Outsiders #7 – Jackson Lanzing, Colin Kelly, Writers; Robert Carey, Artist; Annette Taddeo, Colorist
Ray – 9.5/10
Ray: This has been one of the most gleefully surreal, meta comics DC has ever put out, and that was even before last issue’s big reveal—that this is essentially a hard sequel to the iconic Planetary, and that the mysterious Drummer is none other than key player Jakita Wagner. But how did she get from Wildstorm to here? It’s all explained in this solo issue, which kicks off in the status quo of the last days of the old Wildstorm Universe and shows what happened after the last series—and then shatters it all, literally, as an energy wave comes and erases Jakita’s universe in what we soon find out is the New 52. And just like that, Jakita’s continuity is wrecked just like ours was, and she finds herself in a strange new world she barely understands. This makes a compelling story, reminiscent of some that Astro City did about continuity, and also likely sums up some readers’ feelings about that controversial 2011 initiative.
But Jakita isn’t deterred easily, and she soon settles into the new world and tries to understand it—only to have it undermined and rebooted again and again, erasing everything she loves with it. This is, of course, commentary on comic book reboots, but it wouldn’t work without how Lanzing and Kelly make us feel her confusion and despair in every scene. And then, after one reboot too many, she gets a peek behind the curtain as she’s introduced to someone who’s just as lost as she is. This is, of course, all related by her as she tries to explain her true mission to the team she helped build, and results are… mixed. It’s only been one arc, and this book is already wildly different from what I expected it to be in the best way. More significantly, it’s the best use of the Wildstorm characters since Steve Orlando’s work on Midnighter and Apollo, and the best use of the main concepts of that universe in well over a decade.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
