CD Giveaway - Sam Shrieve, "Bittersweet Lullabies"
Ends Nov 29, 2009
The current student at Berklee College of Music has a rock 'n' roll pedigree, but delivers a pleasing and diverse collection of soft pop on his debut record. Enter our contest for your chance to win!
The Twilight Saga: New Moon Prize Pack
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I've been a fan of Gail Simone's writing for a long time. Not as long as some, but a long time nonetheless. And thus I've committed to giving any new project with her name on it a try.
The Doctor Polaris storyline wrapping up in this issue of Action Comics intrigues me, but doesn't impress me, and I really can't put my finger on why.
To sum up, there's a new Mistress of Magnetism in the DC Universe, a Bettie Page lookalike who has been hunting down other magnetic powered metahumans. Her latest and last target is Doctor Polaris, up until this point the most powerful magnetic villain. But he's nothing as compared to Repulse.
In fact... Repulse is nothing when compared to Repulse.
Text: The man being slowly crushed to death is Dr. Polaris, one of the most powerful villains on Earth. He'd recently been cured of a severe case of Multiple Personality Disorder... Text: ...apparently it didn't stick. Repulse: I'm thinking of a number of severed limbs between one and four. Text: Because his delusions are back, with a vengeance. He's created another identity, one only he can see... a woman this time. Calls her Repulse. Repulse: You really are a durable sort, doodlebug. Text: And she wants the real identity, Polaris, dead.
So we have someone immensely powerful, whose now discovered he's even more powerful, but only if he acts through a transgendered projection of his subconscious. That's pretty tricky stuff for a Superman title.
Subplots! Getcher subplots, here! While Supes is fighting Polaris and his delusion, Lois is busy making friends with a congressman. And nothing says "Let's be friends" like confronting a man the day he's opening a youth center with questions about misappropriating the funds collected to build said center. What, you didn't have any pictures of him with farm animals to pass around while you were at it? Of course, it's just the kind of drama that Lois loves to stir up, and thus completely in character.
When a villain comes to help, do you tell him no?
I think the part that makes this issue a little clunky for me is that it has two endings. We end the fight scene with Superman forced to choose between saving a collapsing bridge (with obligatory victims stuck on it) or pursuing Doctor Polaris, now in the "protective custody" of Society members Zoom and Black Adam. Supes naturally saves the bridge, allowing Doctor Polaris to begin making appearances in Simone's Villains United miniseries. In an interesting understanding of character, Simone has Black Adam actually return to the scene of the save, with one thing in mind--helping Superman save the bridge.
But after all that, we get a few final pages reuniting Superman and Lois (not Clark and Lois) to talk about their respective days and the trouble they're both into. Expanded, it might have been okay, but it just seemed to be stuck in there to say, "Oh yes, I remember they're married. See, they're interacting."
I've also got to say I'm liking the artwork here. Perhaps it's Nelson's inking, perhaps it's Guy Major's colors, or perhaps Byrne does a better job on panels when he doesn't have to divide his time between pencils and scripting. Whatever it is, I'm digging on it. Bring more, please.
Recommendation: It's an unlabelled "Villains United" crossover. Buy one first, then tell your friends.
In stores Wednesday, June 08, 2005.
Advance comics are provided courtesy of The Comic Book Store of Little Rock. Michael Tierney, proprietor, even has his own book out, Wild Stars. Check it out.
