Another week, another chunk of “Countdown” issues to suffer through. It feels unfair to be saying too much about the art, as we’re clearly at the point where the book’s strict weekly schedule is beginning to take its toll. Some artists like Jesus Saiz and David Lopez are dealing with it alright, though certainly not turning in their best works. Others, like Jim Calafiore and Carlos Magno… well, they aren’t doing so hot. Concerning the writing, the various scripters have mostly congealed in a way that’s hard to distinguish. That consistency would be nice if the comic was good, but… well, it isn’t. Palmiotti and Gray get a special shout-out, though, for having developed an annoying gimmick where their scene changes are almost always linked by shared dialogue between disparate characters.
But enough of that boring technical stuff, let’s get to what you’re really here for: the plots.
As has been the case from the beginning, the Mary Marvel storyline continues to be abysmal. Her scenes in #36 in particular are absolute dogshit – maybe not as bad as #44 from the previous batch, but still some of the most unpleasant characterization yet. The issue primarily involves a fight between her and Zatanna, which erupts during a training session where Mary attempts to harness more power than Zee thinks is wise. The fight is littered with “subtle” sexual references: Zee makes a remark about spanking Mary (definitely because she’s acting like a “spoiled brat,” and not because Tony Bedard thought Zatanna spanking Mary would be hot), and Mary gets her hands on some powerful magic relic that basically makes her orgasm. And, of course, there are the copious amount of upskirts that we’ve come to expect. The fight wraps up when Zatanna cleverly uses a mirror to reflect one of Mary’s bolts at her, transforming her back to mortal form, then kicks her out of her home despite Mary’s pleading that there’s something wrong with her and she needs help. I mean, sure, Mary wasn’t acting particularly friendly, but I’d hope Zee, a master of magic, could recognize a possession arc when she sees one (which is confirmed in a scene showing that Eclipso is behind Mary’s recent heel turn). This sucks, man.
The storyline following Pied Piper and Trickster continues to be vexing. In previous weeks, they were primarily dealing with the buildup to and fallout from the death of Bart Allen. This batch continues that for a bit, with the two on the run, which in turns to them accidentally being drafted in to Deathstroke’s plan to crash Green Arrow and Black Canary’s wedding (as seen in “The Green Arrow/Black Canary Wedding Special,” true believers!). This plot is then quickly dropped in favor of having the two rogues face-to-face with Wally West, shortly after his return in “The Lightning Saga” and “All Flash” #1. So far I couldn’t tell you what the point of the Pied Piper/Trickster story is or how it connects to the rest of the series; it just seems to be them bumbling from one concurrent DCU event to the other. True, it’s still early, and it’s not like any of the other stories are particularly intertwined at this point, but the comparative reliance on outside narratives makes this one seem even more distant and pointless than the rest.
The Legion plot at this point finally has some direction outside of “The Lightning Saga” – it’s just largely boring and I don’t care for it. Karate Kid has some kind of unspecified deadly virus, and is seeking out the greatest minds in the DCU to try to fix him. This leads to one of the few impressive scenes in the book so far, in #38, where a distracted Oracle puts Karate Kid’s woes on hold to handle cyber warfare with Calculator. This scene is only impressive in that it contains a few pages of “hacker dialogue” – normally some of the most unbearable dialogue in fiction – that is actually quite readable. Pretty impressive, Palmiotti and Gray! Then again, it seems this has no narrative purpose besides eating up some pages, so… nuts to that. We also have some “Infinite Crisis” callbacks in this arc, as Elias Orr from “Superman: For Tomorrow” informs Karate Kid that the virus may be related to the OMAC Project. Remember “For Tomorrow,” kids? No? That’s probably because it’s a mediocre-at-best story that was only pushed because Jim Lee was a big get for DC at the time. It even had an Absolute edition!
Continued belowI still have nothing bad to say about the Jimmy Olsen storyline. It continues to be entertaining and maintains a certain level of charm no matter who is writing it. His attempts to audition for both the Teen Titans and the Justice League as “Mr. Action” are fun, particularly when he realizes that the heroes took it easy on him and demands that they put him in danger in order to activate his powers (spoilers: they don’t, they’re too good for that). One weird thing that I’m sure will definitely be resolved later in a meaningful way and certainly wasn’t just created to serve as a dramatic cliffhanger for issue #37 is that Jimmy suddenly knows that Clark is Superman. His story in this batch of issues ends with him being approached by some folks from Cadmus who’ve heard about his recent troubles, prompting him to ask aloud why he didn’t think of going to Cadmus earlier. Well, Jimmy, that’s because that probably would have shaved off an issue or two of story, but I’ll let it slide since your plot is the only thing keeping this torment bearable.
Quick note: I’m editing this about twenty issues later and Jimmy knowing Clark’s identity hasn’t been brought up again.
The plot concerning Donna, Jason, and Bob (the Monitor) continues to be a slow burn, despite seeming to be the most “relevant” to the series’s core narrative thrust. As the odd batch (plus Ryan Choi) continue deeper and deeper into the microverse or whatever it’s called, they find themselves at odd with a fairy queen of sorts named Belthera. Belthera easily mind controls Bob, despite him being one of the most powerful beings in the multiverse, nearly escaping into a dimensional rift with her new boy toy before a different boy toy shows up to save the day: it’s Kyle Rayner time, baby! I still have no idea how Kyle fits into things. He has a history with Donna, of course, but he just kind of says something along the lines of “the Guardians told me to save you” to explain why he’s suddenly here in this remote corner of the microverse. The only reason his presence doesn’t completely feel out of left field is because we’ve had the “foreshadowing” of him being referred to as one of the threats to the fabric of multiversal spacetime by the Monitors. As mentioned in previous weeks, however, there hasn’t really been any attempt to explain why this is. Maybe we’ll find out next week (spoilers: we don’t)!
Also now that Kyle is here I guess the editors thought it was time to cut out the filler and get rid of Ryan (no offense to Ryan fans, I like him, too). Deus ex machina is a phrase that gets thrown around a bit too often in criticism to my liking, but I think a literal giant hand reaching down and plucking Ryan from the group with no prior warning or any further explanation counts. Good thing a Green Lantern is here to… ah, the rest of the group is going to just continue looking for Ray without Ryan. Cool, cool. See y’all next week then.
