Bizarro: Year None #1 – Kevin Smith, Eric Carrasco, Writers; Nick Pitarra, Artist; Michael Garland, Colorist
Ray – 9/10
Ray: Whenever Kevin Smith does a comic book, it gets a lot of hype. Along with his collaborator Eric Carrasco and indie sensation Nick Pitarra, he’s promising to craft one of the oddest Bizarro stories ever. There’s just one surprising part of this issue – there’s very little Bizarro in it! This issue picks up about eighteen months after Superman debuted on the scene, but the big man is nowhere to be seen. Coincidentally, Clark Kent and Lois Lane are off on an assignment in Washington DC. That’s when Toyman sends a giant tin soldier that crashes into the Daily Planet, and Perry White (here a much more cranky, opinionated man than he usually is) is determined to make this news story work for the floundering paper. Jimmy Olsen is actually the POV character for this issue, as he tries to convince Perry to hire him and bring the Daily Planet into the modern era.
While these two verbally spar and Perry throws his weight around, another subplot finds a scientist trying to prove himself after a failed experiment in teleportation months ago left him a laughingstock. This time he does prove his technology works – but maybe a little too well, as it rips a hole in Metropolis and winds up sucking Perry and Jimmy’s elevator into another dimension. There, they find a version of Metropolis that’s a little askew, with everyone acting like their alignment is flipped. And overseeing it all is a brutish, simple version of Superman who seems to use people like playthings. Pitarra’s art makes this character look surprisingly menacing, even when he’s not doing anything overtly evil, and that really changes the tone of the whole issue. Because while this issue is funny, the inherent concept of Bizarro World isn’t – and this first issue really drives home just how disturbing it would be to be trapped there.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes
