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I’ll be honest, as goofball as the Return of Superman comic arc was, I didn’t mind it. It was fun to see Cyborg Superman come back during the Sinestro Corps storyline.

This one seems to be lacking something that was fairly prominant in the movie and comic but I suppose it is a little more kid friendly.

One of my favourite villains from the Superman animated series.

Someone could nitpick and say this wasn’t DC but it’s an imprint OWNED by DC so too bad.

Batman – Hush at Amazon for $16.49

Let’s take a break at one of Loeb’s most popular modern stories, Batman – Hush.

This is a pretty neat story, because for me, the least interesting part of the story was the character it’s titled after. I thought Hush himself sucked. He had a generic costume, he wasn’t terribly exciting in any way, and as I found out by reading the story, his motivations were kind of boring too.

Fortunately, the rest was better. Loeb tosses in all the familiar Batman villains, all with their own motivations that tie to the Bat, a big mystery. Hell, he even takes him to Metropolis and has a great Batman vs Superman fight. One of the few I’ve actually enjoyed.

It’s a fairly entertaining read with lots of events happening, it keeps a solid action packed pace, and it’s not too long either. It’s a good Batman fix, even for people that aren’t terribly familiar with Batman, they’ll enjoy it.

The best thing about it is Jim Lee’s fantastic art. I used to like his work back on X-Men, but the first time I read this comic a few years back, I finally got to see just how much he’d improved. It’s really stunning work.

4/5. While some parts are lacking, it’s a solid Batman read. Worth getting just for the art.

The idea for the line is basically a less “adult” version of the more recent Adam Hughes statues, done with the animated ladies. Harley Quinn’s statue has a great concept. Having her laying down on top of a giant deck of cards with a novelty sized gun.

The sculpting is nice and looks very similar to the animated series. The paint is solid, even if it is simple.

I do have one issue with the statue that kept me from keeping it. I don’t like her smile one bit. It doesn’t remind me of Harley’s face in the animated series at all. It annoyed me more the more I looked at it. I’m being too picky but there you have it.

The cards have a tendency to get dirty due to the space between them so make sure you dust this on a regular basis.

3.5/5. Just because I don’t like the face, doesn’t mean you won’t.

Buying Options : Long sold out at retail, good luck at Ebay.

Batman Knightfall : Part One currently available for $12.23 at Amazon

This was a huge thing back in the day. When you think of the setup, who wouldn’t read it? All of Arkham Asylum is let out to destroy Gotham. A newer supervillain, Bane, organized all of it in an effort to break the Bat. It sounded so awesome when I was younger! Shame that I didn’t read it back then, I think I would’ve enjoyed it more.

The main problem is it’s too damn long. The whole event is 68-70 issues. That includes Knightfall – Knight Quest – Knight’s End. Oi. The next problem is there’s a lot of backstory involving Bane/related characters that they don’t bother explaining. It’s not essential, but when you’re dealing with an event this long, there should be some short one-off page that explains what happened in the year prior to the event. Anyways, on to the Knightfall run.

It starts a little cheesy. Batman’s villains don’t usually work in a giant gangbang like this, but you know what? About two issues in, I started getting into it. Bane’s plan is pretty cool, if not ridiculous in concept and execution, he turns out to be a solid character. When my previous opinions of him were based on the cartoon (awesome) and the live action movie (barfo), I wasn’t sure what I’d get in comic form.

It gets better and better as Batman gets worn out and desperate. He knows he can’t rest long or put others at risk. These are by far the best parts of this event. Eventually, Batman is broken. Azrael has to take over his role. If you’re not familiar with him, he’s like Batman. BUT ANGRY. WITH CLAWS.

In the 90s, that seemed like a winning formula. Big surprise, like almost every other edgy attempt in the 90s, it starts sucking pretty quick. Azrael is tolerable until about the end of Knightfall, but it was getting rough to read.

Now you’re probably thinking, damn this is long for a dr_teng comic review, I bet he’ll split it up for the other parts of the event. WRONG. I was reading the rest and it becomes intolerable. I had to skim a good 40 issues of crap. Sometimes I would stop and give an issue a whirl just to see if it improved. It didn’t. It focuses on uninteresting storylines, Azrael’s descent into madness isn’t written in an interesting way, I honestly wasn’t sure how they could’ve taken a mostly fun event and turned it into such dreck.

I won’t even get into art since I found it disappointing all around, even at the best of times it was average.

3.5/5 for Knightfall. There’s some great moments and it’s well paced. 1/5 for the rest. I consider it almost unreadable.

My first impression was that these are huge. I knew they weren’t mini-busts, I just wasn’t expecting something that was over a foot tall. Most DC busts are either mini-busts, ala the Women of DC series, or 1:2 scale busts, like the recent Batman and Joker, and the Sideshow Legendary Scale busts. I can’t think of any other busts that’re in scale with these, so they stand out in a collection.

The paint is pretty decent, but it’s a fairly basic job and isn’t anything special. Superman’s eyes are strange. On my bust, they’re just black. I’ve seen other pictures where they’re like this, and I don’t get the reasoning. Why would Superman have black eyes that look like they simply weren’t painted? Who knows!

As for the sculpting, it’s not terribly well done. Batman is the better of the two and looks like his animated version, the Superman kind of does, but not really. Not nearly as nice as the maquettes. The bases are quite basic, and unfortunately, the letters are weak. It couldn’t have been that much more effort to make sure the letters look decent, but I guess that just wasn’t on the gameplan! The pose is fairly standard, and while nothing original, it’s not ugly either. I think these look pretty decent when displayed at an angle, so if you pick these up, keep that in mind.

2/5. These feel like a sloppy effort. The redeeming qualities are primarily the size and novelty of these busts, and that they look decent if you can display them at an angle. If you’re a huge fan of the animated series, these aren’t a bad purchase, but they should’ve put more effort into them. Poor form, DC!

Buying Options : The only place these are currently available is when they pop up on Ebay.

Batman : Faces for $9.95 at Amazon

The basic story of this is that Two-Face escapes prison and puts together a collection of carnival freaks to help him with his crimes. There’s a few issues I had with the story. But hell, it was only 3 issues long so I’m not going to get into mega critique mode here.

The thing that most puzzled me was the motivations of some of the characters within the story. When you see what happens in the ending and try to relate it to events that happened during the storyline, it didn’t quite fit for me.

On the plus side, the art is perfect with a great classic feel while not coming off as outdated in the slightest.

3.5/5 Despite my little summary of the story and what may seem like more complaints than praise, it’s a short and enjoyable story.

Identity Crisis for $10.19 currently at Amazon

As far as DC events go, this was one of the more readable ones. The overall events are always easy enough to understand, but understanding why certain actions are done usually requires a huge understanding of DC history, which I don’t have. Nor care to have, since I don’t feel like reading about the history of some third rate character from the 70s.

It starts off with the death of a hero’s wife. The story is supposed to be a mystery with the Justice League trying to figure out if their families are in danger. Obviously, there’s a lot more going on beneath the surface than that.

The most interesting part of the whole story for me was that it was ending an era for DC superheroes, and really, heroes in comics in general. Yeah, you’ve had dirtier heroes for decades, ones that were willing to do what it takes, but you never had someone like the Avengers or the Justice League willing to do what they did in Identity Crisis to keep themselves and their families safe. The rift that forms in the Justice League, the way villains start trying to protect themselves, even what the heroes had to do to their own, it’s all fascinating stuff.

The mystery itself wasn’t that appealing to me, especially when the villain gives itself away accidentally when others are beginning to realize who it is.

In another plus, the art is well done, and the covers (by Michael Turner) are top notch, especially the one with Wonder Woman. I find it to be one of her most iconic images.

3/5. It presents itself as a mystery, but the mystery isn’t satisfying. As an evolution of DC heroes, and not necessarily for the best, that’s where the strength of this event lies. It’s a very important event in DC history.

Dark Knight Returns for $10.19 currently at Amazon

One of the classic Batman comics, considered a must-read, and I gotta say I agree, but Frank Miller goes over the top here.

You’ve got a unique art style that works well for the comic, even if some of the illustrations of people look ridiculous. They sometimes don’t make any sense and look like someone took a hammer to their faces/bodies. Some of the other illustrations really knock it out of the park and they’re gorgeous. So yeah, the few crappy parts don’t take away too much from the rest of the art, it’s just a mixed bag.

Now we’re on to the story and writing. Batman is in his mid 60s and has been in retirement for around a decade. Superheroes for the most part have retired. Gotham’s gone to shit, there’s tons of crime, and a huge gang of mutated dudes are getting ready to attack Gotham. It’s a pretty good start and a solid enough reason for Batman to get into the action. The story develops well and it’s an interesting idea, which is why I’m sure the premise was somewhat used in Batman Beyond (though obviously, he’s even older in that and fully retired).

Writing wise, I thought Miller did a much better job on Year One. It seemed for Dark Knight Returns he was let loose and the impression I got was he really hates : the media, the government, criminals, liberals, Superman, basically everything except Batman, since he’s the only voice of reason. It’s not so bad at first, but he keeps hammering away at it for pages on end. Yeah alright, Batman is great, without the strong moral authority of Batman the world has went to shit, blah blah.

Fortunately, it’s not difficult to get past that and enjoy this for what it is.

3.5/5.