Abuse him when you don’t need him, plead for him to help when you do.
Creative Staff
Story: Grant Morrison, Sholly Fisch
Art: Rags Morales, Brad Walker
What They Say:
Is your mind prepared for an encounter with the deadly Terminauts? What awful master do they serve? What horrible fate awaits Superman and the city of Metropolis? The true scope of Grant Morrison and Rags Morales’ ACTION COMICS run begins to come into view, so get those sunglasses ready, ’cause it is gonna be blinding!
And in a backup story from writer Joshua Hale Fialkov and artist Matt Camp that spins out of ACTION COMICS #2, John Henry Irons takes his first steps toward becoming the hero known as Steel!
The Review:
The early days of Superman are definitely full of challenges, especially when you have a populace that changes their feelings about you on the turn of a dime. While there is the belief, rightly so in some cases, that bad things will gravitate to Metropolis because of Superman’s presence, it’s also true that bad things will hit there no matter what. And on a bigger scale as well as we see from the start of this issue as the alien presence has launched its Terminauts on the world in order to collect priceless valuables and other important artifacts. And it’s using our own things against us by having the robots self-manufacture at auto and other manufacturing plants around the world. So while the focus is squarely on Metropolis, we do get to realize that this is a very big problem. And one that has a good number of Metropolis’ citizens begging for Superman to come and help them. Some do continue to blame him though, which is amusing when he does show up on the scene amidst the terror and the cops try to cuff him.
The bulk of this book is focused on the action as we get superman getting into the struggle and pushing back against the Terminauts. It’s pretty small scale action for the most part, but it works well to see him doing the hand to hand stuff. Where it turns a bit more difficult is when John Corben gets involved as he’s been overtaken by the alien and is being used to seek out the one that it wants the most. The more personal side of it works well as you have Lois trying to reason with John even as he struggles with what’s going on inside of him, showing that you can push back some but that the alien presence is simply stronger. It also brings in a bit of an interesting character that I hope to see more of in John Henry Irons, as he was the one behind development of the suit that Corben’s wearing which has been manipulated now. He kind of goes over the top quickly with what he’s wearing himself and especially the sledgehammer, but it’s just how the character has been identified for so long that it’s not a surprise. Irons brings a bit more to the book to be sure, especially as his contribution here leads directly into the backup feature.
That backup, which runs for eight pages, is a bit of background on Irons himself to show how he ties into things a bit more, but mostly the narration deals with his name and personal history. The explanation about his name, the issues with it as a kid and how he came to appreciate it is certainly decent for the time spent here, and it plays out at the same time that we see the extended part of his fight against Corben. Rather than dominating the main story with a back and forth piece between the two, shifting it here works rather well so that we get the fight if we wanted to really get into it and the main book itself kept its pacing and focus on Superman. Considering the times that the main character in a book gets sidelined for awhile by other stuff, especially in an expansive family of characters like Superman has, seeing it treated this way is definitely a plus.
Release Notes:
This comiXology edition of Action Comics comes with the main cover as released with the print edition and the Mike Choi alternate cover as well as the pencil sketch version of the main cover.
In Summary:
Action Comics doesn’t have much in the way of meat here, but it does tantalize a bit more. Luthor’s reactions to how the alien is going against what he agreed to with it is amusing, but all it does is reinforce in his mind that aliens are bad and not to be trusted. The use of Corben and Irons helps to build the supporting cast from the start of Superman’s career rather than later additions and we get to see how Lois is handling some of these changes in a personal way. The Terminauts are kind of all right overall, but I do like that it’s working its magic fairly well when it comes to the capture and acquisition of artifacts and other things since it’s classic Braniac overall, just with some mild tweaks. I’m still expecting a twist or two along the way, but this issue delivers decently with what it wants to do, it just doesn’t completely captivate or draw you in totally.
Grade: B
Readers Rating: [ratings]