Welcome, friends to another installment of “The 3cap,” our weekly recap of DC’s three weekly titles: “Batman Eternal,” “Earth 2: World’s End,” and “New 52: Futures End.” Each week, we will take a look at the each issue released, while recapping the action and asking the burning questions. If you spot something we missed, make sure to leave a note in the comments!
Batman Eternal #48
Written by Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, and Kyle Higgins
Illustrated by Fernando Blaco
Reviewed by Zach Wilkerson
News, notes, and debuts:
Issue #48 is a daily by the number issue of “Batman Eternal,” with the issue’s main twists and turns centering on James Gordon and Oswald Cobblepot. The mysterious powers that be have orchestrated yet another riot at Blackgate (is anyone at home keeping a tally?) with the intent of pairing Penguin and Gordon for some unknown purpose.
Meanwhile, another party fights for Gordon’s freedom; Jason Bard. Bard meets with Mayor Hady pleading, then threatening for Gordon’s release. The character has been on a sort of redemption arc for some time, but as we see here he’s still far from being Gotham’s White Knight.
Picking up from Hush’s release and subsequent seizing of the Batcave, we find that things aren’t going so well for the Bat-family. With Hush in the control seat, the Bats and Birds are forced to fight against not only Batman’s rogues, but their own equipment. Things take an ill turn for Stephanie Brown as well after an unexpected reunion with her father. It seems that Gotham’s best hope now lies in Julia Pennyworth, stranded outside the forsaken city.
Three Eternal Questions:
1. Is Signal Man a villain to watch?
Before she is abducted (once again) by her father, Spoiler seems to indicate that Signal Man plays a special significance in the conspiracy. Vicki Vale’s reaction is one of incredulity, and you can hardly blame her. The character has gotten a bit of a push lately, playing a part in “Forever Evil.” Earlier issues of “Batman Eternal” (issue #40, I believe) have also hinted that there’s more to Signal Man than meets the eye. However, forgiving me for thinking that the idea of Signal Man as the big bad is very…underwhelming.
2. Who freed Hush…?
This issue has Hush parading around the Batcave, but his mysterious savior is nowhere to be found. Is he/she still lurking around the cave as well, or did he high tail it and leave? Perhaps he/she had other business to attend to, such as…
3. …and is it the same person pulling the Penguin’s strings?
Another mysterious benefactor prepares to strike a deal with Penguin, offering to return Penguin to power in return for taking care of Gordon. Now, there’s reason behind my choice of words here as we don’t know whether Penguin’s intent is beneficent or malicious. The issue certainly seems to imply that Penguin and his gang intend to finish off Gordon once and for all, but that could just be cliffhanger bait. An interesting twist would be that Penguin has been tasked with rescuing Gordon.
Earth 2: World’s End #22
Written by Daniel H. Wilson, Marguerite Bennett, Mike Johnson & Cullen Bunn
Illustrated by Tyler Kirkham, Eduardo Pansica, Marc Deering, Jack Herbert, Vicente Cifuentes, Jorge Jimenez, Robson Rocha, and Guillermo Ortega
Reviewed by Vince Ostrowski
News, Notes, and Debuts:
– This has become another one of those cape comics where characters seem to appear into scenes when they’re needed, as if out of nowhere. “Earth 2: World’s End” is by far the most straightforward of the DC weeklies, but it also feels the most disjointed, because few of the sequences of events or encounters feel organic. Moreover, they aren’t saying anything about the characters, which makes this as mindless an event as DC has going on right now. My mother always told me I should pair negative opinions with positive ones, so I will say that I think the writers really took care to get the pacifistic Val-Zod right as a character. And the friendship of Helena and Kara works really well too, but that’s one that brings a lot of historical development with it already. Aside from these aspects, there the actions and motivations of the players are not character defining. Dick Grayson’s role, for example, is rather thin and doesn’t say much about his personality, yet his story has taken up an awful lot of the series. For a character that is as rich as a former Robin can get, his appearance here still continues to baffle me in the grand scheme of things.
Continued below– As disjointed as the story feels to me, I am happy to report that I still cannot say the same about the art. The art, hodgepodge of DC’s talent pool that it is, is pretty strong across the board and doesn’t distract, even as the styles change. It’s a far better mix than “Futures End” has been, where the art can vary wildly from week to week – even between different issues from the same artist.
– A quick rundown of the plot goings-ons: Alan Scott slowly comes to terms with his new role as Earth 2’s Captain Planet. New New God Jimmy Olsen spoils Barda and Kalibak’s killing spree. Terry Sloan revealed himself to be a magnificent bastard in a terrible costume. And Val-Zod and the gang showed up just in time to watch the Earth get enveloped by the forces of Apokolips. Oops.
Three Worldly Questions:
1. Is New God Jimmy Olsen more than a diversion?
Jimmy Olsen makes something of a triumphant appearance on the battlefield in this issue, but is pretty quickly put to the turf. Not before Barda and Kalibak come to realize that he now possesses the power of a New God. This sounds like something that could potentially change the landscape of Earth-2 going forward – or be completely wiped out in quick, unceremonious fashion by a retcon at the end of “World’s End.” I must admit, I’d be far more invested in Earth-2 going forward, were this potential plot point to stick. As of right now, “World’s End” has done more to lose me, than it has to gain me as a consistent Earth-2 reader.
2. What does Mister Terrific Michael Holt have up his ‘Fair Play’ tattooed sleeves?
Another thing that the DC3 has been waiting to see is if Mister Terrific would actually be heroic for once. Through this comic, and “Future’s End” as well, Holt has been depicted somewhat inconsistently. He’s regarded as a public hero in “Future’s End”, but has done little, at least on the page, to inspire any such praise in any of these comics. “World’s End” #22 set the table for him to finally show off his heroism a bit. Will he one up Terry Sloane?
3. What happened to Dick Grayson’s son?
A good rule of thumb in comics has always been “if there’s no body, they’re not really dead.” And in “World’s End” #22, all we got was a dangling shoe. Maybe DC thought it would be too gruesome to show the death of a young child. *considers “Identity Crisis”, “Death in the Family”, and “Cry for Justice”/”Rise of Arsenal”*
Okay, so that’s not it. But I’m of two minds about the danger Dick Grayson’s son has been put in. On the one hand, killing off his kid gives him the proper motivation to become a vigilante hero (or villain?), which is totally conjecture on my part, but also one of the only logical reasons I can think of with regards to why we’ve been following his story for so long. On the other hand, I kind of liked thinking of the Dick Grayson of Earth-2 just being a superheroically ineffectual normal guy that has to deal with the consequences of his wife being a hero. One thing is for sure – they need to get to the point with his character, because we’ve invested a lot of time in him already.
The New 52: Futures End #44
Written by Brian Azzarello, Keith Giffen, Dan Jurgens, and Jeff Lemire
Illustrated by Patrick Zircher and Andy MacDonald
Reviewed by Brian Salvatore
News, notes, and debuts:
One of my big pet peeves of the New 52 has been the lack of heroes acting like heroes – this issue goes a long way to addressing that concern. We see sworn enemies, like Firestorm and Doctor Polaris, working together. We see heroes stepping above and beyond what is expected of them for the greater good. This looks like superheroes working to save the world. And it is great.
I didn’t expect to see Brother Eye be the saving grace of the Brainiac invasion – that, alone, was a nice little twist I didn’t see coming, and seems like this is a plot point that wasn’t messed up by “Convergence,” which so much of the overall structure seems to have been.
Continued belowThe real star of this issue was Superman, as the cover gorgeously depicts. We can easily be jaded to just what an incredible character he is, and then we see him do what seems impossible (but written in a way that seems possible), and I just have to sit back and marvel at it. When written properly, he is superhero comics, and it is a shame how often that doesn’t happen.
The art duties were shared here between Patrick Zircher and Andy MacDonald, and while the results are fine from both artists, the switch in their artwork is a little jarring, if only because their styles aren’t very similar. Once you get past that, the book looks nice – but both have done better work in these pages already. I wonder how rushed these last few issues were, from a production standpoint.
Three Future Questions:
1. OK, seriously, what the fuck is going on with Mister Terrific?
Has there ever, in the history of comics, been a character more inconsistently written than Mister Terrific? Well, probably many, but this is nuts. Over the past three issues, he has seemed possessed, helpless, and brilliant – and not because those are all aspects of his personality, but because he is all of those things 100% from scene to scene – we don’t see him teeter along edges, he just dives into one disparate personality trait after another. I just don’t get what I’m supposed to be seeing from the character. Is he supposed to be schizophrenic? This is incredibly frustrating
2. Why does Palmer have to remind people he’s the Atom?
I find it very interesting how Palmer, twice, tells people to call him the Atom. Is this a matter of him reclaiming a title he once held? Is he taking someone else’s? Or is this the start of his heroism, and this is the name he is now claiming? Each of those possibilities has a different set of questions that follow, but they are all quite interesting.
3. Has Terry’s plan been working?
Terry, Batman Beyond, came back to this time to save the world – has it worked so far?
We’ve been given no indication, no photograph fading away, of whether his plan is working or not. Did all of this happen the first time around? I’m surprised that it has taken me nearly a year to ask that question, but it is one worth exploring. Did his presence set off a domino effect that allowed Terrific and Batman to figure out the Brainiac problem? We don’t know yet, and I’m interested to see how it shapes up.
