Her Greatest Battle Yet

     Rise of the Olympian has been an odd story thus far, but it seems that the latest Wonder Woman arc is finally coming into focus.  The true antagonist of the whole arc is finally revealed to be Ares, who was behind the creation of Genocide and the manipulation of Zeus into creating the Gargareans.  He is also now courting Alkyone, former leader of Hippolyta’s personal guard and current Wonder Woman antagonist.  It’s all pretty nuts.  Etta Candy is in pretty bad shape, and Nemesis forgets to tie up the back of his hospital gown.  Then, we finally get a fight between Wonder Woman and Achilles, which is pretty cool.  Achilles is a dangerous opponent, every bit as good as she is.

     To be honest, this should have been split up into two arcs.  Or maybe the plot points should have been scattered across a series of arcs eventually leading to the actual Rise of the Olympian.  Fighting Genocide and Achilles in one arc is going to be really hard for Wonder Woman.  The latter is also substatinally more interesting than the former, whose origin is finally revealed in this issue.  But the whole Ares manipulation thing is really cool, and I can’t wait to see how this plays out.  Bernard Chang takes over on art for this issue, and he’s another great artist for this series.  I particularly like his depiction of Achilles.  Gail Simone has had some great ideas for Wonder Woman, but they’ve suffered from poor pacing more than anything else.  Otherwise, she might be one of the best writers this book has ever seen.

Plot: 9.3      Art: 9.2      Dialogue: 9.3      Overall: 9.3

Beginning to Take Shape

     I would have preferred to have a bigger picture, but for some reason, nobody likes this cover.  Anyway, the new Justice League of America is taking shape.  Right now, it’s rather small.  The official members are only Green Lantern (John Stewart), Dr. Light, Zatanna, Vixen, and Firestorm.  Not exactly a gigantic team here.  There’s also the lingering problem of Shadow Thief and his mighty master, Starbreaker, looming over the horizon.  And that problem gets addressed here.  Starbreaker is back in a big way, and unlike his debut, he doesn’t have the almighty JLA to stop him.  Just this group of misfits.  Dr. Light and Firestorm can’t walk an inch without arguing, which, even though it’s really amusing, doesn’t bode well for the team.  Then there’s the whole technical fact that Black Canary disbanded the team.  Like that’s going to last.

     With Dwayne McDuffie FINALLY getting to use some of his hand-picked members for the team, his trademark dialogue is really shining out.  It’s the same wit that he used with Justice League Unlimited, and it shows.  Dialogue-wise, this is one of the best comics in the business.  With Ed Benes gone, it doesn’t look like we’ll be having a consistent artist for a while.  I liked Shane Davis, and I like Rags Morales.  Both of them really fit the tone of JLA.  But I just hope one of them stays for longer than one or two issues.  At any rate, this series will finally start going in an original direction that isn’t dictated by editorial mandate and event series for the first time in a big way since the Brad Meltzer run.  The JLA may not be the Grant Morrison, god-like team, but it’s going to be good.

Plot: 8.7      Art: 8.8      Dialogue: 9.0      Overall: 8.8

A Bad Crossover

     When the Deathtrap crossover, linking Teen Titans, Titans, and Vigilante, was announced, I was less than enthusiastic.  The Teen Titans have been this poorly written in years, and the whole idea smelled of bad planning and mediocre characterization.  However, since I will be reading the Teen Titans for as long as possible, I bought these issues.  And boy, what crap they spewed.  Jericho is trying to kill people because the voices in his head tell him to.  The idea is that all his body-hopping has left all these negative mental influences on him, including the voice of his father, Deathstroke.  Now, he’s already tried to kill both the Teen Titans and the Titans, but this time, he’s “going to make it stick.”  Or something like that.  And Vigilante’s there just because Marv Wolfman wants to right the Teen Titans again.

     Sean McKeever handles both the Teen Titans and the Titans, and Marv Wolfman handles Vigilante.  Now, you can definitely tell a difference in writing style when Wolfman takes over.  He has a better handle on the Titans than Sean McKeever, and he makes Vigilante seem like more than just some schmuck with guns.  Sean McKeever, however, brings his bizarre characterization of basically everyone, minus Ravager, to the table.  And he has Blue Beetle use some euphemism that I’ve never even heard of.  I don’t mean that I’m the guru on euphemisms, but a writer should try and make his dialogue understandable.  The plot is idiotic, as thus far, it has consisted of Jericho’s various attacks, the Titans trying to lure in Vigilante, and the Teen Titans getting blown out of the sky.  That’s it.

     As I said, Ravager’s characterization is good.  Thus far.  But most characters sound like one-dimensional caricatures of themselves.  And the artists can’t even keep Red Devil’s costume or the T-Bird visually consistent.  Same with the hair colors of certain characters, especially Red Arrow.  That’s pretty sad.  Angel Unzueta’s work is just plain ugly, especially with Beast Boy, Tom Lyle’s is passingly decent, and Joe Bennett’s is naturally quite good.  But even the writing is more consistent than the art.  And by that, I mean that it’s pretty consistently bad.  Why is Jericho torturing that one guy in the Teen Titans issue?  No particular reason.  Sean McKeever just wants to try and drill it into our heads that this former Teen Titan is evil again.  If you don’t already read one of these comics, skip this.  And if this turns you off from Teen Titans, there is hope.  Sean McKeever only has one more issue.

Plot: 3.4      Art: 7.7      Dialogue: 651      Overall: 4.8