Post by Zoom on Jun 10, 2011 15:11:51 GMT -5
Flashpoint Week 4
This week, we have the next issue of Booster Gold and four new minis. To be honest, I was only excited about one of them, Citizen Cold, written and drawn by Scott Kolins. I like Captain Cold. I like the Rogues. I liked seeing Scott Kolin’s art evolve over the course of his run on the Flash and I’m very interested in seeing him write a mini. The rest of this stuff? Well Booster Gold is of course my favorite mainstream comic these days (Fables and Walking Dead being my other favorite stuff) so I was looking forward to that but the other minis just looked like crap.
Deathstroke showed up in Flashpoint 2 and from what I could tell, somebody said “Hey, Deathstroke has a sword, a gun and an eye patch. You know who else has a sword a gun and an eye patch? Pirates! What if Deathstroke was a pirate?” and then just ran with it without doing anything else. Aquaman is “What if Aquaman was like a bad guy and stuff?” Then there’s Frankenstein and the Creatures of the Unknown. I think Franky is likeable from the very few comics I’ve read with him and the concept is fun but overall, I don’t even care about these guys’ regular versions so I was finding myself not particularly caring about their Flashpoint versions. Being the professional (and by professional, I mean acting professional. I’m not getting paid for this, unfortunately) reviewer that I am, I pressed on and I’m happy to say that I was surprised by these issues. On to the reviews!
Citizen Cold 1 – This stuff is excellent. Kolins is every bit as good of a characterizer of Rogues as Johns is. After all, he was there for most of the big Rogues stories of the past few years. Weather Wizard with a beard looks cool and I liked the new Rogue quite a bit. This, along with Vengeance of the Batman, is the mini to pick up if you aren’t going to pick up most of them.
4/5
Booster Gold 45 – Booster Gold has a showdown with Doomsday who is being controlled by Captain Nathan Adam (that’s Captain Atom minus superpowers). This wasn’t my favorite Booster issue. That is to say that I didn’t laugh. I did say “Oh snap!” near the end, though and the art and likeableness of Booster still make it a good story to pick up.
Oh and Booster Gold will be joining Barry in the main Flashpoint storyline by issue 5. Flash fact.
3.5/5
Emperor Aquaman 1 – This was probably the issue that surprised me the most. Like the rest of the minis, this is a flashback to the origin of one of the major players in the main Flashpoint series. We get to see how and why Aquaman decides to sink western Europe. We get some characters that I didn’t expect to see. Titans and Outsiders fans will be happy with this storyline.
3.5/5
Deathstroke and the Curse of the Ravager 1 – This story is every bit as bad in concept as it looked in Flashpoint 2. I don’t buy Deathstroke’s character motivation in the slightest and with Rose being such a central part of this, I can’t help but wonder why there’s no talk of Grant or Joey. The book isn’t that bad, it’s just kinda there. A further complaint is that by the end of issue 1 of the mini, we’ve already caught up to the main Flashpoint series, which means that we aren’t setting Deathstroke up to be a major player in that, we’re just tying a scene from this into the main story for the purpose of selling another tie in. This wouldn't be such a big deal if the story wasn't mediocre but it is, so I rank this a bit lower than I would on it's own merit.
2/5
Frankenstein and the Creatures of the Unknown 1 – I was really hoping, what with this issue starting in 1942, that we’d learn why the hell the Nazis are in Brazil. Alas, this is not the case, though we do get to see monsters fighting Nazis, which is kinda cool. Like Deathstroke, these characters just don’t feel like they’re going to play an important part in the series. Still, they are more fun and less ridiculous (yes, I’m talking about the WWII monster based super soldiers when I say “less ridiculous”) than the Deathstroke characters and I am interested in picking up the next issue.
3/5
This week, we have the next issue of Booster Gold and four new minis. To be honest, I was only excited about one of them, Citizen Cold, written and drawn by Scott Kolins. I like Captain Cold. I like the Rogues. I liked seeing Scott Kolin’s art evolve over the course of his run on the Flash and I’m very interested in seeing him write a mini. The rest of this stuff? Well Booster Gold is of course my favorite mainstream comic these days (Fables and Walking Dead being my other favorite stuff) so I was looking forward to that but the other minis just looked like crap.
Deathstroke showed up in Flashpoint 2 and from what I could tell, somebody said “Hey, Deathstroke has a sword, a gun and an eye patch. You know who else has a sword a gun and an eye patch? Pirates! What if Deathstroke was a pirate?” and then just ran with it without doing anything else. Aquaman is “What if Aquaman was like a bad guy and stuff?” Then there’s Frankenstein and the Creatures of the Unknown. I think Franky is likeable from the very few comics I’ve read with him and the concept is fun but overall, I don’t even care about these guys’ regular versions so I was finding myself not particularly caring about their Flashpoint versions. Being the professional (and by professional, I mean acting professional. I’m not getting paid for this, unfortunately) reviewer that I am, I pressed on and I’m happy to say that I was surprised by these issues. On to the reviews!
Citizen Cold 1 – This stuff is excellent. Kolins is every bit as good of a characterizer of Rogues as Johns is. After all, he was there for most of the big Rogues stories of the past few years. Weather Wizard with a beard looks cool and I liked the new Rogue quite a bit. This, along with Vengeance of the Batman, is the mini to pick up if you aren’t going to pick up most of them.
4/5
Booster Gold 45 – Booster Gold has a showdown with Doomsday who is being controlled by Captain Nathan Adam (that’s Captain Atom minus superpowers). This wasn’t my favorite Booster issue. That is to say that I didn’t laugh. I did say “Oh snap!” near the end, though and the art and likeableness of Booster still make it a good story to pick up.
Oh and Booster Gold will be joining Barry in the main Flashpoint storyline by issue 5. Flash fact.
3.5/5
Emperor Aquaman 1 – This was probably the issue that surprised me the most. Like the rest of the minis, this is a flashback to the origin of one of the major players in the main Flashpoint series. We get to see how and why Aquaman decides to sink western Europe. We get some characters that I didn’t expect to see. Titans and Outsiders fans will be happy with this storyline.
3.5/5
Deathstroke and the Curse of the Ravager 1 – This story is every bit as bad in concept as it looked in Flashpoint 2. I don’t buy Deathstroke’s character motivation in the slightest and with Rose being such a central part of this, I can’t help but wonder why there’s no talk of Grant or Joey. The book isn’t that bad, it’s just kinda there. A further complaint is that by the end of issue 1 of the mini, we’ve already caught up to the main Flashpoint series, which means that we aren’t setting Deathstroke up to be a major player in that, we’re just tying a scene from this into the main story for the purpose of selling another tie in. This wouldn't be such a big deal if the story wasn't mediocre but it is, so I rank this a bit lower than I would on it's own merit.
2/5
Frankenstein and the Creatures of the Unknown 1 – I was really hoping, what with this issue starting in 1942, that we’d learn why the hell the Nazis are in Brazil. Alas, this is not the case, though we do get to see monsters fighting Nazis, which is kinda cool. Like Deathstroke, these characters just don’t feel like they’re going to play an important part in the series. Still, they are more fun and less ridiculous (yes, I’m talking about the WWII monster based super soldiers when I say “less ridiculous”) than the Deathstroke characters and I am interested in picking up the next issue.
3/5
