Superman: Action Comics #1096 – Mark Waid, Writer; Skylar Partridge, Artist; Ivan Plascencia, Colorist
Ray – 9.5/10
Ray: For the first time, Mark Waid’s reinvention of the early days of Superboy is crossing over with the present as part of Reign of the Superboys, but that’s just a small part of the issue. The bulk is just more great Mark Waid Superboy action – but then things get weird. The issue begins with Superboy continuing to investigate Lana’s mysterious father Lewis Lang, but the two cross paths when a mysterious explosion of a tree provides Superboy’s first hint that something wonky is going on. He soon heads with his friends to the Metropolis Science Expo, a return to where it all began last year, but he soon notices some strange time anomalies plaguing the area. The ice cream Pete Ross is eating never seems to shrink, time is out of sync with sound, and a falling object seems to freeze in mid-air. He’s forced to ditch his friends and start looking for the answer – but being in Metropolis for the first time as Superboy throws him for a loop.
As soon as he’s surrounded by the chaos of the big city, he starts seeing people to save – and it never stops. There’s a great multi-page segment of Superman just battling to save one person after another, driving himself into a breakdown before he remembers some key advice Ma Kent gave him when he was young. Waid hasn’t written too many Superman lead comics before this era, but his take on the character is always so human, so profound, and it works perfectly. But before too long, he’s able to zero in on the source of the anomaly, and finds his way to a strange lab – where three familiar faces from the modern day step out, pulling Clark into his biggest adventure yet. It’s basically spoiled that he’s coming to the present, at least for a short period, and that’s going to be a huge change for this title’s tone. But if there’s one thing Waid has earned after a year on this book, it’s all the time he needs to create his master plan for the character.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes
