives of Hal, John, Kilowog and a bunch of others.  This nicely played into many of their origins, which saw them all as ordinary people, abused and tortured by life, only then to receive a ring that just enslaves them even more.  Underneath the rage, hate and killing, they all started out as tragic figures.   So having Atrocitus as some one-liner spouting bringing of justice just doesn’t seem as appealing in comparison.

So sadly, I found little to really keep me on this book.  I’ll certainly keep up on it via forums and the like to see what direction it goes in and see if I want to go back and start picking up other issues, but for now, this just isn’t for me.  I do note online that there are plenty of people that do enjoy the Red Lanterns in that anti-hero role, so I hope the book does well, but for me, its just not the direction I would’ve really liked to have seen them used in, and as I say worries me that the emotional spectrum as a concept is becoming diluted into just differently coloured Green Lanterns.  My take on this book would have probably been more of a Green Lantern entrant into the “Dark” side of the DCU.  More horror-themed tales of abusers getting their comeuppance as their victims are turned into unstoppable killers.

As a result, I did have some issues with this first issue of the relaunched Green Lantern.  Namely that it didn’t really come across as a number 1 at all. There was little real sense of it being a jumping on point, with it following on so many plot points directly from the previous run.  Given accessibility is the name of the game with this whole “new 52″ push, I felt Geoff Johns missed a bit of a trick here.  While we knew Green Lantern’s immediate continuity would be largely unaffected by the reboot, there still should’ve been more of an attempt to hook new readers with this first issue.  Instead what we got was very much issue #68 of volume 4 as if nothing had changed.

However, I’m not a new reader.  I’m an ongoing reader, and one who’s been a bit wary of Geoff’s run on this title over the last year or so.  And as an ongoing reader, this issue hit a lot of the right buttons for me.

It was not without its flaws.  Once again we have a reliance on the Guardians being unlikeable idiots spouting mysterious stuff to tease the next big event.  Frankly this is something we’ve seen far, far too often during Johns’ run on the title, and its really time to get away from it.  One day the Guardians will get some characterisation rather than just being an obstacle to be overcome by the GLs.  But not in this reboot.  It felt very much like things were having to be put into place, just so Geoff could explore Sinestro being a GL again.  There’s no real logic to the Guardians’ reasoning for letting him go, it just serves the larger plot.

With that done however, I found a lot to like about the issue.  One of my complaints for a while has been Hal Jordan’s guest star status in his own book.  And while he may not have the ring or the title anymore (or even the cover), he’s very much the star of this book, as Johns tries to reconnect us to Hal’s character, as he finds himself jobless, broke and eventually homeless.  Hal’s attempts to reconnect with Earth and Carol was nice to see, and I liked how he was mature enough to accept the desk job she was offering him (something I’m not convinced earlier incarnations of this character could’ve done).  Of course, that goes wrong and Carol eventually refuses to have anything to do with him (admittedly another example of characters acting in a way to push the plot along, but nevermind).  I liked seeing Hal stripped of everything, and the desolation when he reaches home after angering Carol, only to find he’s been evicted ontop of everything else was nicely done and a good payoff to the downward spiral Hal had been in throughout the issue.  Its very much Geoff Johns’ take on Hal.  He’s nothing without the GL ring.

On the flipside, once freed of the Guardians and his imprisonment, Sinestro’s story goes quite differently.  He heads straight back to Korugar, only to find the population suffering under the whims of the Sinestro Corps.  For some reason, the fact that leaving a big society of killers in charge of the planet being a bad idea had never occurred to Sinestro, and he’s appalled that they’ve not obeyed his orders to stay away from the citizens.

In general terms, while its all a bit forced, I am onboard for seeing how Sinestro reacts to being a Green Lantern once again though.  A recurring theme is that he’s always viewed his actions as a deliberate way to strengthen the Corps against coming threats, and he believes in the Corps, but not the Guardians (similar to Hal and any other GL worth listening to).  This is even nicely captured when he tells the Guardians he doesn’t need redemption.  He sees everything he’s done as necessary, with the ends ultimately justifying the means.

So to put him back into that role of a GL is an interesting move, and one I’m intrigued to see explored.  But how can he be seriously surprised by what’s happened on Korugar?  My concern is that Geoff’s leaning towards the yellow ring influencing him, which I hope is not the case.  Sinestro’s not a character who should be redeemed, especially after his actions in volume 4.   So I’m a little warier of this aspect of the storyline, but it does lead to the nice surprise conclusion at the end of the book, where Sinestro appears on Earth to confront Hal and offer him a chance to get his ring back.   An action that is exactly in line with Sinestro’s character.  He knows that Hal feels the same as himself with regards to the Corps and the Guardians, so in many ways, its in Sinestro’s best interests to ensure Hal gets his ring back.   Although, with the Guardians having fired him out of fear of his willpower, if Sinestro does help Hal get his ring back, I wonder if this will lead to Hal going rogue as was prophesied earlier in the run?

From the view of accessibility I wonder if it would’ve been better reducing Sinestro’s role and focusing solely on Hal’s attempts to get used to life on Earth again, only for Sinestro to then turn up at the end of the issue.  Issue 2 then could’ve been from Sinestro’s perspective and filled in the Guardians letting him go, his discovery on Korugar etc.  It would’ve kept the main story beats in tact, but reordered things slightly just to make things that bit more new-reader friendly.

I do like the current direction though, but I wish Geoff would step away from storyline building for a while. I really don’t need the Guardians being mysterious idiots for the umpteenth time since he took over as writer. Especially since they never show any development after they get blind-sided by the near-destruction of everything, again.  However while I may come across a bit negative, I definitely enjoyed this issue a lot more than anything in the New Guardians story arc.  Hal getting the much-needed focus was great, and I look forward to even more during this storyline.  The Sinestro as a GL is an interesting hook as well, along with the mystery of why he’s got a ring that can’t be removed, and while we have to assume Sinestro will eventually end up with a yellow ring once more, I’m intrigued to see how things get to that point.

Batman and Robin relaunched this week with a team I’ve been curious to see for a while.  Part of the fun of the previous series, was the role reversal by having a lighter hearted Batman, and the grim Damian Robin.   So for the first time we have Bruce and Damian operating as Batman and Robin.  I’ve always felt this was a teaming DC had skipped past for the sake of their larger story, and given its interesting father and son dynamic, its something I’ve been curious to see approached for a while now.

First off, I’ve read some complaints online about the characterisation, and I must admit I can see what they were talking about. Peter Tomasi’s Damian definitely felt a bit off. More in line with the character’s early appearances, almost ignoring the maturing we saw during his partnership with Dick. That said, I did like how Tomasi is trying to move Bruce on as a character, and play up the fact that this is a father and son team (Bruce trying to lay down the law to Damian in a way that’s clearly going to encourage rebellion struck me very much as a parenting trap).  The idea that Bruce is trying to move beyond the death of his parents, tying in nicely with him now focusing on his own son, so I really liked what Peter Tomasi was doing there.

One book that was probably the first of my nice surprises this week was Paul Cornell’s Demon Knights.  Despite finding myself a bit lukewarm to last week’s Stormwatch, I really enjoyed this much more fantasy based series.  While featuring some familiar DC characters (notably for me Jason Blood and Etrigan), the setup is for a straight sword and sorcery tale rather than any superheroics.  The way all the Arthurian stuff worked into the story appealed to the side of me that’s long been a fan of that legend, so this was a real win for me as something a bit different in my comics pile.  Definitely onboard for the next issue.

The other surprise this week was the Mr Terrific book.  Having liked the character in the JSA I thought I’d give this a try, and it’s really intrigued me with a bit of mystery surrounding the appearance of his unborn son, and the fantastical nature to Holt’s accomplishments (his lab stored in a pocket dimension, that kind of thing). The thing most likely to generate discussion though, was the appearance of Karen Starr of Starrware. No sign that she’s actually Power Girl (although the dress she wears to a reception seems like a clear nod to the character), but I wonder if they’ll keep it quiet, and then reveal her as being from Earth-2 or something later on, once JSA is established.  All in all, for a book I hadn’t been sure about, I liked the take on the character, and the fact it wasn’t afraid to be a bit outlandish with some of his inventions, almost setting him up as a DCU equivalent to Reed Richards in some ways.

Superboy I found myself a little torn on. On one hand, I found it enjoyable and got into the story it was telling. That said, the character is a complete reboot, with little to tie him to the Conner/Kon-El I was a fan of before, which makes it a little trickier to get into for me.  The fact his origin is kept familiar (minus its Death of Superman trappings), along with the Kryptonian/Human hybrid angle was reassuring though, despite the changes to the voice of the character who comes across much more alien.  I was really happy to see his telekinesis used in the book (and I suspect he’s also telepathic, something new to his powerset).  Conner’s tactile telekinesis was often ignored by later writers, so its nice to see it a key part of Superboy’s powers once again.

I did like the cute knowing wink when they were talking about his human donor.  Assuming of course, Lex Luthor isn’t going to be a red herring with this version of the character (although the clone of Superman and Lex Luthor angle is probably too strong a concept to drop).

I’m definitely intrigued to stick with this for a bit and see where its going.

The one thing though, that’s beginning to irk me about this reboot more generally though, is that I wish DC hadn’t introduced this mysterious woman who’s appearing in all the issues either.  While its a fun thing to have her popping up in all the books, and makes for a game, trying to find her, I wish this was more of a clean slate.  It automatically ties events back to Flashpoint, and is clearly laying the seeds for the next big uber-crossover.  DC has done nothing but Crisis after Crisis for years now.  And after having finally pulled the trigger on the reboot, I’d really have hoped they’d have had the confidence to let all the books bed in without preparing another big crossover already.  As I say, I’d have rather things were left as a clean slate, without risking event fatigue in the middle of possible the biggest thing DC have done since the original Crisis.

Its really no surprise that Action Comics was excellent. A Superman whose powers aren’t quite up there yet, and a nice reference to Smallville early on (at least, I have to assume it was intentional ). Its interesting to see Clark pushed more into a Green Arrow esque role here, but it works, especially with the idea that this is Superman starting out. He’s not at the level of cosmic threats yet (although Luthor’s dialogue hints towards something coming). Morrison’s on good form here, and Rags Morale’s artwork is great. I do wish artists would stop overusing the Superman with glowing red eyes thing, but that’s just a personal peeve.  To be honest, given that this is the premier Superman title, and is probably the earliest set of the superhero books in the new 52, I think they could’ve easily used this as the launch title instead of Justice League.  Really strong first issue that shows Clark as much more of a Superboy than a Superman, and also a nice showcase of Luthor.  Very interested to see how this book develops.

Batgirl, also lived up to the hype.  Its no secret I had  a lot of misgivings about the book.  Barbara’s role as Oracle had been a big part of the DCU for years, and the character of Batgirl had gone on to enjoy success first with Cassie, and then more recently with Steph.  To be honest, pre-reboot the Steph Batgirl series by Bryan Millar was one of the best books DC was putting out, so I really disliked the way it had the rug pulled out from under it.  However, then DC put Gail Simone on the book, who was possibly the only writer that could’ve convinced me to pick it up.  And Gail came through brilliantly.

Instead of being ignored or rebooted, the story nicely uses Barbara’s disability throughout the book. I did have a nagging wish for more of a bridge between this and the previous series, which is a peril of not rebooting as cleanly as Superman has – but I do find myself itching to know what happened with Steph and why Barabara’s walking – only one of those questions is likely to be answered in the near future though.

The way Gail used the fact that Barbara was new to being back out as Batgirl worked brilliantly, and her characterisation using The Killing Joke is built up to the point where Barbara freezes when a gun is pointed at her, causing her rescue of someone to go badly wrong.  Its powerful stuff, and despite really being against Barbara’s reinstatement as Batgirl, I now can’t recommend it enough.  Between this and Action Comics, DC couldn’t have asked for a better couple of books for this first proper week of the reboot.

JLI was fun, but entirely setup. Dan Jurgens definitely convinced me he can pull off this team book though after writing Booster Gold’s solo adventures for so many years, but I was quite surprised just how quickly Guy exited the title. Frankly putting him on the cover was a bit cheeky (makes me wonder if he was sticking around longer in the initial plans?). For me, it seemed to carry on the tone of the recent Generation Lost series I enjoyed, so I’m happy.   It was nice to see Booster brought in from the beginning as the team leader, and it feels like the dialogue between the team is just right to capture that lighter hearted JLI feeling.  I’m also a big fan of the friendly relationship between Booster and Batman, something that in this rebooted universe is pretty unexpected. I assume there’s a story there that’s going to be revealed at somepoint (I’m not going to be surprised if this is the original timeline Booster who went to the DCNu’s Bruce for help after finding himself stuck here – we know Bruce found out about the timeline changes from Barry).

Animal Man was a nice surprise too. Really well written and intriguing. I had been going to skip it, but I was glad I didn’t. There’s some nice balancing of the superheroics, Buddie’s domestic life, and the horror elements.

The two books that didn’t blow me away were Detective Comics (enjoyable, but didn’t feel as fresh as the other books to me – I have to wonder if not rebooting Batman and Green Lantern in a similar way is going to make them stick out in all this), and Stormwatch, which I’d expected really good things from but didn’t really grab me (And good lord, Midnighter’s new costume is bloody awful – although that’s not a complaint restricted to him in this new DCU). I have to wonder if Stormwatch was just juggling too many characters in its first issue. And the fact that part of the setup seems to hang off of a Superman issue that’s not out for a couple of weeks seems a weird decision.

So overall, as someone who wasn’t entirely convinced of the reboot, this first proper week of books did a lot to convince me.  Action Comics, Batgirl, JLI and Animal Man are all books I’m definitely going to keep picking up.

The premise is pretty straight-forward.  For the first few story lines, Justice League is set some 5 years behind the rest of the new books (barring Action Comics, which is set earlier than Justice League), and will chart the emergence of the superheroes from myth into public life.  Focusing on Green Lantern and Batman for this first issue, we see how the authorities are suspicious, if not outright hostile, in a manner all too familiar to fans of Batman.  However, this time rather than just Batman, its all superheroes that they’re gunning for.  However, over the course of the next few story arcs, as Justice League catches up to the present day, we’ll see the League forming, and the public acceptance to superheroes growing, until we reach a more familiar DCU.  Presumably.

Choosing to focus this initial issue on Green Lantern and Batman made a lot of sense to me, and while its a decision that, along with the slow burn approach, has garnered some complaints online, for me it worked.  Green Lantern and Batman are two of DC’s hottest properties at the moment (at least within comics) however, ironically it means the two heroes ushering in this new universe are the two whose continuity seems to be most intact from what we can tell.  But while the slow burn approach may be getting criticised, its one that’s proven effective in the past where you’re reintroducing characters readers will already have some degree of familiarity with (most notably in Ultimate Spider-Man).

Geoff Johns also has a lot of fun here, playing off these two characters, building on the idea of Hal being the light to Batman’s darkness that he introduced back as far as Rebirth.  Here its magnified though, along with the difference in the two personalities.  Where Bruce is shown as driven and controlled, Hal’s cockiness is played up to the Nth degree.  Hal’s got the most powerful weapon in the universe on his finger, and he’s not been afraid to let that power go to his head.  Seeing himself as that powerful, he’s arrogant in the extreme, and I found it a fun take on the character, especially with the way it played up the ring’s strength in a way that we’ve not seen in the main Green Lantern title for a while now.  I suspect Geoff’s also planning for the way he’s going to take the character in the ongoing title, having now been stripped of the ring.  We see here a Hal that’s pretty much defining himself by his power, and even pre-reboot there was a character point about how long he’d had the ring on and had cut himself off from Earth.  This characterisation just seems to reinforce the idea that Hal’s going to struggle to reinvent himself stripped of his powers.

About the only thing that didn’t really work for me, was the introduction of Vic Stone, the soon-to-be Cyborg.  His scenes stuck out an awful lot amongst all the super heroics, and while established readers have the benefit of knowing what’s going to happen to him, I still found they slowed things down a bit too much.  However, that said, I’m also still unconvinced by the big push Cyborg is getting both here and in Flashpoint.  He’s very much a B-list character, and tying him into the formation of the Justice League in this way to me stinks of something similar to how Black Canary replaced Wonder Woman in an earlier iteration of the League’s foundation.  Its  a change that stuck out and niggled fans for years, and I can’t see Cyborg being crowbarred in fairing an awful lot better.  That said, he’s not replacing any of the A-listers like Dinah did.

So all in all, I have to say I found this a strong first issue.  While not flawless, the Batman and Green Lantern pairing was a strong one to launch things with, and I enjoyed Jim Lee’s art (apart from the weird redesign of Hal’s shoulders, which changed from panel-to-panel – but then I could rant about the over-designed new costumes quite a lot more, and some weird story-telling issues with a Parademon where some panels didn’t quite work).  The promise of Superman versus Batman does leave me, as an established reader, a bit cold for next issue, as its a conflict that’s pretty much cliché, however from the perspective of enticing new readers, I think its a strong cliffhanger to leave the book on.

Overall, I have to say, I’ve been really pleased with the aftermath.  The only rough spot possibly being the split between Soranik and Kyle, however that was made worse, by the issue of GLC it happened in coming out before Aftermath #2, which played a big part in their relationship breaking down, as Kyle stepped in to stop Soranik killing Sinestro.  That said, I did really enjoy that issue for the way it tied up old plot threads relating to them, and the reappearance of Miri.  I also really enjoyed seeing her being apparently overwhelmed by the power of her Sapphire ring.  Its something we haven’t really seen before and yet we should have, since its on the far end of the spectrum, like the red rings.

Kyle’s attempt to stop the Lanterns killing Sinestro perhaps continues the trend of ignoring the history between Kyle and Sinestro (knowing that he’s the guy that engineering his mother’s death, would Kyle *really* be that eager to defend Sinestro?).  I liked how Kyle was fighting to stop the other Lanterns stooping to Sinestro’s level though, especially Soranik, and his smack down on Vath was a great moment (seriously, did these guys forget they were facing down an Honour Guard Lantern?  Kyle should be able to hold his own against the group).

John faired well in the aftermath as well.  His destruction of Mogo playing a big part of things, as he finds himself a target for his fellow Lanterns.  Kyle’s attempt to reach out to him was nice to see, and I liked the way John shot him down.  Its clear to me that John’s dealing with the guilt for what he did in his own way, and seeing this more introspective John really reminded me of the character I enjoyed reading about in the past, versus his more recent “I was a marine!” appearances.  The single issue that saw him teaming up with one of the Lanterns recruited while Krona was controlling the Corps was possibly one of my favourite issues of GLC in a while.  I suspect not having to share the issue with Kyle allowed Bedard to write a more balanced John Stewart, and its perhaps a shame we’re only getting to see this, as Bedard is finishing up his run.

The scenes with Ganthet weren’t a big part of the story, but still very nice to see.  Again, it was nice to see Bedard picking up on dangling plot threads, with Sayd’s absence being brought up which has been badly needed for a while now.  We may not know what’s happened to her, but at least she’s not been totally forgotten about.  The final cliffhanger was quite chilling, so it’ll be interesting to see what’s happened to Ganthet.  After the scenes in Aftermath 1 and 2, I can’t help but wonder if the Guardians are going to have forcibly removed his emotions.

Between the cliffhanger with Ganthet, and the short scenes with Sinestro (which confirm that the GL ring is somehow unable to be removed from his finger) there was a bit of setup for the next storyline, but thankfully it was kept at a minimum to allow Bedard to really look at the reactions of the Green Lanterns to recent events.  Something that was especially welcome given the tendancy of big events to focus more on setting up the next big thing over the last few years.