Is it bad to say that this was going to be my Pick of the Week before this even came out? Can you blame me? It has freakin Aquaman! Not just ‘the’ Aquaman, but it clearly looks like the ‘Superfriends’ Aquaman. Then you have him with the oddest team mate to have even for a title like this. Etrigan the Demon? How on earth is JMS going to make this work?

You know how he makes this work? From how I read this…..he just can! The plot is very ‘Lovecrafitan’ in a way. In fact it seems like a very, very loose adaptation of ‘Dagon’ by Lovecraft. It has a man finding himself involved with creatures he’s never seen before, it has a legion of followers for the ‘monster’, and the monster in this story looks like a Lovecraft creature. With that aside I think JMS writes a fantastic Etrigan. He’s mysterious and he does a damn fine job doing the rhyming in this. Most writers who use the character seem to have a hard time with this aspect, but JMS makes it so work here. If he could do a Etrigan mini in the future, I’d read it. The story itself seems a bit simple in the whole scheme of things. Once again the action isn’t the focus it’s the story. So yes the big fight is a bit short and simple; but with great writing for these two characters I’m not gonna complain.

Jesus Saiz is back on this title and thank god for that. When Geoff Johns does Aquaman Rebirth (I refuse to believe he won’t), I hope he asks Saiz to do the art. As always with him there is just an unnatural beautiful with his pencils. Amazing amount of detail with each panel and the settings he’s tasked to draw here are beautiful. His take on Aquaman’s powers are spot on and the creatures in this are actually terrifying. Although I would like to ask both Saiz and JMS on how Etrigan can breath fire underwater…..No matter though, you can’t find me a comic book with such beauty on each page. Maybe Saiz isn’t the best DC artist (Ivan Reis is just destroying that theory with Blackest Night), but I still think Saiz is in the Top 3 for DC artists.

I have been waiting so long for this issue to come out and I’m so glad with what I read. With a mix of action, Lovecrafitan horror, and just a good sea story; JMS writes a damn good team up with an unlikely pair. With Saiz by his side this is also a mighty fine good looking issue as well. I think with this comic you could also make the case that there can be good Aquaman stories given the right writer. Maybe the Aquaman: Rebirth by Geoff Johns is a pipedream…..But no one ever said JMS can’t do an ongoing either.