First contact!
Creative Staff:
Story: Brian Michael Bendis
Art: Ryan Sook, Jay Fabok, Wade Von Grawbadger
Colors: Alex Sinclair
Letterer: Cory Petit
What They Say:
The merciless killer and zealot calling himself Rogol Zaar has searched the cosmos for Superman-and when he reaches the Fortress of Solitude, his actions will cut Superman to the core.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The first two issues of this series were interesting reads as I got reacquainted with what Superman is like currently as I’ve spent most of my time with fringe DC books for the last few years. Most of my exposure has been through the animated films that have been fun and prior to that my “one true love” Superman was from the Byrne post-Crisis relaunch and all. Bendis had a lot of different things in motion, which made some of it feel cluttered, but this one is much smoother with its narrative and narration. It also has a more consistent feeling even with three artists working on it but part of that comes from simply having just the one main storyline playing out for practically the whole issue instead of cutting to different things.
While we get a one-page nod to events with Lois and Jon, the main focus here is on Superman himself. The opening pages are strong as we see Rogol Zaar arriving on Earth like a missile and plowing through the Fortress of Solitude. It’s a brutal moment with what gets destroyed and I love the wider shots for much of it just to add to the scale and the isolation of it all, which to me just makes it all the more malicious. When Superman hears the alarm for this and heads off it’s something that cuts deep for him even while just understanding that they’re things. But it’s important because there are so few things of Krypton left and he views himself as a kind of guardian for them, and not just for them but for Kara as well. It’s a sequence that reveals a lot about Superman when it comes to his heritage and its importance but also good reminders of Pa Kent and just how human Superman is.
With the hunt on for whoever did this, as Rogol is largely absent beyond this, I really liked that Kara shows up to help deal with it and some of the ideas of what it could be, which are amusingly standard comic book goofiness. But Superman understands the seriousness of this, as does Kara, but he sets her to protecting her loved ones before reconnecting on the hunt, which takes him to Metropolis. All of this follows up some good stuff early on in regards to the arsons that are being investigated as we see more of Superman dealing with the new firefighter we met the last time around but also the inclusion of Batman coming in for some help. It’s not exactly “light” material but there’s some good humor in the mix of it that delights and it ties well into giving Superman an outside connection at the end of this issue in case things go south.
In Summary:
While I enjoyed Man of Steel so far it was this issue where I really liked what I was reading. Stripping away all the other stuff and focusing on just one of the stories helped a whole lot, making Superman’s narration a lot smoother and the flow of events a whole lot more engaging without being tossed between multiple stories and personas. It also doesn’t hurt that I think this it the best looking of the run so far with a lot of it owed to the color work since we get so many blues with the Fortress sequence and such a bright looking Metropolis. There’s a lot of detail, some great perspectives, and some strong character design work that it just left me lingering on the pages more, which got me to re-read the narration more. Here’s hoping the back half can provide enough payoff.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: DC Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: June 13th, 2018
MSRP: $3.99
