I’ve been saying it for weeks now but it’s true: This title was meant for me. You have Kelley Jones as artist and the guy who hosted ‘Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?’ as the writer? How can this not be a good issue?

I want to get the writing out of the way because it’s not the strongest reason to pick this series up. Shinick does a pretty decent job with Clayface, the opening pages with him being tormented about his acting career is good to read. But the actual plot in this is a bit weird, and by the time it gets resolved, I left this book not feeling satisfied. At the end of the day it’s a nice start for Shinick in comics (that and his short Mr. Freeze story in the 80-page Giant) but nothing really to light the world on fire.

What makes this issue a must read for me is Kelley Jones artwork. Jones is Batman to me (as I said earlier this week). The extra long cape, the huge ears, the weird scowl he gives Bruce; it’s everything I grew up with Batman. With him doing a Clayface story, his imagination really runs wild here. His way of handling his transformations is really nice to look at and his layouts are really inspired. I also love the ‘chapter’ breaks he does every couple of pages too. That and we have more of his Batman models which, as I said already, look amazing. I feel like I’m transformed right back into the late 80s-early 90s with Batman again with this one-shot….and that’s a good thing.

So while the story isn’t the best ever, I do urge people to pick this up for Jones artwork. You want to see what made Batman stories so fantastic to read in the old days? It’s all because of Jones amazing artwork…..that and some talented writers helped too.