I’ve been a pretty involved member of the spoken word community for the last ten years, and it’s pretty well established that, within that medium, it is always best to lure people in with a funny beginning, and then kick them to the groin with the dramatic portion of your poem/story/whathaveyou.  This is not always true with comics.  And it is definitely not true with this issue.

The previous Tales Of The Corps titles felt flat to me.  They dealt with characters I didn’t really know, and didn’t do a fantastic job of endearing me to them.  They weren’t BAD stories, they just felt unnecessary.

That is not the case with this issue.

Tales #3 starts with the story of Kilowog (the GL Corps trainer, in case any of you poozers don’t know) and his days of being trained as a member of the GL Corps.  While the characters feel fairly two dimensional in this piece, it’s a purposeful two dimensions.  And it works.  It is a completely endearing story about how Kilowag became the character we know from GL Corps.  It might even lump your throat a bit, if you’re as completely exhausted as I was when I read this book.  (Also, it appears Modok was in the GL Corps when Kilowog was training…check the background of the third panel on page two, and tell me I’m wrong.)

The second story strikes with the humor.  It’s about a character I don’t know, and honestly, have no interest in ever reading about again.  But it was a nice little slice of dark humor to balance out the fucken-damn-it of the previous story.

The issue is rounded out by a “commentary track” of Blackest Night #1 by Geoff Johns, Adam Schlagman, Eddie Berganza (don’t feel alone, I’d never heard of the last two, either, they’re editors).  Probably really cool if you’re into that sort of thing.  I”m not, so while I flipped through and looked at the pencils, I can not vouch for how interesting the new insights into the story are.

I wasn’t in love with the art from the Kilowog story, though I suppose it had an oldish feel to it that was meant to remind you that this story took place a long time ago.  Ehh.  I much preferred the art from story #2, which had an almost Olivetti feel to it.   The pencils on the Blackest Night commentary story were amazing, but you know that if you picked up issue one, which you clearly did if you’re reading this issue.

There was also a preview of Johns’s Adventure Comics #1, which, were it not written by Johns, I’d have no interest in.