Brightest Day #18 Review

Written By: Geoff Johns & Peter J. Tomasi

Artist: Ivan Reis, Ardian Syaf, Scott Clark, Joe Prado

Inker: Vicente Cifuentes, David Beaty

Colorist: Aspen MLT’s Peter Steigerwald, Beth Sotelo

Cover Artist: David Finch

Letterer: Rob Clark Jr.

Editor: Adam Schlagman, Eddie Berganza

My Awe-Inspiring Opinion

And here we are, eight issues into the finale of Brightest Day and things are beginning to make sense…while still being confusing as hell!  This series has been plagued with confusion ever since issue #1, with nothing making any more sense than me playing a game of basketball completely in the nude outside of my neighbor’s house.  Johns and Tomasi have finally figured out where to start giving this story its main pile of gumption, and what better way to do that than by killing off two of DC’s more popular characters?

Now for those of you who have actually read #18, you may or may not be shocked at the death of the Hawks.  I mean, good grief, Comic companies kill off enough characters consistently enough that sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever be surprised at another heroes death ever again.  But in any case, this turn of events is pretty epic, especially how Deadman is left in a dusty cloud of despair, allowing the ashes of the Hawks to trinkle between his fingers.

But of course this issue is a nightmare for the fan of the pure and unadulterated action story that feel a good storyline has no place amongst all the testosterone, punching, explosions, and what not right?  It’s all about love and how the power of love will conquer all.  Sound cheesy right?  Well…it is.  Up until that point where we think we can sit back, relax, and enjoy the fact that Hawkman and Hawkgirl can at long last be together with their curse finally lifted.  Johns and Tomasi certainly pulled out the ultimate cliffhanger as the white ring upon Deadman’s hand interrupts the Hawks moment of embrace and tears them apart, once again causing us to question if the two lovers will ever be happy.

Enhancing the story is of course the ever crowded room of toggling artists, with Ivan Reis heading the team and Peter Steigerwald taking over the coloring duties.  And one thing I am completely sure of, Blackest Night and Brightest Day has been a colorist’s dream boat.  One thing I am ALSO certain of is that the Star Sapphire’s color scheme can do a real number on the eyeballs if not careful.  And I completely echo Mr. Paul Mallory and his inability to look at pinks and purples without thinking of the toy isle bearing Barbie dolls. 

Now this isn’t a criticism, I for one enjoy the clever way the colors were displayed on every page.  But for those of you with weaker eyes…or at least the ones who feel their manhood has been put into question because you’re reading a comic book filled with pretty little colors and all about love…you might want to put on some sun shades.

My Majestically Climactic Conclusion

No doubt this is the best issue of Brightest Day thus far, but it hasn’t had too much competition to begin with.  But offing the Hawks was definitely a story addition that is going to keep me interested until eight issues from now.  (knock on wood.)

But then again, could this death be another rouse?  Will the Hawks come back from the dead?  Tune in next month when we will, more than likely, be confused and start wondering why the hell we are reading this series to begin with.

Rating: 7 out of 10 stars

Comic Book Review: Brightest Day #13

Literary & Artistic Credits

Writer: Geoff Johns & Peter J. Tomasi

Penciller: Ardian Syaf, Ivan Reis, & Joe Prado

Colorist: Peter Steigerwald, John Starr & Ray Dillon

Letterer: Rob Clark Jr.

Cover Art: David Finch, Ryan Winn & Steigerwald

Editor: Eddie Berganza

My Awe-Inspiring Opinion

I haven’t completely given up on Brightest Day as of yet, it’s still keeping my interests going.  But as of late, I’ve been moving closer and closer to dropping this title completely.  I want to remain loyal to Geoff Johns and Peter Tomasi, but the lack lustering feel of this series has left me very unimpressed.  #13 however brings us a much more solid storyline, focusing almost solely on the Hawks and not jumping around from different story to story that doesn’t seem connected in the least.

Both Hawkman and Hawkgirl are at their wits end!  Hawkman brings in an army of Lionmanes and Lizardkons to save his beloved Shiera whose tied up to the gate which has been the bane of both heroes existence since they first become lovers.  But Shiera is not your typical damsel in distress; hands tied and completely hindered, she was still able to crack the neck of Hath-set, theoretically ending the curse that plagues the Hawks.  But now Hawkgirl’s mother has taken her daughter and Hawkman, chained up, to the Star Sapphire’s home planet, where her dreams could very well become a reality.

I’m really not sure how Hawkman and Hawkgirl’s story connects with Brightest Day, but in and of itself, this issue is the best Brightest Day installment thus far.  It was smart on Johns and Tomasi’s part to single out one story and lay the other plots to rest for two weeks.  This particular story with the Hawks has been one of the more confusing story additions to this series and needed to be fleshed out a little more.

With Hath-Set dead now, the big question now remains, is the curse actually broken?  This could be a great lead-in to a new Hawkman solo series huh?

I’m not sure what Hawkgirl’s mother hopes to accomplish on Zamaron.  The planet is full Star Sapphires and the entity is right there, ready to protect everyone.  Sure, she’s powerful, but can she fight an entire corps of Violet Lanterns?

For those of you who read my blog regularly, you already know my feelings on the art right?  With that in mind, it isn’t anywhere NEAR as bad as it has been.  I don’t know who’s consistently penciling everything out, but it was nice to have the bulk of this issue maintained by one artist.  Plus, it seems like this issue used artists whose style’s mimic each other a little better and more consistently.

My Majestically Climactic Conclusion

Half way through the series and things are still as confusing as ever.  But now there seems to be a real conscious effort in trying to wrap up the individual stories to help make sense of this whole ordeal.  I’m not sure what I think of Batman being a possible candidate for the chosen one, but I doubt anything will be truly revealed at this point as far as who the White Lantern will be.

Rating: 7.33 out of 10

Writing: 7

Art: 7

Themes: 8 

Comic Book Review: Brightest Day #8

Literary & Artistic Credits

Writers: Geoff Johns & Peter J. Tomasi

Pencillers: Patrick Gleeson, Ivan Reis & Ardian Syaf

Inkers: Vicente Cifuentes, Rebecca Buchman, Mark Irwin & Ivan Reis

Colorists: Aspen MLT’s Peter Steigerwald with John Starr

Letterer: Rob Clark Jr.

Cover Art: David Finch, Scott Williams & Steigerwald

My Awe-Inspiring Opinion

I’ve decided that this story is so compact that, no matter how it ends, I’m going to be so overwhelmed that I’ll never want to read it again.  There’s enough mystery and enough at stake to keep me interested, but I’ll never understand why Johns and Tomasi felt it so necessary to make Brightest Day so busy to begin with.  What a relief it was for me to find that the focus of this issue was more on Hawkworld that our two winged avengers have found themselves trapped on.  Martian Manhunter is given a spotlight, but truly, this issue gave us a chance to slow down, breathe, and take in one story without worrying about everything else going on.

Martian Manhunter sees a glimpse of what happened to M’Gann and who her attacker was.  But at the center of this whole fiasco is, of course, (We all saw it coming!) the forested Star City.  But nothing more is revealed other than the red eyed, bald-headed, poorly dressed alien flying downwards into the heart of the forest itself.

Hawkman goes on the search for Hawkgirl but runs into what seems like a religious calling in the eyes of the Hawkworld inhabitants.  But Hawkman need not worry about his beloved too much since she’s drop kicking everyone’s ass that gets in her way of escaping.  That is until her (gasp) mother shows up!  Despite a mere distraction on her part which caused her to not mind her surroundings, Hawkgirl just showed us that the “girl” portion of her name really doesn’t apply to her womanly personality.  If Hawkgirl ever gets her own series, sign me up as a regular subscriber!

I won’t go to heavily into the art as most of you who read my blog consistently already know what my thoughts are.  But I’ll give it to DC, this issue was tremendously smoother in the artist transition.  If my scanner didn’t FINALLY kill over, I would have scanned in Hawkgirl’s triumphant and exciting burst towards us, the readers.  The intensity in that scene, along with all of the other events happening on Hawkworld was spectacular.  If only Syaf could have stayed out of this issue, I would have given the art a 10!

My Majestically Climactic Conclusion

Brightest Day is slowly kicking off into a much more solid and comprehensive story, enough so to keep me reading it to the very end.  But to be honest, I don’t know how in the world the series is going to end without giving all of its readers an aneurism.  There’s way too much going on and I don’t think this series is going to be as successful as Johns and Tomasi hope it to be.

Rating: 8 out of 10

Writing: 8

Art: 8

Themes: 8

Comic Book Review: Brightest Day #7

Book Information

Written by Geoff Johns & Peter Tomasi
Penciled by Ivan Reis, Patrick Gleason, Ardian Syaf, Scott Clark, Joe Prado
Colors by Aspen MLT’s Peter Steigerwald with John Starr
Lettered by Rob Clark Jr.
Cover by David Finch, Scott Williams, & Steigerwald

My Awe-Inspiring Opinion
Alright, now we’re getting somewhere. Finally, things are starting to make sense, and just when I was ready to call it quits with this comic. Johns and Tomasi have definitely raised the bar this week with the promised and much anticipated revelation in this issue. While the bulk of the story is still a mystery, we’ve been given some angst to hold onto for two weeks to help boost our confidence that Brightest Day is actually going somewhere.

Each character gets their time in the spotlight, but none like Deadman. One of the questions at the forefront of my mind dealt with the King Arthur figure and who would actually be able to lift the white lantern from the ground. I don’t want to call it too soon however, it’s still fairly early in the story, but finally we can be certain of Deadman’s importance within Brightest Day.

The artist toggle didn’t work for me as much this time through; there was a lot more bumpy transitions from style to style that I wish would have felt more seamless. I just have a REALLY hard time going from this…

To this…

However, the artistry of each separate unit was executed quite well. Some parts of the toggling were actually very interesting, especially during the revelational two paged spread where each character is given a specific task to perform. And while the artistic finality of the two pager spread is quite ingenious, the whole idea that the white lantern entity is setting destiny in motion seems rather contrived to me. I felt the entity was very helpless against Nekron; being displayed as very innocent, ignorant, and like an infant unable to understand the world around him. (Or is it a her?) But this is part of the overarching mystery I suppose, I shouldn’t knock it quite yet.

Is it just me, or does Aquaman’s dilemma seem a bit TOO odd? First he can only control dead sea creatures, now he can bring them to life? I would really like to know where Johns and Tomasi are going with this. I understood the connection with death since he is, after all, a retired Black Lantern. But now, all of the sudden whatever he touches comes to life? Maybe this falls into place somewhere that I’m not seeing, but I would very much like this to resolve sooner rather than later.

My Awesomely Climactic Conclusion
Nicely done. I truly was ready to give up on this series. I was afraid the Morrison disease was spreading into Johns and Tomasi writing a story with a confusion lead up to a eventual poor ending. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

Ratings
Writing: 8
Themes: 8
Art: 6
Overall: 7.33 out of 10

Comic Book Review: Green Lantern Corps #48

Book Information

Written by Tony Bedard

Penciled by Ardian Syaf

Colored by Randy Mayor, Gabe Eltaeb, Carrie Strachan

Inked by Vicente Cifuentes

Lettered by Steve Wands

Cover by Rodolfo Migliari

My Awe-Inspiring Opinion

With an entirely new creative team behind the Corps, opinions have been running amuck all throughout the internet and other social networking sites if the Tomasi and Gleeson replacements will live up to the standard set by the said writer and artist team.  I fell into this category numerous times as I constantly found myself worried if Bedard and Syaf could actually pull off an equally good continuation of the Corps post Blackest Night.  And without a shadow of a doubt, they do.

This book follows a typical pattern any comic book does when recovering from a major event.  However it works quite well with the Corps since this title, month after month, focuses on three to four plotlines that don’t always correlate with one another.  Bedard uses this unique aspect of the Green Lantern Corps as a way of easily transitioning into Brightest Day, except this time each plot seems to connect to the darker, more mysterious plot. 

While Kyle Rayner and John Stewart, along with the assistance of a few newbie Lanterns, attempt to rebuild the Oan City, (in a more traditional look) The Alpha Lanterns are seemingly taking many Lanterns one by one and turning them into Alpha Lanterns.  With this going on, I find it highly suspicious that Alpha Lantern Boodikka requests John Stewart’s assistance with some unknown event.  Also in the background, right at the beginning in fact, is the strange alliance that Guy Gardner and Ganthet seem to have with Atrocitus.  It was just enough of a teaser to keep us intrigued about the future, but did not linger and dull over the main plot.  Bedard is building his story up a tad slow, but it keeps the momentum going and never lags.

Artistically, I have very little complaints.  I did, however, find it a bit odd in the beginning when Atrocitus’ jaw seemed disconnected from his head due to the vast amounts of blood splattering from his mouth.  Other than that, Syaf delivers the quality work that I’m sure we’ve all come to expect from him. 

My Profoundly Climactic Conclusion

Overall, this issue is fun and satisfying.  I’m not sure it’s AS good as the literary precedent Tomasi has set, but Bedard is definitely showing potential.

Ratings

Writing: 10

Themes: 9

Art: 8

Overall: 9 out of 10

Comic Book Review: Brightest Day #1

Book Information

Written by Geoff Johns & Peter Tomasi

Penciled by Ivan Reis, Ardian Syaf, Scott Clark, Joe Prado

Colored by Peter Steigerwald

Inked by Vicente Cifuentes, Mark Irwin, Oclair Albert, David Beaty

Cover by Ivan Reis

My All-Inspiring Opinion

If you were to try and decipher the differences between Blackest Night and Brightest Day, you might find the task a little more daunting than expected.  This first issue (well, 2^nd if you count issue #0) begins the latest chapter in the Green Lantern mythos.  Johns delves into the mystery involving the risen heroes and the mysterious white light that seems to be weighted down in its Lantern shape by some unknown force.  We also see the beginnings of conflicts that our featured heroes, Aquaman, Firestorm, the Hawks, and Martian Manhunter will face in the coming issues.  Each hero finds themselves faced with memories or events of a violent nature, riddled with violent stranglings…

Dead sea animals rising from the depths…

And cleavers slicing through men’s throats…

I would say that the title “Brightest Day” is quite deceiving in its uplifting and appealing connotation. 

In seeing the the 3^rd panel on the 5^th page of Hal Jordan attempting to lift the White Lantern from the ground, I was very close to tossing this book across the room.  But my frustrations were relinquished when Geoff Johns clearly wanted his audience to be aware of this aspect in the story’s plot development.  I was relieved that Johns wasn’t trying to hide the fact that this IS going to be the story of “The Sword in the Stone.”  This gives DC’s most popular writer the ability to shock and alarm his readers since he will most assuredly give Brightest Day an unexpected conclusion.  Will the “destined one” be a King Arthur type of figure, or a lowly man who has a deeper connection with life and death?

While Blackest Night had some of the most disturbing visuals I’ve ever seen in comics, Brightest Day gives us some fairly disturbing sequences of which play around with the mind much more.  Aquaman, despite having risen from the dead and being completely healthy with no Captain Hook arm, (Thank God!) he finds himself unable to call on the aid of living sea animals.  In addition, Firestorm, the Hawks, and Martian Manhunter are flooded with disturbing images and scenes that cause me to wonder just what emotional baggage do they unwillingly carry from the events of Blackest Night?  Just when you thought all your questions would be answered, Johns throws a monkey wrench into the story.

Aquaman and Mera seem to share a problem.  As stated, since being severed from the Black Ring’s power, Aquaman still finds himself connected with the dead, only able to contact a deceased, mauled Shark and giant squid.  Likewise, Mera still seems to have some connection with her brief, but intense relationship with the red ring of rage.  This theme of lingering connectivity with the emotional spectrum stuck out at me the most and I feel Johns could be going somewhere with this. 

As most of you who follow my blog, I’m sure you’ve already guessed my opinions on the artistic approach.  The entire team of artists on this book are great, but the toggling from artist to artist drives me nuts.  Ivan Reis does fantastic work, so why couldn’t DC just hire him to draw the whole friggin issue?!?!  He’s not doing anything right now!  I don’t get it!  I can’t justify ranking the art high when I become so distracted by the different art styles.  Although, Reis certainly gave us some amazing visuals…

My Profoundly Climactic Conclusion

Nothing more can be said except that this issue is great.  I don’t think it deserves any awards for greatest comic book ever, but it does start the mystery off well.

Ratings

Writing: 9

Themes: 9

Art: 6

Overall: 8 out of 10

Comic Book Review: The Phantom Stranger #42

Book Information

Written by Peter J. Tomasi

Art by Ardian Syaf

Plot

The Phantom Stranger returns to the comic books stands as Blackest Night comes closer to its inevitable climax.  The Stranger takes on the Black Lantern Spectre along with the help of Blue Devil.  To make matters worse, the confusing dilemma of Deadman fighting his risen body becomes the central focus of the Stranger; he assists Deadman in taking control of his body to hopefully bury it where it will be kept safe.  But what happens when a barrage of Black Lanterns have set out to destroy that very resting place?

My Thoughts

I know nothing of the Phantom Stranger except that I’ve heard of him and seen him occasionally cameo in certain titles I pick up monthly; that’s the extent of my knowledge.  After reading this issue however, I’m starting to hope DC has plans on making a permanent revival of the hero because I loved every moment of this book.

Tomasi intelligently writes the banter between Blue Devil and The Stranger, making it humorous while still maintaining that serious undertone.  It was fun to see Blue Devil unable to out wit someone with his negative outlook on life.  The Phantom Stranger wasn’t even making any snappy comebacks at the expense of Blue Devil, but still kept the blue demon in his place.

The story has two major plotlines going on, (which is a risky thing to do) where the Stranger and Devil assist the Spectre to take back control of his body with no success, and Boston Brand fights his risen corpse and rebury it.  Both of these plots stay strong and do not linger or dwell on unimportant dialog and narratives.  We discover that the souls of risen lanterns stay in tact while the bodies remain consumed by the black rings.  This was also hinted at in Blackest Night: Wonder Woman #2 in which her Diana’s inner monolog narrates the story while her body brutally murders three people.  Boston Brand fighting the horde of Black Lanterns was intense and terrifying; I could sense the pain coming from Brand so vividly it was incredible.  I did enjoy the Spectre fight, but I was thrown off by the unresolved conflict where The Spectre was unable to regain control of his body, and the Black Lantern side of the spirit of vengeance flies off to find Hal Jordan.  I’m sure this only means The Spectre holds some importance to the resolution of Blackest Night, which means I have more to look forward too.

The Phantom Stranger is such an interesting character, much like the Question and the Spirit.  I find myself attracted to those hardcore, vintage detective titles more and more as DC continually revitalizes the silver age of comics.  I cannot stress enough how I wish DC would give the Phantom Stranger his own title back and allow us unfamiliar to him to discover how obviously cool he is.

Ardian Syaf is a great artist whose style resembles that of my favorite comic book artists, Ed Benes and Ivan Reis.  The realistic figures and wonderful facial expressions should not go unnoticed or undenied as some of the best work in comics.  In fact, I would argue that where Syaf surpasses Benes lies with the originality of his work.  Ed Benes tends to make all of his woman and men very similar in facial features, where as Syaf seems to have a variety of faces in which he brings to his art.

Overall

No complaints about this issue except for the fact that Zatanna appears on the cover, but not in the actual story.  I hate it when that’s done and it seems to be a consistent feature of DC comic books.  However, I’m not allowing that to dictate my feelings about this issue.  Unless one of my comics I’ve subscribed too comes in the mail later and blows me away, I think this issue will most definitely make my top three comics for the month.

Rating: 9.5 out of 10 stars