DC vs. Vampires vol. 2

Humanity has lost.  Vampires now rule the Earth under their king and their superhuman army is devoted to rounding up the remaining humans to serve as their cattle.  As well as rooting out any remaining resistance, of which there is plenty.  Batgirl, Black Canary, John Constantine, Steel, Green Arrow, Jayna – the remaining Wonder Twin and more are still alive, but are also divided on the best strategy to strike back against their vampire overlords.  This leads to a three-pronged attack on their central stronghold in Gotham, their feeding cages, and their only offworld transport.  Each of which is mixed with practicality and personal vengeance that may or may not wind up getting everyone killed.

I was mixed on the first volume of this series as it was an apocalyptic set-up that didn’t really offer the kind of unusual pairings or surprises you tend to get out of these stories.  While I was hoping that this concluding volume would offer something more entertaining, that was definitely not the case in both senses.  Outside of the occasional witty line that felt like it came from co-writer Matthew Rosenberg or inspired setpiece, vol. 2 of this series has very few surprises to offer.  Everyone goes about their given job in a straightforward fashion that doesn’t offer much excitement or have anything new to say about the characters involved.

Now, when I said “both senses” that also refers to vol. 2 being a concluding volume.  Originally solicited as a twelve-issue maxiseries, “DC vs. Vampires” was apparently successful enough to warrant a follow-up maxiseries “World War Blood.”  I don’t know if this caused writers James Tynion IV and Rosenberg to re-tool their originally planned ending to take advantage of this, but the one we get here offers up zero sense of closure as it trumpets its new status quo.  Which, in addition to putting a stake in my interest for this franchise going forward, makes it easy to decide that both volumes of this series now have a spot in my “To Sell” pile.