By: Ethan Van Sciver & Gail Simone (writers), Yildiray Cinar (penciller), Norman Rapmund (inker), Steve Buccellato (colorist)
The Story: Firestorms on a plane!
The Review: By now, some of you may be pretty familiar with my Dropped List, where all the titles I can’t bring myself to purchase, read, and review go to rest. What usually lands a comic into this unfortunate pile is a lengthy period of mediocrity, although there are some so patently unreadable that they bite the dust within one issue. I’m a great believer that the best way to express your dissatisfaction with a product is simply not to buy it.
It did not bode well that this series got a C+ on its first issue. Since then, it’s vacillated slightly in both directions, but has remained stubbornly generic, bland, dry, and, unfortunately, boring. I would never have thought I’d use any of those words to describe a Simone-penned comic, but no amount of author-loyalty can blind me to how thoroughly uninspired this series has felt. I think Simone must feel the same, given that she departs from writing duties in a couple months.
Considering all the literally explosive action in this issue, it may seem strange to describe it as boring. The problem is so much of the action feels like it’s just thrown in there, and lacks the necessary tension to make you feel affected by it. Take the confrontation between Pozhar, pseudonym of Mikhail Arkadin, co-creator of the Firestorm Protocols, and Haji Al-Farishtaa, illicit seller of the Protocols. Their violence and fury aside, you don’t get anything out of the scene other than a pointless death and some senseless moralizing over absolute power: “Your work belongs to whoever has the courage to possess it. To use it! To kill with it!”
Even without this underwhelming distraction, the integrity of the star characters themselves continue to pose a problem. There seems to be a clear streak of defensiveness in their tones, almost like they’re trying to convince you that they’re more than one-dimensional. Ronnie spends most of his time musing on his own open-mindedness (“A lot of jocks, they give the brainiacs crap all the time… Not me. I know those guys are gonna run things someday.”), while Jason nurses an increasingly soapy crush on Tanya (“…how did you let the girl you love get shot, Jason, you idiot?”). I’d hardly consider this character development.
As for the bad guys, after facing setback after setback in trying to confront the Firestorms directly, they go for the next obvious tactic: if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. Or, in this case, get ‘em to join you. But honestly, does anyone really expect Jason and Ronnie to join Zither when she had their families captured, and is essentially holding them hostage? If you say no, guess again; Ronnie has more than fallen in love with the idea: “They’re freaking awesome!”
Cinar is one of the great generic artists, by which I mean he can draw pretty much anything, but it all lacks distinction. He lacks an obvious style; his art doesn’t stand out in your mind. The most dramatic scenes often lack all power and import because his figures look so aggressively plain. I continue to feel that stronger art might have been everything to this title, but with no sign of permanent change-ups on that front, there’s no point in speculating on what could be.
Conclusion: As promised, I stuck it out another issue to see if the story can pick itself up and live up to its goal of being a game-changing thriller. It has not. Dropped.
Grade: C
– Minhquan Nguyen
Some Musings: – Apparently, Jason doesn’t need to get into Firestorm mode to use his powers. Can we also assume that the “Firestorm!” cry is also an unnecessary affectation—and get rid of it before it becomes a permanent joke about the character?
Grade
Conclusion