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POTW Archive:

• August 28, 2013 - Batman / Superman #3
• August 21, 2013 - Wonder Woman #23
• August 14, 2013 - Thor: God of Thunder #11
• August 7, 2013 - Quantum and Woody #2
• July 31, 2013 - Indestructible Hulk #11

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Story by Kurt Busiek
Art by George Pérez
Colors by Tom Smith
Letters by Comicraft

Published by DC Comics & Marvel Comics | $5.95

This miniseries really is turning into a fanboy’s dream. It’s everything I thought it would be and more.

When they originally announced that Kurt Busiek was going to be the writer, I was a bit skeptical. Not because I think Busiek is a bad writer — he’s one of my favorites — but because he’s not somebody that I ever associated with DC characters. To me he’s always been a Marvel guy and I was worried that my favorites characters from DC were going to get the short shrift. Thankfully, I’ve been pleasantly surprised that Busiek’s encyclopedic knowledge of all things superhero seems to extend to the DC Universe as well.

The story so far has been just the right mix of big convoluted cosmic event (in the grand crossover tradition), superhero slugfest, and the little character interaction moments that these kind of inter-company mixers virtually demand.

The boundaries between time and space have totally broken down, causing our heroes to skip around between eras. It’s a clever concept that plays on the old Earth-1/Earth-2, JLA/JSA scenario with the Avengers taking the JSA’s place. It also allows us to spend some more time with the likes of Hal Jordan and Barry Allen.

This issue might have been my favorite thus far. I read the entire thing with a big stupid grin on my face.

This issue also contained — thus far — the series’ most powerful moment. Faced with all their future failures (Barry Allen’s death, Hal Jordan’s madness and murder, Tony Stark’s alcoholism, Jason Todd’s death, Hank Pym’s spousal abuse, etc, etc.), the heroes are given a choice: remain in their idyllic yet fractured and false reality, or fight for the return of their true realities. Even with the knowledge of the pain and the horror to come in the future, they choose to fight.

George Pérez is a genius. Really. I can’t even imagine another person touching this series with a ten foot pole. The art in this issue has calmed down considerably from the last, which seemed overly busy and at times hard to follow — it felt like George was trying to cram the kitchen sink into every panel. In this issue he allows the work to breathe a bit more, and my favorite part was when he worked in the original promo art from the first series twenty years ago.

It’s not often these super-hyped series live up to their billing, but this one is doing a fine job.

Conor Kilpatrick
What a cover!
conor@ifanboy.com

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