Originally published on Patreon
Do yourself a favour before reading this issue, read Dark Crisis: The Deadly Green before picking up this issue, as it acts as an issue 4.5 for the event. I read them in the wrong order, and whilst it didn't mess things up too much you'll get the best experience doing it the other way.
This issue follows two main stories. The first takes place on Earth-0, beginning with a team arriving to save Black Adam from Deathstroke's dark army, bringing him back to the Hall of Justice to help the heroes. Sadly, Adam's will has been broken somewhat, and he seems to be at the point where he can't see any way of the good guys winning this.
Whilst the heroes are putting together their plan, under the leadership of Nightwing, Superman and his team return from their own mission (see The Deadly Green) with information on The Great Darkness. The Justice Society volunteer to head out into the multiverse to deal with the Darkness, whilst Nightwing brings every hero possible to the Hall in order to face off against Deathstroke and his forces.
The other story catches up with Hal and Barry, who manage to find a way to snap Bruce out of his brainwashing. Deciding that they need to get the League out of their fantasy worlds, they head off to do so, grabbing Diana, and then going for Clark. However, Clark figured out that his world was a fake a while ago, and has been slowly building up his strength; transforming himself into an even more powerful being.
Clark breaks down the walls of Pariah's fake realities, bringing the League back together on Pariah's planet. But this begins to cause havoc in the newly create infinite earths, and Pariah transports himself and his shadow forces to Earth-0 to destroy that reality and bring his plan to fruition. The issue ends with Pariah arriving on Earth-0 before the assembled heroes, with Deathroke's forces, and the Dark Army that 'killed' the Justice League, including Darkseid, Doomsday, Necron, and the Spectre.
Dark Crisis is a a series that manages to have a lot happen, yet also fits in the time to cram in character moments that are sometimes lacking from these big events. There are some nice moments in this issue, such as Black Adam losing his shit, Nightwing having gained his hope for a good outcome, and the return of Beast Boy after the events of issue one. He might be sporting an eye patch now (ironically similar to Deathstroke, who shot him), but he seems ready to kick some ass.
But it's not perfect, there are some things that do take away some of the enjoyment of this issue. One is the feeling of missing out if you don't read The Deadly Green first, the other is Damian suddenly leaving to go off and do his one-shot. The other is the continued little use of Red Canary. The character was built up in the promotion, and we were told that this series was going to be her big debut, but we're tow issues from the end and she's been hanging in the background not doing much.
There are several other characters who are present but don't get to do much, and certain areas, such as the League doing their stuff very quickly, that have me wondering if perhaps this series would have benefited from being longer, so that some of these smaller characters moments and fast paced story beats could have been given more time.
This seems to be a big turning point in the series, where we've entered the final stages of the story and things are going to ramp up towards the big conclusion. The final page, and Pariah's statement about wanting to destroy Earth-0 points towards the possibility that we may end up losing some people before this is all said and done, as the army that Pariah has assembled is incredibly heavily stacked, and there are several members of it that could kill most of the heroes on their own. However it goes, I don't think this is going to end well for everyone.
This article, and many others, can be read a month early on my Patreon for as little as $3 a month!
No comments:
Post a Comment