Sunday, December 11, 2011

DCnU Capsule Reviews, Week 13

This will be my final month reviewing all of the DCnU titles, so let's get cracking:

Action Comics #4: Things were going well until 'this fight continued in the back-up feature' (weird, but whatever), then 'this story continued in issue #7' (huh?!). That's some sloppy editorial management there. Rating: 3 (of 5).

Animal Man #4: The stuff with Buddy and Maxine in The Red is moving a bit too slowly, but there's a nice two-page center spread by Foreman, and Socks is awesome. Rating: 3 (of 5).

Batwing #4: The Guest art by ChrisCross makes for a clearer story experience; as for that matter does the flashback to Batwing's days as a child soldier. Rating: 2.5 (of 5).

Detective Comics #4: So is Bruce Wayne going to have a different girlfriend in every Batman comic? (I actually kind of like the idea...) Batman's confrontation with The Dollmaker isn't terribly special. Rating: 2.5 (of 5).

Green Arrow #4: Even with the change in writers, this continues to be quite generic. Rating: 2 (of 5).

Hawk & Dove #4: A five page story crammed into twenty pages. Rating: 2 (of 5).

Justice League International #4: The old-school super-hero team action continues. The color palate is a shade too dark for a Justice League comic, but not distractingly so. Rating: 3 (of 5).

Men of War #4: When your big last page reveal/cliffhanger leaves the reader going 'huh?', that's not a good sign. Rating: 1.5 (of 5).

O.M.A.C. #4: I continue to enjoy the heck out of this loud, kinda-dumb comic (which I think is a bit smarter than it appears). A continued shout-out to the colors from Hi-Fi, which help the art's Giffen/Kirby blend pop off the page. Rating: 3 (of 5).

Red Lanterns #4: The brief two-page origin flashback of Ratchet offers a frustrating glimpse at how this could be a good comic, if the rest of it wasn't full of dumb posturing and shouting and not much happening. Rating: 2 (of 5).

Static Shock #4: Every so often a glimpse of Rozum's writing style shows through, but mostly this is starting to test my affection for the character. Rating: 2.5 (of 5).

Stormwatch #4: A big, explosive Stormwatch-stye confrontation with the Creature from The Moon. Rating: 3 (of 5).

Swamp Thing #4: Fill-in artist Marco Rudy doesn't miss a beat, and turns in a few really stellar pages; particularly page sixteen, with Abby and Alec lying next to each other on the bisected page. Also, it's interesting that the views of The Rot offered here and in Animal Man don't exactly match-up, no doubt due to the different viewpoint of the messengers. Rating: 3.5 (of 5).

Ratings compared to the third issues: 3 improved; 9 stayed the same; 1 was worse.

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