By: Mark Millar (writer), Leinil Yu (pencils), Gerry Alanguilan (inks), Javier Tartaglia (colors), Clayton Cowles (letters) & Nicole Boose (editor)
The Story: Now that we know the origin of the power that turned a little boy into Superior, we have to see what evil this Faustian bargain will bring.
Five things:
1). A well told story, even if it is a little predictable. If you follow Mark Millar at all online, you see that most comments about him relate to the way he hypes his projects or how he often has movie deals lined up before the comic miniseries is finished. It’s hard to imagine what’s so objectionable about a guy marketing his creator-owned material or a guy taking a movie studio’s money when they offer it to him (especially because I’m sure it puts money in the artists’ pockets too), but for some reason Millar’s behavior drives some fans to distraction. That distraction is unfortunate because Millar really does write well. There’s nothing too ground-breaking about the story in Superior, but the script is well-written and both this issue and series have hit all the appropriate dramatic beats at just the right time. It’s easy to take professional story-telling for granted, but then you read a hot mess like Fear Itself and realize that this stuff is harder than it looks.
2). A touch of humanity from the reporter. This series has also reminded readers that Millar can write effectively about things that aren’t hyper-violent. The turn the sexy reporter takes in this issue is very touching (even if Millar does wields her compassion like a blunt weapon). All along, she’s been played up as Ms. “I’ll do anything to get the story that’ll make my career” and when we last saw her, she was plotting to hump Superior’s brains out to get his side of the story. Not only did the story not go there (with all the icky Big-esque issues), she really surprised by being a compassionate human being with a touching back story.
3). Pretty good art. Yu’s style is a little too realistic to really make me personally go wild, but he does his thing very well in this issue. He has a really fine line that is pretty distinctive. What complaints I have about the art are more from a coloring standpoint: It’s a little too highlighted for my tastes, but most comic fans are going to eat this up.
4). Classic morality play. As stated above, the story isn’t groundbreaking. This delves into SPOILER territory, but after this space monkey turns a handicapped boy into Superior (think Superman), the monkey reveals himself to be a minion of the Devil and takes the boy’s powers away. He can only get them back by selling his soul. The moral equation is pretty easy there! But Millar doesn’t leave things be and tosses in a wrinkle that makes it a much more interesting moral dilema whether the boy should take the monkey up on his offer or not.
5). Well released. This series has had some delays in the release schedule, but they did something smart by giving us #’s 5 and 6 pretty close together. That makes so much more sense than having a 3 month wait between every issue. Who knows what the plans are for the remainder of the series are, but if they follow this path and release the rest of the issues “on time” it’ll be like when a TV show splits it’s season into two chunks of episodes. Of course, monthly release would be optimal, but since that isn’t realistic, I’d prefer this method of releasing the first few issues “on time” (generating revenue for their efforts) and then taking a break before releasing the remainder.
Conclusion: Nothing too earth-shattering, but there’s nothing wrong with a well-told morality tale with nice art.
Grade: B
– Dean Stell
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Conclusion