Sunday, January 25, 2009

Faces of Evil: Deathstroke #1 Review

Recently reviewed by me at CBR: Faces of Evil: Deathstroke #1, about which I write the following sentences: "Nothing in this comic makes any kind of logical sense, not even using the kind of DC comic book logic that allows Batman to shoot gods with space bullets or Superman to live in the heart of the sun. (And it's way less interesting than either of those things. It's less interesting than reading the Wikipedia entries of those things.)"

Read the entire review HERE.

4 comments:

Vanja said...

I've not read the book itself, but I expect better from David Hine, than doing fill ins on "the Brave and the Bold" or oneshots, such as the one that opened "Joker's Asylum" or this one. He has done some solid work for Marvel (the "Son of M" mini-series), and his "Strange embrace" is one of the best horror comics I've ever read, so I can't say that I'm thrilled seeing as to how he's been losing prominence as the creator in the last couple of years.

On the other hand, it's strange to see Georges Jeanty off "Buffy the vampire slayer" already, considering it was one of the best non-Marvel/DC launches in a long time. He never was the flashiest penciler, even when he was doing stuff like "Gambit/Bishop", so it's surprising to see him going back to fill ins for other companies already.

As for Deathstroke itself, I've always found him an over-the-top self-consciously cool grim and gritty character. It always seemed to me that his creators thought he wasn't cool enough being a gray-haired guns and ammo veteran, and had to add a patch to his eye to drive home the point, even though his main super power is the healing factor. Coupled with an increasingly complicated family tree, I've always found it strange that he managed to hold on to an ongoing series for several years. It was during the comic boom in the 90-ies, but still, the idea that he lasted so long as the protagonist, and me never seen it brought up by fans or professionals, it's still a surprise.

Timothy Callahan said...

One of the characters in this issue asks "if he has a healing factor, why doesn't his eye grow back?" It's unanswered in the comic.

Other unanswered questions: "Who thought this story would be worth paying someone to draw?

"Why does Deathstroke need to 'redefine' himself as a stand-alone operative?"

And: "Seriously, Mike Marts is a great guy, a smart guy, so was he coerced into approving this script or was he just groggy after reading all the 'Batman R.I.P.' scripts?"

Anonymous said...

Tim, you sound like one of those "R.I.P. makes my brain hurt"-people.

Anonymous said...

Seeing David Hine try to imitate Geoff Johns makes me want to cry.