DC Solicitation Sneaks: June 2021
Above-the-Board Recommendation:
The Nice House on the Lake #1 (of 12)
You know that friend you have who’s just a little bit annoying, but not annoying enough to stop being friends with? Walter is “that friend” in this series and he has just come through for his friends big time. He’s invited all of his friends to his gorgeous lake house for everyone to hang out, reconnect, and recuperate after the hardest of years. It sounds like a can’t-miss opportunity for everyone involved. If only the thought of spending time in an enclosed place with “that friend” didn’t start setting off alarm bells for anyone reading the solicitation text. Or that it’s coming from writer James Tynion IV, whose horror title “Something is Killing the Children” is name-checked here and his “Detective Comics” collaborator Alvaro Martinez.
I’m not recommending this maxiseries because I’m expecting it to be good. Tynion has yet to really wow me with his creator-owned work; though, the 12-issue length suggests that at least the pace will be less glacial here than it is in “Killing.” No, I’m recommending it because it should not exist here at all. “House” is a new creator-owned title published by DC under their Black Label imprint. This is something they haven’t done yet with the label and it’s the first creator-owned work I’ve seen come out of DC since Joe Hill’s short-lived “Hill House” imprint over a year ago. It’s either a massive flex by Tynion in the wake of his success with “Batman” or an experiment on DC’s part to see if selling a new comic by one of their hottest writers is commercially viable.
Whatever the case is, I’d like to see it succeed regardless of how good it actually turns out to be. DC’s future has looked increasingly corporate as of late, and I’m surprised that it’s publishing this series at all. If it does succeed, then it can only mean that more will follow. That’s the logical route, at least.
Batman/Fortnite: Zero Point #3 (of 6): That there’s going to be a comic book where Batman winds up on the Fortnite island doesn’t surprise me. “Fortnite” has been doing lots of crossovers with characters from other media and putting Batman on the island in the comic seems like a safe way to print money to me. The reason I’m spotlighting the third issue of this miniseries is because it features something I didn’t see coming: Batman fighting Snake Eyes on the island. That’s right, Snake Eyes from “G.I. Joe.” It’s the crossover that nobody saw coming, but still managed to make fanboys of a certain age go, “AW HELL YEAH!” Not me, unfortunately. While my love of “Batman” is eternal, any active “G.I. Joe” fandom I had went out with the 80’s. Still, if Epic Games wants to keep using “Fortnite” as a way to broker unexpected crossovers like this, I’m all for it. I’m sure they’ll find one that I can’t resist if they keep it up.
Infinite Frontier #1 (of 6): So it turns out that the “zero” issue wasn’t just an introductory point for the DCU post-”Death Metal” and “Future State.” It was also a setup for the company’s next event series which will spotlight the multiversal superhero team known as Justice Incarnate, featuring President Superman, Calvin Harris. It’ll be up to him and his team to sort out the chaos left over from these events and find out where the DCU stands in this new Multivers. Maybe even tease what Darkseid is up to as part of the buildup to re-establish him as the DCU’s Big Bad. Xermanico is providing the art, which is good as his work on “Green Lantern: Blackstars” was pretty great. Josh Williamson will be writing and outside of “Birthright,” he hasn’t really done anything that has impressed me. While this series is clearly going to be important to the overall narrative of the DCU, I think I’ll be giving it a pass for now.
Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow #1 (of 8): Just when you’re prepared to go, “Oh, another maxiseries from Tom King,” the writer throws a curveball and says, “Gotcha! This one is only eight issues!” Which is apparently all the space he needs to tell a story of Kara Zor-El working with a young girl who wants vengeance on the people who destroyed her world. Revenge is a tricky business even when one side looks completely justified in seeking it. While I’ve got plenty of time for King (when he’s not pillaging the corpse of “Watchmen”) this tackling of moral issues in space reminds me of “The Omega Men,” a sci-fi epic he wrote that other people love and I didn’t much care for. Maybe the two-protagonist setup will allow the writer to give us a different kind of space opera. I can at least say with confidence that we’ll be getting a better-looking one because “The Dreaming’s” Bilquis Evely will be providing the art.
Batman: Reptilian #1: When you’ve made it clear that you hate superheroes, coming back to write them doesn’t come off as a power move. It comes off as a sign of weakness. That’s because after years of reading comics from Garth Ennis, I can’t believe that he has always wanted to write a story where Batman and Killer Croc team up to stalk a new threat that’s terrorizing Gotham City. The vibe of the solicitation text and the preview art suggests that we’re not getting the kind of ridiculous Batman that the writer likes to write. Which means that if someone pukes on his shoes here, it’s going to be a sign that the stakes are being raised, not a sign for the reader to laugh. As a result, we’re likely getting the kind of “Competent at Least” work Ennis delivers when he’s clearly not invested in the material. However, Liam Sharp is providing the fully-painted artwork and it does look incredible. Even if the story is just “meh,” Sharp is looking to do all he can to elevate the experience.
Batman: The Adventures Continue — Season Two #1: Paul Dini, Alan Burnett, and Ty Templeton’s comic revival of “Batman: The Animated Series” comes back for another round. Seeing it here reminded me that I need to pick up the collection of the first “season,” and then found out that it’s not coming out until May. Well, seeing this here is just more incentive to pick up that volume when it arrives.
Event Leviathan: Checkmate #1: This was supposed to come out last year, but, you know. Covid. It may have taken a while, but Bendis and Alex Maleev are giving us the follow-up to their “Event” *rimshot* series from over a year ago. If you’ll recall, I was more impressed with the buildup to it than the event itself. It just a lot of tension building and red herrings regarding the question of “Who is Leviathan?” that the creators tried their damndest to stretch out over six issues. Then, when we finally got the answer to that question in the final issue, I had no idea who it was because Paul “Manhunter” Kirk was a character from a cult series of backup stories done by Archie Goodwin and Walt Simonson back in the 70’s. Now he’s been outed as the leader of Leviathan and hopefully we’ll get some answers as to why he’s trying to remake the DCU on his own terms. Standing against him is the reformed spy organization known as Checkmate, made up of Lois Lane, The Question, Robin, Steve Trevor, Kate “Manhunter” Spencer, Bones, and Talia Al Ghul. All of whom did a great job of being stumped by Leviathan at every turn until the penultimate issue. Yeah, I think Mr. Kirk has this in the bag.
Wonder Woman: Black & Gold #1 (of 6): Not one to be left out of the color-coded anthology trend, Wonder Woman gets her own. Not much to say about this beyond that. Though, the fact that John Arcudi & Ryan Sook, and Becky Cloonan are among the creators listed for this issue does pique my interest.
DCeased: Unkillables: In case you were waiting for the paperback edition of this miniseries that was better than the series it was spun off from, your wait is over!
Sweet Tooth Compendium: Collecting all forty issues of the series that helped put Jeff Lemire on the map. It’s a post-apocalyptic story about a young human/deer hybrid boy who crosses paths with a bitter old mercenary named Jeppard, and the organization of scientists that are looking to use the boy to further their own ends. My thoughts on it at the time were that it was a familiar tale which overcame its shortcomings through some quality artistic execution. Years later and I’m pretty much done with the writer. What I’m trying to say here is that I think it’s time for a re-read of this series to see if it has held up better than my opinion of the writer has.
The Green Lantern: Season Two vol. 2 HC: Now here’s a series that I was expecting great things from and wound up with only… okay things. Grant Morrison has a fervid, fecund imagination and he has usually been able to tame it by tying his out-there sci-fi concepts to relatable human concerns. In the case of “The Green Lantern,” it often feels like the amount of ideas he’s throwing at the reader are crowding out any meaningful characterization. This is the final volume, and I figure I should see his run through in this format. Then re-read it to see if this craziness reads any better front-to-back.