Superman: Action Comics #1061 – Jason Aaron, Writer; John Timms, Artist; Rex Lokus, Colorist
Ray – 9/10
Ray: Jason Aaron has been making a strong arrival at DC, with his debut in Batman: Off-World followed by coming on Action Comics for the first arc on Superman: Superstars. This anthology format will tell oversized stories featuring some of the biggest creators in the industry, and for Aaron’s first tale he focuses on… Bizarro? A strange choice, but especially due to the fact that there are actually two versions of the backwards-talking Superman doppelganger. The first, a failed clone created by Lex Luthor, is a mostly heroic chaos agent friends with Jason Todd. But the other, the version from Bizarro World, is much more powerful and much more threatening—and actually poses a serious threat to Superman through sheer strength and anger. At least, that was his only asset—until now. Because as this issue begins, he’s rampaging his way through Sorcerer’s World, taking what he wants.
Because after all, if Superman is weak to magic, Bizarro should be the strongest there is at it, right? It’s an interesting hook, and results in the most threatening Bizarro we’ve ever seen. Bizarro World is missing since the last universal reshuffle, leaving Bizarro desperate to get his wife and daughter back. When he arrives in Metropolis, he proceeds to unleash a beatdown on Superman the likes of which only Zod or Doomsday could deliver, before unleashing a twisted master plan that has shocking effects on the city. I’m a hard sell for a Bizarro story, because his speech patterns get annoying a length, but Aaron finds a way to sidestep that early on. While Bizarro is more intimidating here than he’s ever been, the real strength here is in Aaron’s Superman characterization. There’s an excellent scene involving how his super-hearing works early on. It’s a strange story to begin with, but this arc has a ton of promise.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
