It’s somewhat unfortunate that this story arc joins the “ridiculously late comic book” club.  While, I’m unaware of the reasons behind it, I would like to think that the creators had good reason to take their time with this story arc.  At least, I want to think that way because this was just a really great story.

For those unaware, this story started back in December of 2006 to much anticipation.  I mean, it was the tag team of Richard Donner and Geoff Johns paired with the famous Adam Kubert.  It seemed like a dream team, and fan expectations were high, especially with the team’s promise of bringing Superman back to form.  And after a strong start, the series faced serious delays, which lead to the final chapter coming out today.

Last night, I sat down and re-read my back issues, and I found myself loving the storyline.  It was fast paced, featured great villains with a plausible explanation behind their motivations, and the art was spectacular, shoving every sort of dynamic action sequence into each panel.  And the Annual that appeared between the issues really fleshed out what the story was about.  So, in regards to today’s release, I was really looking foward to it. 

And I wasn’t disappointed in the least.  The story played out in a great fashion as Superman teams up with Lex Luthor to take on Zod (yes, the Zod from the movies…only ten times meaner).  And did I mention that Luthor has a team of supervillains that are joining the fray?  This, of course, leads to all sorts of shenanigans and backstabbing while also moving the story and action forward.  The ending leaves a lot of unanswered questions, but closes up enough to leave the reader satisfied.  It’s the type of ending that I hope Johns revisits some day because it has lots of potential.

Probably one of my favorite aspects of this book was Kubert’s art.  It was dynamic and beautifully rendered.  The action scenes had this amazing fluidity to them, while each punch felt like it had weight.  Superman was truly heroic in this book and each panel you can feel the force in which these powerhouses collide.  That really adds a great level of realism

It’s almost too bad that this experienced the delays that it did because I feel like this could have been included in the talk that surrounds Johns’ recent Legion storyline.  What Johns is doing with Action Comics is truly awesome, and I can’t wait to see what he’s got next.