Suicide Squad: Dream Team #4 – Nicole Maines, Writer; Eddy Barrows, Penciller; Eber Ferreira, Inker; Adriano Lucas, Colorist
Ray – 9/10
Ray: While this was initially announced as a Suicide Squad side comic, it’s quickly evolved into the biggest lead-up to Absolute Power yet, pitting Dreamer against a more-ruthless-than-ever Amanda Waller—and her own team. As Dreamer realizes just how far gone Waller is, she made a last desperate stand, but her team has their own concerns—namely, not having the bombs in their head blow up. There’s only one member of the team who displays some second thoughts, and that’s Bizarro—the hapless, clueless super-strong clone who might be able to survive the bomb. As Dreamer makes an escape and seeks out Waller, there’s a surprising casualty and some big action scenes as she arrives in Gamorra—but that’s nothing compared to what awaits. It’s a testament to the strength of this series’ writing that its most compelling scene is just two characters standing opposite each other and arguing.
And once they meet, it becomes the tensest face-off this series has had yet. Dreamer is all righteous rage, still believing that she can put the world right. Waller, meanwhile, has nothing left but hardened rage at the many obstacles put in front of her. It doesn’t make her any less of a monster, but you can tell Maines has sympathy for the woman Waller used to be before she turned her back on her last scruples. And speaking of which… when Waller’s final gambit against Dreamer is revealed, it’s so twisted that it’s hard to imagine anything in the main event will top this. Given the nature of Dreamer’s powers, it’s no surprise that there are some unique twists here in terms of the format of this issue, but it wouldn’t work if the previous three issues hadn’t gotten us deeply invested in the plot and the characters. This has me very excited to see more of both the event and Dreamer, hopefully under Maines’ writing.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
