Deathstroke Inc. #5 – Joshua Williamson, Writer; Paolo Pantalena, Artist; Hi-Fi, Colorist
Ray – 8.5/10
Ray: Joshua Williamson continues to switch things up every issue of this high-octane thriller, swapping settings with ease and near-constant chaos. This issue finds Deathstroke and Black Canary lost in the Crooked House, the headquarters of the notorious Prometheus. This space outside of time and space usually comes with illusions and bizarre physics, and it doesn’t disappoint. With the style of a haunted house, it forces Slade and Dinah to split up, and then gives us a look at the alternate lives they could have lived. Slade finds himself a patriarch of a family of superheroes, a mentor to the Teen Titans, and is confronted with his horrible failures as a father. Dinah, meanwhile, gets her mother back and has her whole family reunited, but at the cost of discovering that they’re assassins and villains in this world—and they’re about to wage a war on the Justice League.
It’s an interesting concept, although it doesn’t quite feel like these worlds really make sense and Dinah’s isn’t much of a temptation—although it is good to see another reference towards Lian, who should be making her way back to the Arrowfam soon enough. They eventually make their way out of there and discover a little more about the masterminds behind the plot in TRUST. The new Libra gets an origin, along with a massive gang of villains backing her up—including some familiar faces and a shocking betrayal from within the TRUST gang. Sure enough, the end of the issue brings another major status quo shift, as Slade proves that some things never change. While this title has maintained an unpredictable vibe since the start, it’s building towards something big—maybe bigger than we know, given recent announcements. It really feels like Williamson is building the future of the DCU in these titles.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
