Anything but terrific.

Eric Wallace introduces us to a Mr. Terrific who is more Tony Stark, than Reed Richards. It is not a characterization of Michael Holt we’ve seen before in the pages of JSA and I found it rather off-putting. Simply put he’s not that likeable.

For a first issue Wallace throws a lot at you with the assumption that all will be explained later. This makes the issue feel rushed and dampens the significance of the ideas he introduced – imagine if in first issue of Superman you learned about the Fortress of Solitude, Krypton, the Phantom Zone, Kryptonite, the Daily Planet, and Lex Luthor in 20 pages – it’s just too much.

The dialogue was especially weak – Can we please stop referring to Stephen Hawking as our straw man smart guy? – and alarming- an exchange between Kara (possibly Power Girl from the old DCU) and a black woman about race and dating is unrealistic and insensitive.

Artwise Gianluca Gugliotta does solid work but you can see the quality deteriorate by the final few pages.

I’m tempted to give this title another chance only because of my fondness of the character but I’ll either wait for the price to drop on the digital copy or just pick up something else.