The saga continues!
Jimmy Olsen#141 finishes the Don Rickles storyline, and does it with a great deal of pace and polish. The real Don Rickles shows up, meets his doppleganger Goody Rickels, is predictably revulsed. The Golden Guardian races to find a antidote for the explosive he, Jimmy and Goody have eaten. Superman/Clark Kent finds himself in another dimension and is saved from same by of all people Lightray of the New Gods. Morgan Edge is upset when Goody and Jimmy show up and soon are saved by the Guardian who has beaten the Inter-Gang up and gotten the antidote. Then Clark returns via Boom Tube and his plan to eliminate these nusances is completely dashed. Don Rickles overcome by all this is literally carried away to end the story.
Foreve People #4 is one of my favorite issues. The cover is outstanding and the story has the FP captive in "Happyland", Desaad's torture chamber on Earth disguised as an amusement park. The FP are held in various traps which cause them great distress because illusions force them to think others are ignoring their plight. While they suffer, the crowd laughs at what they understand to be entertainments. These are very clever and show the emphasis on psychological stress as opposed to physical stress. Desaad doesn't want them to die necessarily, but he definitely wants them to suffer. It's great evil on display and still sends a shiver. Darkseid walks the grounds of the Happyland and his evil is only seen by a child, scared to death of him, Darkseid says only children see the world accruately as they are not blinded by their own self delusions. It's a great scene and his maliciousness is readily apparent.
New Gods #4 gives us the O'Ryan Gang, the four Earthers Orion saved work together to infiltrate Inter Gang and destroy the "Jammer" a device which keeps Orion's Mother Box from finding Darkseid's minions. The story opens with the death of Seagrin, a New God who we only seen after his demise. The Black Racer shows up to carry him away, and Orion declares he'll see vengeance. At the end of the story, Orion is on his way to battle the Deep Six and confronts the Spawn. The preliminaries are over and the New Gods saga is really beginning to click on all cylinders. Some of Kirby's best work ever is in the offing!
Mister Miracle #4 completes the battle with Doctor Bedlam and shows us how Scott escapes the tower of madmen. He does so with the help of Big Barda. She debuts in this issue, first scaring Oberon and then rushing to Scott's aid. The two of them end Bedlam's threat, escape multiple traps, including one on a TV soundstage featuring a show about Medieval times which explains the cover image, and return home to explain it all to Oberon. Scott usually does his stuff it seems, then stops to explain his trick, a pattern we've seen in previous issues. Barda shows up at the end of the story sans armor in all her zoftig glory and suddenly we're all more interested.
This round of stories really gives the first in which all the series seem to have fully established themselves and are just telling stories. New characters show up, Barda and Sonny Sumo at the end of Forever People, and the scope of the war seems to be spreading. Even Jimmy and Superman seem to be drawn deeper to the center of things in the Rickles issues.
It's all great stuff, and gets better each round. With this installment I'm putting my analysis of the Fourth World books on hold for a time. Maybe I'll get back to it later on.
Rip Off
No comments:
Post a Comment