Do A Powerbomb!
Daniel Warren Johnson is one of the best artists in comics. Full stop. Not only does he bring a lot of detail to every page that he draws, but there’s an incredible energy to it all as well. Whether it’s a war-torn science fantasy civilization, heavy metal imagery invading real life, or the heroes of the DC and Marvel Universes, you can always expect a visually stunning experience when you crack open something from Johnson.
His writing, on the other hand, has never been in the same class. Works like “Extremity” and “Wonder Woman: Dead Earth” suffered from familiar plotting and characterization, and a reliance on tropes in their storytelling. “Beta Ray Bill: Argent Star” felt like the art was propping up a serviceable story. It’s only with “Murder Falcon” where the spectacle of the art fully sold what Johnson was trying to get across with his writing.
The writer/artist’s return to creator-owned storytelling with “Do A Powerbomb!” should, in theory, provide a chance for him to deliver that kind of experience again. I mean, Daniel Warren Johnson delivering an amped-up, over-the-top take on pro-wrestling sounds like it’s something that should play to his strengths, right? While this miniseries does have its moments, I regret to inform everyone that this is another case where the writer’s artistic ambitions are, once again, let down by his writing.
It doesn’t come off like that at first, though. The opening chapters are really quite entertaining as we’re introduced to wrestling legend Yua Steelrose as she prepares to take on her nemesis Cobrasun for the Tokyo Grand World Heavyweight Title. It’s an incredible match, right up until the point where a botched setup leads to Yua’s neck getting snapped and her death shortly thereafter. Worse still is that this happened while her daughter, Lona, was in the audience and it leaves the girl devastated.
Not discouraged, however. Lona idolized her mother and was determined to grow up to be a pro wrestler just like her. While we can see that she’s got the skill to be a great one, her dad has been doing his best to keep his daughter out of the industry lest she wind up like her mother. This has only strengthened Lona’s resolve, which is why she accepts the chance to get in on a tag team tournament when it comes her way.
The catch is that this tournament is sponsored by an incredibly powerful warlock who loves pro wrestling and has used his power to set up a multiversal tournament for his amusement. How did he get enough wrestlers to go in on something like this? By providing them an offer they couldn’t refuse: The chance to resurrect the loved one of their choice. Lona is obviously up for this, but she needs a partner. Fortunately the warlock, Willard Necroton, knows someone who might want to bring back Yua as much as she does: Cobrasun.
If you think that a fantasy multiverse-driven wrestling story would allow Johnson the chance to demonstrate once again why he’s one of the best artists in the industry, you’d be absolutely right! Even though the opening bout between Yua and Cobrasun is ostensibly between two normal people, it’s still a thrilling spectacle. They both come off as convincingly larger-than-life characters, whether they’re cutting promos or cutting moves in the air, which hit incredibly hard on the page. It’s easy to get get drawn in by all this, which makes the moment when he twists the knife that much harder to take.
Things get only crazier when we get to the Deathlyfe Tournament and we get to see who Lona and Cobrasun are up against. Tag teams made up of orangutangs, medieval warriors, superheroes, robots seem tailor made for the artist to go nuts with. While we don’t see them all in the ring, the ones we do have a crazy intensity to them. Even when it comes down to using extreme wrestling tactics like chains, light tubes, thumbtacks, and barbed wire-wrapped props.
Now, some of you might be asking, “Hey, if Lona and Cobrasun are just regular humans, how are they supposed to fight some of those characters in this tournament?” To which I can only say, you’re just going to have to assume that everyone is made to be equal here. I know that’s not a good explanation, but it’s the only one you’re going to get since one isn’t given in the story itself. It may sound silly to ask how tag teams made up of humans and sentient orangutangs are meant to have a fair fight, but this is the biggest instance where the story logic of “Do A Powerbomb!” falls apart when you start to think about it.
Oh, and if anyone’s wondering how Johnson deals with the issue of wrestling being “sports entertainment” in our world, but a genuine sport in this dimension, rest assured that he addresses it. By having characters bringing it up, laughing it off, and then getting on with the story. If you’re coming into this story expecting a credible explanation regarding how professional wrestlers from this Earth deal with having to wrestle “for real” then you’re not going to get it here.
The wheels don’t really come off until the final third of the story when Lona and Cobrasun get to the finals and we get a mixture of plot developments that come off as too much too soon and a couple of narrative big swings that don’t pan out. I don’t want to give too much away, but the reason our protagonists wind up having a final bout at all is due to some dumb violence that’s meant to come off as tragic, but winds up just feeling stupid instead.
Then when we get to Lona and Cobrasun’s final opponent, and… I wanted to believe in this. It’s a crazy swing of the kind that you don’t see many creators take these days and arguably thematically appropriate for the series. However, if you were having issues with how our protagonists were able to take on their opponents as regular humans, then this is going to snap whatever suspension of disbelief you had left like a brittle twig. Johnson does his best to sell it with all the spectacle he can muscle, but the whole setup felt like a bridge too far for me.
That final match really felt like something that needed to be set up better in terms of foreshadowing and power level management. In fact, I think “Do A Powerbomb!” is one of the rare series that really could’ve stood to be longer than it was (seven issues). The extra space would’ve allowed Johnson to flesh out the other characters in the series and show off some of the other fights in the tournament. I can’t be the only one who wanted to see how those robots fought. We also would’ve been able to see a major development between Lona and Cobrasun get the room it needed to breathe since it’s a major part of their relationship.
Which is one that was set up really well in the early issues. While it’s a familiar trope to see characters with bad blood between them put it aside for a higher cause, Johnson surprised me early on by adding another wrinkle to Lona and Cobrasun’s relationship. It might’ve come off like a cheap shortcut for added drama if it wasn’t for the fact that the creator offered a really good explanation for it in the issue that followed. That was when I started to think that this series could be the complete package for Johnson. The first miniseries he’s done where the writing was going to be on the same level as the art.
That didn’t happen, of course. We at least got a wrestling story that made an impressive attempt to capture the over-the-top spectacle of the sport on the printed page. It does a really good job of that, even as I have to acknowledge that the story it tries to tell just didn’t work in the end. “Murder Falcon” is still Johnson’s magnum opus and the one work of his that I’ll recommend to the general public when it comes to showing what he’s capable of. “Do A Powerbomb!” shows that his art and artistic ambition remain strong, even as his writing keeps holding them back.