yes, yes, a thousand times yes!

i don’t consider myself a fan of alex ross. sure i like kingdom come, but i’ve always felt the art looked a little stiff, and a bit, well, pretentious. it’s just the sort of thing that doesn’t always fit with the books underneath the covers he draws.

so i almost didn’t buy this, but i love the JSA gog storyline (and can’t really understand the complaining about someone who isn’t simply putting out cookie cutter six-issue for the trade arcs, but is actually writing an interesting, long, character driven story), and so gave it a go.

and it was the right move.

here’s what’s great about this issue:

– the art is really wonderful and expressive. kingdom come superman just comes to life in these panels – you can see all sorts of expression in his face, and the world he lives in is beautiful. furthermore, the “pretension” of the art i spoke of above really fits here – it’s a serious, sad type of story, and the art really does support it well.

– this book has all the best things about multiverse/elseworld characters. we get to see a take on superman which is a really interesting one – an older, more powerful superman who has failed his world, and can’t really deal with it, and ends up losing a bit of his human side. he swings between anger and sadness, without as much of the solid moral grounding we expect, but still desperately wants to save our world, like he couldn’t save his own. the scene with lois perfectly shows that perhaps she was (and is, for our real world supes) the real anchor holding him in place. yet another title combatting the generic “superman is boring/unrelatable/stupid” complaints – KC superman gives us a really striking portrayal of the character.

great pick if you like fun comics. if not, stay away.