Pick of the Week

Written by Adam Beechen, J.T. Krul, Dustin Nguyen, & Derek Fridolfs
Art by Norm Breyfogle, Howard Porter, Dustin Nguyen, & Livesay
Cover by Dustin Nguyen

Size: 48 pages
Price: 3.99

I’m in the midst of the dreaded Con Plague which made reading my stack of comics a bit of a chore and is making formulating this Pick of the Week review more difficult than usual. This is like the opposite of the time I had to read comics and write the Pick of the Week review while on multiple mood altering medications. That was actually pretty fun.

Hold on, I need to find more tissues.

Man, my nose is really raw.

Anyway, the reason why I tell you all of this is because the thing that I was really looking for out of my comics this week was to be cheered up. I wanted to read something really fun; something that would make me smile. When it came down to it, the comic book that I enjoyed the most, from top to bottom, was Batman Beyond Unlimited #6.

And what a lot of enjoyment it was! At 40 story pages for $3.99 it might just be the best value for your buck in comic books right now. For those not familiar with this book—and judging by the pull numbers, that’s most of you—what it is is a trio of stories taking place in the Timmverse Animated DC Universe, more specifically, in the Batman Beyond years, i.e. the future. Released in shorter chapters each week digitally by DC, this is the monthly issue that collects them in one big chunk for comic book stores.

The first story is written by J.T. Krul and drawn by Howard Porter and features an aging Superman wearing a black and white suit sans cape, and right now he’s got his hands full with violence-happy super cops, an intelligent Solomon Grundy currently lording over Metropolis, and Lex’s daughter Lucinda Luthor who is picking up where her father left off. I love seeing an older, wiser, more contemplative Superman having to multitask as all of these problems come to a head at the same time. He doesn’t say a whole lot, he just tries to get the job done as quickly and as efficiently as possible while minimizing loss of life. It’s a different ind of Old Man Superman than the one in, say, Kingdom Come. Here he’s more like a wizened veteran who can still show the young kids how things are done, even if Lucinda Luthor’s plan to take him down appears to be rather insurmountable. Plus, there was the added bonus of having Old Man Bruce Wayne show up at the end to help his buddy in Batman armor reminiscent of The Dark Knight Returns. This has been one of the best things I’ve read from J.T. Krul. He keeps the action moving and his graying Superman is a reticent delight. Howard Porter is a pro on art duties. His style has changed a bit since his days of drawing Grant Morrison’s JLA—the line work is tighter and his characters a bit more robust—but the dynamic heart remains.

The second story is written by Derek Fridolfs and Dustin Nguyen and is drawn by Nguyen and focuses on the Justice League, which in this issue is comprised of Superman, Batman (Terry McGuinness), Warhawk (the son of John Stewart and Hawkgirl), and Green Lantern (Kai-Ro). They’re on Apokolips helping stop the destruction of New Genesis and Apokolips by a snake god summoned on Earth by Justice League member Micron, who was brainwashed by Kobra (they love snakes!). This story was the middle chapter/calm before the storm that was all about character and it was fantastic. Superman and (a blind and dethroned) Darkseid butt heads over past encounters while Orion’s wife Bekka flirts inappropriately with Terry McGuinness when she mistakes him for Bruce Wayne. The Superman/Darkseid scenes were intense and conjured up fine memories of the animated shows while the Batman/Bekka scenes were laugh out loud funny. You know that it’s all going to go to hell in the next issues when the battle commences and these kind of character moments are crucial to lending weight to the action. Derek Fridolfs and Dustin Nguyen are long time collaborators and it shows. This was probably the most entertaining section of the issue.

The third story is written by Adam Beechen and drawn by Norm Breyfogle and stars the titular character, Batman/Terry McGuinness. Gotham is being overrun by (if the title is to be believed) 10,000 members of the Jokerz gang from all over the country intent on wrecking havoc in honor of their inspiration. This one’s all about fast paced action as Batman must stop a group of Jokerz who have taken a bunch of kids hostage at a middle school. And there’s also a bit of intrigue as something is clearly up with Bruce Wayne back at the Batcave, as he falters in his communication with Terry after the Jokerz have been put to bed. Is he sick? Dying? In need of new batteries for his mic? We’ll have to wait to find out. Adam Beechen is probably the most accomplished writer of the bunch and he has the most experience writing the Batcharacters, both in the comics and in the cartoons. His considerable talent is buoyed by Norm Breyfogle who is my all time favorite Batman artist. His action scenes feature text book storytelling and that instantly recognizable Breyfogle style that sees Batman’s limbs almost become sharp as knives when the action kicks off. I cannot adequately describe how much I enjoy seeing Breyfogle on a regular Batbook again.

There’s a heavy nostalgia factor involved in this book, there’s no denying that. It’s based entirely around continuing the adventures from a much beloved series of cartoons and some of the creators involved harken back to previous eras in comics. But this book—and this issue in particular—is great because you have highly skilled creators working at the top of their games to tell stories with characters from those cartoon which were popular and highly regarded for a reason: they were damn good stories featuring wonderfully realized, and in some cases iconic and definitive, characters of the DC Universe.

Conor Kilpatrick
I’ll probably get around to watching Batman Beyond… when I retire.
conor@ifanboy.com