Superman Volume 1: Son of Superman (Rebirth) Review

Supes, you gotta turn of the flash
on your camera, dude.

Writer: Peter J Tomasi
Artist: Jimmy Palmiotti
Collects: Superman: Rebirth #1, Superman #1-6

Background Information

Superman's past few years in the New 52 was... rocky. I maintain that Grant Morrison's Action Comics was a great Superman story, but it's hard to pretend that it caught on with general readers. The following issues were an absolute train wreck. Lois and Clark were broken up, Clark was de-aged so that he looked ultimately naïve and the stories themselves were great in concept, but poor in execution. The way they fixed this was very long winded, but long story short, DC brought back the old Superman with the old Lois Lane and got rid of the New 52 versions of each. I do something similar with my children all the time!

Review:

By this stage, I think we can safely say that DC Rebirth is good. It's sold well enough and rarely do we hear a word against it. Most of that, I'm convinced, is due to books like Son of Superman.

So the old Superman is in the main universe again with a wife and now a ten year old son. A "Son of Superman", if you will. This son, Jonathan Kent, is developing big boy powers of his own, so the old Clark Kent now has to teach his son not to kill people by accident. You know how it is; your child hits puberty and suddenly there's a lot of awkward conversations about girls.

I hope every Spider-Man writer sees this.

I get the feeling that the Rebirth initiative as a whole was designed to troll All-New-All-Different-All-Weather-All-The-Time Marvel. This is probably most relevant in Rebirth's Superman. Peter J Tomasi's Superman seems to point at Dan Slott's Spider-Man and say "See? Having a superhero married with a kid is a GOOD thing because it allows characters to grow and mature  and maybe one day you can get a movie where Peter isn't defined by high school!"


He then turns  Tom King's Batman and says "Hey, kid's develop best with two parents at home, too!"

To which, Tom King responds "Okay" (with his fingers crossed behind his back).

This book really sells itself on the positive family dynamic. There's a weird habit that a lot of shows have of portraying married characters as being on the brink of divorce. Son of Superman bucks that trend by giving us a Lois and Clark that are happily married. The drama, instead, comes from the Superhero action which is accentuated by Clark's efforts as a father. It helps that Jon's character is probably just as well-written as everyone else's. Many comic writers try to portray children as snottier adults, but Tomasi's gives us a son of Superman who is more wide-eyed and in awe of those around him. As a result, we actually like this character as opposed to, say, Damien Wayne, which needed a pretty long adjustment period and even then people cheered when he died because they thought Tim was going to be Robin again.

The actual events of the story, the "what exactly happens here?" are a bit of a letdown, though. Superman takes Jonathan back to the fortress of solitude, where a Kryptonian robot that's hell-bent on ethnic cleansing gets activated and decides that  Jonathan must be killed for not being a purebred. Was this thing programmed in Auschwitz? I thought Krypton was meant to be more progressive than this! The whole thing completely fails to be engaging. The whole is fixed by... wait for it...

...getting Batman involved.

The bad guy is the one with the S on his chest.

Hang on, DC, are you trying to tell me that a man capable of moving the earth out of its orbit needs the help of a grown man who depends on his butler? Why is Batman even here? I know he's had the more popular movies but it's not like you need to introduce him to anyone! You could live your entire life in a cave and I bet you know who drives the Batmobile! Why not include Blue Beetle? Booster Gold? John Constantine? You could build your universe this way, but no; you need to lend credibility to the claim that Batman is all DC has!

This is an unashamedly pretty book, as well. Every character is designed to be highly expressive, which adds to their relatability. The way Johnathon is drawn hits home how (literally) wide-eyed and optimistic the lad is. Superman looks his age without looking past his prime. The book is big, colourful and bombastic in the way it communicates its action, like a gang war during Mardi Gras.

There are some who are going to claim that Son of Superman is a return to hope and optimism that "SOUPAMAHN WAS ALWAYZ MENT 2 B!" I don't know if I would say that, but it's certainly Superman starting on an era that he was always meant to reach eventually. Time will tell if Bendis has an inch of respect for what happened in this run... Dammit.

Four out of five Mardi Gras gangsters.

Batman: I am Gotham (Rebirth) Review

Batman Volume 1: I am Gotham (Rebirth)

 

Writer: Tom King

 

Artist: David Finch

 

Collects: Batman (2016) #1-6, Batman: Rebirth #1 

 

Background Information:

 

DC gets very precious about Batman. It must be awful for the rest of the superheroes knowing that no matter what they do, they'll never be loved as much as papa WB's miracle child. It's only Batman that gets the hot new writers. Only Batman gets the weekly series. Only Batman that gets to beat up literally everyone else in the universe. Well, now Tom King has signed a permanent contract with DC, and guess who gets the grace of his widely-praised pen. Superman? Don't make me laugh!

 

Review

So now the man behind the much-gushed-about Vision takes the caped crusader and while I Am Gotham is certainly good, it would be a strain to call it original

"But T Vulture," Tom King protests with all the calm logic of a paranoid chimpanzee, " I'm the best thing to happen to Batman since two-for-one funerals. How could you not worship at my feet in the hope of my blessing?"

 

"Excuse me Mr King, but isn't the new antagonist basically Superman? And haven't we seen Batman fight Superman so many times that stale becomes an understatement, and we've now moved on the term "fossilised?"

 

"No, no, no," explains King as he pulls at his collar. "For starters, my character's name is Gotham and that's a completely different word. So there!"

 

"Is he super strong?"

 

"Yes..."

 

"Can he fly?"

 

"Yeah, but..."

 

"Does he fight a billionaire?"

 

"Well..."

 

"Does a have a blonde female sidekick who wears a skirt and is related to him?"

 

"Ummmm..."

 

"GO TO YOUR ROOM!"

 

"Okay."

 

I'm not exaggerating either. Gotham is basically what happened if Frank Miller got his way and Superman just realised that Batman is the most super-cool guy on the planet. Now he wants to help Batman with his sidekick... urgh... Gotham Girl.

 

That's another thing, Tom. Are so many possible super-hero names taken that we now have to call heroes after the town they came from? And if so, doesn't that limit them to defending their that town? For crying out loud; I can imagine the scenario if this guy ever joined the Justice League. Sorry guys, but if I go fight in Metropolis I lose the copyright. I guess Darkseid wins after all.

 

Thus far I've made it sound like I don't like I Am Gotham, but really, I don't. There's an interesting degree of psychology that's woven into Gotham and Similarly-Named-Girl so that the whole mystery around how they came to be becomes quite intriguing. On top of that, Gotham not being weak to a certain green McGuffin means that Batman really does have to use his wits to defeat him this time. Without spoiling too much, it doesn't go to well and this is where Tom King really highlights the main thing that has always made Batman feel realistic... well comparatively. There's a real sense of Batman being out of his depth despite the stakes feeling nowhere near as high as they did in Scott Snyder's run.

 

That said, though, it's not like King ignores Snyder completely. Right from the opening of issue #1, King references the major moments in the New 52 such as the Court of Owls and Zero Year. Batman even has a new sidekick in the form of Duke Thomas, an African American kid that Batman can use to prove to people on the internet that he's not racist. Though not in the field yet, Duke is highly likeable and his interactions with Gotham Girl are pretty heart-warming. He feels like a distinct person which, considering how each Robin has offered a take on "young sidekick" that many in the industry have tried to ape, is quite a feat.

 

Another thing that King does very well is action. He has this ability to put Batman in peril in such a way that I found myself thinking that this was it: they were really going to kill off Batman. That's something I almost never feel when reading comics and it was great to be taken to edge of my seat once again. David Finch's detailed-yet-dirty art style helps to convey this detail perfectly to such a degree that even though you first see Gotham and Gotham Girl looking very Superman-and-Supergirl-y, you still feel tense around them.

 

As much as I like the book, though, I'm not sure I can recommend it. As I mentioned before, the main villain is essentially a Superman clone and we've had this so many times. Between this, The Dark Knight Returns, the Injustice games and comics, last year's Batman v Superman and Hush I think I can safely say DC need counselling, or at least Tom King needs to go and get into a fight with his significant physical superior just to get it all out of his system. Batman and Superman fights are fun, but so is eating a whole cake. Eating six whole cakes makes you a diabetic, and that's essentially what Tom King has done here.

 

As much as I'm not ready to recommend this Particular volume, I do recommend that you follow King's Batman run. He's got a lot of talent for pacing and tension and what are you going to do anyway? Read something else? HA!

 

This one gets three out of five diabetics.