By: Peter Milligan (writer), Mikel Janin (artist), Ulises Arreola (colorist)
The Story: Now, now, June, there’s nothing to lose your head about.
The Review: As a reviewer, I try to keep my biases under control when I do these things, or at least make them obvious when I can’t keep them inside anymore. So I’ll admit it: I really looked forward to this series back when all the new 52 were announced. It featured a bunch of my favorite characters within one of my favorite genres, and it had a fairly qualified writer and artist on deck to boot. But now I must confess this series has been a disappointment on a lot of levels.
For while Milligan has been a competent storyteller for this series, dedicated to selling the “dark” part of the title, he has made the plot and tone dull through repetition. He needs to understand that we get it—Enchantress has gone loco and so is her counterpart, June Moone, and so is just about everyone gathering to confront her. In fact, I’d give good money simply to never hear the words “crazy,” “insane,” “mad,” or any synonym thereof ever again. Milligan sprinkles them throughout every issue, and they’ve lost meaning as a result: “Enchantress has gone crazy.” “A magic that’s stronger and crazier than [Zatanna’s].” “Oh God, I’ve landed in a madhouse.”
Milligan just needs to learn the wisdom behind “Less is more,” or at least the value of timing. He’s so eager to convince you of how twisted this story is, he doesn’t seem to realize that subjecting you to so much grimness can only build your resistance to it. We’ve already seen decayed golem girlfriends come back to life, women getting themselves killed en masse in the street, and a guy who needs a seizure to activate his powers. Homicidal children feel pretty commonplace after all that.
All this applies to character work as well as plot. By this point, Enchantress’ simpering and whimpering about needing June Moone to feel whole fails to garner any of your sympathy, mostly just irritating you. “Why isn’t anyone listening?!” she cries. Because what you’re asking for is cruel and rather selfish, and there’s little anybody can do to help you if you insist on attacking them in this haphazard fashion, you think (or at least, I think).
There are other, more fundamental, flaws with the story besides. For one, you still don’t quite understand Dove’s continued presence in this story. While the early scenes of her and Deadman falling out over the physical nature of their relationship worked fine, all her material afterward has felt unnecessary. We never get to see what happened after her traumatizing run-in with Enchantress in #2; she simply reappears in this issue, beaten and weary, but at least walking upright, only to be told the obvious by Constantine: “You ran into some bad magic?”
On a purely personal level, I disagree with Milligan’s current portrayal of Madame Xanadu, a character who has always been shown to be in control of herself even when she’s not in control of the situation at hand. Now, she’s seen as a woman so on the edge of breaking down that she’s become a druggie to keep herself in control, and even in that state, she shows a very unbecoming testiness when confronted (“I never wanted…to hurt anyone… You don’t…understand.”).
Janin’s photorealistic art is fine, giving the script more dramatic depth than it really possesses, but he’s undermined by Arreola’s somewhat uneven, grainy, and at times faintly blotchy coloring. Looking at everyone’s skin tones, you can see actual patches of color against each other, which results in an overall unsightly effect.
Conclusion: One more issue just to see where this title is going, and I think I’ll probably be done. It’s gotten too hard to overlook the problems with the story, and it simply lacks the subtlety and richness its brethren “Dark” titles has.
Grade: C-
- Minhquan Nguyen
Some Musings: - In another burst of favoritism, can I just say that I’m also not thrilled that Milligan has made Zatanna ineffective not only against Enchantress, but against her copies as well? Give the Mistress of Magic some cred, won’t you?
- Now, imagine this series written by John Rozum and drawn by Ryan Sook. Big win in my book of impossible dreams.
Filed under: DC Comics, Reviews Tagged: | Boston Brand, Dawn Granger, DC, DC Comics, Deadman, Dove, Enchantress, John Constantine, June Moone, Justice League Dark, Justice League Dark #4, Justice League Dark #4 review, Madame Xanadu, Mikel Janin, Mindwarp, Peter Milligan, Rac Shade, Uilses Arreola, Zatanna, Zatanna Zatara
Whilst you are right, it’s bad writing practice to tell the reader what they are meant to be feeling and better to make them feel it though depiction of the story, there are times in which the repetition of words with similar connotations work to create an almost hypnotic flow, like a chant spread under the surface of the story. Lovecraft was probably the best at this – he layers on adjectives so thick and heavy that by all rights he should drown the story, yet this stylistic choice only serves to make his stories all the more effective.
Whilst he is no Lovecraft, Milligan seems to be doing something similar here. The mind-bending imagery and cryptic speech that peppers it’s way though the comics have set the books in the DCU whilst also making it feel like a totally different place.
I guess even when applied at it’s best, this is likely to be divisive method to use, however, so I can’t really fault you for finding it repetitious.
I can appreciate that point of view on it. I confess, Gertrude Stein uses a similar tactic in her writing, and I can’t stand that either. It’s a very impressionistic style of writing, and while I love impressionism as an art form, I find that it really drives me crazy when I read it. But it’s not surprising to me that plenty of other people like it for the reasons you’ve stated.