Aside for the thoroughly mediocre Batman: Face to Face, it would seem that James Robinson is entirely incapable of writing anything that isn’t either absolutely brilliant (Starman, Golden Age, Batman: Blades) or absolutely, head-smashingly terrible (Comic Book Villains, the script for League of Extraordinary Gentleman and, the title at hand). Guedes’ art is pretty good, weird plastic hair aside, and that is just about the only remotely positive thing that I can say about this stinker of an issue. 

This book is so badly written, I don’t even know where to start. I don’t think that Robinson gets Superman’s character at all, though Clark displays so little personality in this issue, it’s a little hard to tell. The story, such as it is, is tired and there’s nothing in it that comes even remotely close to piquing my interest. Nor, for that matter, does Atlas and considering that Robinson spends most of the issue “fleshing out” his origin, that’s really a problem.

And then there’s the dialogue. 

At one point Lois calls Krypto a “four-legged psychopath”. Seriously. I mean, yeah, I hate Krypto as much as anyone who grew up on Byrne’s take on the Superman mythology but “four-legged psychopath”? Seriously? Of course, two panels down Clark asks “Why are you being this way, honey? Is this about Zatanna?” Zatanna? We’ve gone from some of the most inept and puzzlingly written dialogue I’ve read in quite a while to something that somehow manages to make even less sense. I mean, what the hell? ZATANNA? Has James Robinson been reading entirely different Superman comics to the rest of us for the last few years. I suppose I should take some sollace in the fact that the naration is less awful this time around but this time around we have to deal with Clark calling Krypto a “good boy” something like fifty times in the space of five panels.

AND ALL THIS TAKES PLACE OVER THE SPACE OF A SINGLE PAGE!!!!!!

I don’t know what else to say about this empty-headed, dull and non-sensical comic, except that I still really cannot believe that this is the same James Robinson who is responsible for some of the finest superhero stories ever put to page. This is, unquestionably, the comic book dissapointment of the year, which is made all the more dissapointing by the fact that Geoff Johns’ sublime work on Action Comics is going to be very closely tied to this rubbish in the coming months.