Comic Review: Deathblow – The Deluxe Edition

Published: March 25th, 2014
Written by: Brandon Choi
Art by: Jim Lee, Tim Sale

Image Comics, Wildstorm, DC Comics (reprinted), 292 Pages

Review:

Back when I was pretty hardcore into Image Comics, the company was still fresh, new and helmed by the coolest creators of the early ’90s. I used to buy everything I could get my hands on.

Jim Lee’s Deathblow was one of those titles and I remember first seeing the title character in the Darker Image one-shot, which was used to introduce a few characters with a darker or harder edge about them.

Deathblow really stood out, even though most people remembered that comic for bringing Sam Keith’s The Maxx into the mainstream.

There was just something super cool and brooding about this character, though. He felt like a much darker version of a Stallone or Schwarzenegger character with a bit of Punisher sprinkled in for extra flavor.

However, Deathblow’s solo series never really resonated with me like I had hoped but as I got older, I thought that it might have had a lot to do with my age at the time. So I always wanted to go back and read it to see it with fresh eyes and a few extra decades of life experience.

Unfortunately, this didn’t blow me away and I actually found it kind of boring once I got to about the midway point of this beefy collection. It just didn’t captivate me and it felt too much like a product of its time, embracing certain tropes, but not really offering up anything unique or different.

However, I have to point out that the artwork is absolutely stupendous and some of the best work I’ve seen from Jim Lee, a real legend in his field. I loved the muted colors and the high contrast and it was the cool art that at least kept me engaged where the story waned.

Looking back and also having read some of the Image Comics stuff as an adult, I think that this was really the issue with a lot of their comics. The art was always top notch and incredible but the stories were always kind of lacking. Maybe this is why Image never became another Marvel or DC, focused on superhero stories, and eventually moved well beyond that genre with things like The Walking Dead, East of West, Paper Girls, Chew and Saga.

Rating: 6/10
Pairs well with: other comics from Jim Lee’s Wildstorm universe.

Comic Review: Deathstroke, Vol. 2: Lobo Hunt

Published: December 14th, 2010
Written by: Rob Liefeld, Justin Jordan
Art by: Rob Liefeld, Art Thibert, various

DC Comics, 266 Pages

Review:

I guess this came out in a time where I wasn’t paying close attention to new comics. Because I would’ve been on board for Rob Liefeld’s take on Deathstroke, especially since his most famous creation, Dead Pool, was done as a sort of parody of the character.

But, man. Having read this now, I kind of wish I never knew about it.

I hate to be harsh but the writing was a disjointed mess that was all over the f’n place. Plus, this collection doesn’t finish Liefeld’s story! It ends on a cliffhanger where Deathstroke and Hawkman are about to fight a horde of evil hawk dudes and then you turn the page and it’s a totally different story.

I mean, what the fuck, DC? Was the Hawkman story a crossover? Where’s the rest of that story? You just jump right past it and into another arc done by a completely different creative team. And frankly, the second half of this book should have just been a volume three, as it is drastically different than the Liefeld stuff that’s left incomplete.

This collection is garbage. It’s poorly organized, its a total clusterfuck narratively and tonally due to the creative team change midway through.

Honestly, this is only worth checking out if you are a Liefeld die hard. And even then, you’ll still be disappointed.

Although, I should mention that I thought it was neat that Liefeld utilized Jim Lee’s WildC.A.T.S. characters, as they’ve pretty much faded away into oblivion since Lee sold them to DC.

Rating: 4/10
Pairs well with: the Deathstroke collection before this one and then the other New 52 stuff after it.

Comic Review: The Flash: Flashpoint

Published: October 8th, 2013
Written by: Geoff Johns
Art by: Andy Kubert

DC Comics, 166 Pages

Review:

This is the best Flash event that I’ve ever read. Granted, I’m not a hug Flash fan in the comics and I haven’t read a lot of his big events but this wasn’t bogged down by too much Speed Force bullshit, which is typically a bone of contention with me, as it’s used to explain every random ass weird thing that happens in modern Flash stories. It’s also why I lost interest in the TV show, which started out pretty damn good.

The Speed Force does play a factor here but it doesn’t make this a mental clusterfuck like the plot of The Flash: Rebirth.

And while The Flash does fight another speedster, this isn’t just about a guy with speed fighting another guy with speed because that shit also gets tiresome and is another reason why I stopped watching the show.

There are a lot of characters and the fact that this takes place in an alternate reality where things are different enough to make the world interesting, makes this feel different than the standard Flash event.

Granted, I wish this featured more of the regular rogues that aren’t speedsters but when most of those villains have become jokes, that was probably for the best. At least we get small cameos from Captain Cold and the Pied Piper, even if they don’t have much to do with the story.

The thing that makes this so good, is that it just grabs you and holds on. It’s a quick read, as it takes place over just five issues but there is a lot to absorb. But in the end, this will hit you in the feels from a few different angles and frankly, that took me by surprise. But the final moments in this made this whole journey worth it.

Geoff Johns is one of my favorite writers of the last decade or so and this is the first Flash story that I felt was on the same level as his best Green Lantern work. Plus, Andy Kubert’s art was incredible and it wasn’t too far of a departure from the style I’ve come accustomed to seeing in Johns’ biggest stories, which were mostly drawn by Ethan Van Sciver.

Flashpoint is an action packed and legitimately emotional ride through two men’s tragic journeys. It was well executed and a visually stunning piece of work.

Rating: 9/10
Pairs well with: the Geoff Johns era of The Flash, as well as other major Flash events.