Sometimes Ares on your side isn’t a good thing.
Creative Staff:
Story: Tom Taylor
Art: Trevor Hairsine
Colors: Rain Beredo
Letterer: Saida Temofonte
What They Say:
Nothing is what the heroes of Earth thought it was. The shocking truth is finally revealed and the fate of all of existence hangs in the balance. Lobo joins the fight, but will the main man help or hinder the greatest heroes in the universe as they gather to fight the galactic armada of the undead?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
DCeased continues to be a property that just delivers in spades for me in ways of seeing characters not re-imagined but actually progressing forward and showing how they’d cope and deal with issues. Every time I think Tom Taylor is done with this story he ends up doing a bit more and I fall in love all over again This installment of the franchise is moving things forward to what happens after the cure and where things have gone elsewhere in the galaxy as that opens up its own special fun. The series has Trevor Hairsine handling the pencils on it with a great team behind him inking and coloring it so that it shows a real richness in design and layouts and captures both the power of the events and the humanity of it as well.
The buildup to the big and final conflagration is coming along well and the series is doing some good stuff in spending time along unexpected areas. The opening to this issue does some great stuff as Alfred copes with his killing of several of his sons during the original infection as it haunts him. Leslie is doing his best to help him with his grief as both his girlfriend and his doctor but he struggles with a long pent-up rage that exists in him. We get a lot of great character material in a small space and a lot of fun when Damian walks in on them together as well. But we also have Damian managing Alfred well as Alfred wants to join in on the fight and use his rage and to try and do right by those he lost. Damian’s a tricky character but Taylor continues to nail him in this older form really well so that it doesn’t feel inauthentic as he manages to convince Alfred that he’s been pivotal in so much already.
Beyond that, we get a good sequence showing the Almercian people being evacuated from their homeworld while their leaders stay to fight the oncoming Anti-Life folks with the former Forever People and the like. It’s a good battle and fight sequence and one that shows just how brutal Darkseid is now that he’s powered up with the Yellow Lantern ring. All of this happens while a lot of forces are gathering with the Guardians on Oa where they’re making a plan to deal with it. The Guardians being who they are, they’re intent on isolating and wiping away everything on those worlds, which doesn’t sit well with those from Earth, of course. It’s weird because nobody says that the cure that Earth has will definitely work on other species, but there’s no attempt either. The Guardians just see it as an existential threat to be wiped out and they’re going big, which sparks quite the fight thanks to Ares giving it a nudge. It’s not unexpected to see hero fight hero though cause sometimes comics gotta comic.
In Summary:
While I’m not thrilled with the Oa side of things because it’s just too predictable in a lot of ways, there are some good moments and Guy gets to have one of the best callback lines out there. The book does some great stuff with Alfred and Leslie and I liked a lot of what we got with the Almercian side of things even though I’ve got barely any memory of these characters since I haven’t seen them in years. It all ties together well while the larger violence is unfolding across the galaxy is great and seeing where the urgency is. As well as where the compassion lies and whether you can have that or night when existence is stake.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: DC Comics
Release Date: November 15th, 2022
MSRP: $3.99
