Why aren’t I loving this book?  I mean, I really want to and I’ve dropped the cash on every issue so far and will likely buy the last. The thing is, I mainly feel like I SHOULD buy it, not that I WANT to buy it.  I’ve loved big event books in the past, although I grant you the shine has gone off them in recent years.  And it’s not like Fear Itself is any better (except in the art department).

The thing is, this is meant to be important, but it doesn’t feel important.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not one of those people saying it doesn’t count because of the reboot in one month.  I just mean that there’s no “oomph”, I never get the sense of the stakes and I never feel like there’s any real scale to the story.  Events should have scale in my book.  It seems to just boil down to a war between Amazons and Atlanteans, and a bunch of heroes getting in the middle, along with a load of “what if” ideas thrown in.  The book doesn’t even convey the cost to the earth of this battle.

Now, I’m not reading the tie-ins (other than Project Superman), so maybe that’s my fault.  Thing is, to do that would seriously hamper my ability to afford a variety of comics in a month, and I don’t feel that Flashpoint should warrant that sacrifice.  Secret Wars, Siege and Civil War are epic, wide ranging crossovers yet read great all by themselves.  So does Crisis and even Final Crisis (I get the criticisms of that one but rereading it as a HC really works).

I’ve seen the whole elseworld thing done many times over the years, primarily by DC.  I have no problem with it and sometimes it’s amazing, just look at some of the Batman books they’ve done.  But the concept or the hook soon loses it’s luster when there’s no great story to hang it on.  And I’m afraid it feels like that’s the case here.