By: Geoff Johns (story), Ivan Reis (pencils), Joe Prado, Eber Ferreira, Rob Hunter, Andy Lanning (inks), Rod Reis, Tomev Morey, Tony Avina (colors)
The Story: Grid tries to learn more about his new friends.
The Review: The past couple issues did a fairly good job splitting time between fleshing out the backstories of the Syndicate and budging the Forever Evil story forward. This issue is a lot heavier on the backstory, but then again, it’s covering quite a few more Syndicate members. Even on a parallel Earth, if you aren’t a Batman or Superman analogue, you’re not important enough to merit a whole issue to yourself.
That said, the jumble of characters makes the issue feel even more packed, if anything, and while the origins of Grid, Power Ring, Johnny Quick, Atomica, and Deathstorm don’t really have much of the complexity that Ultraman and Owlman’s did, there are things worth noticing. Besides, it’s hard not to enjoy seeing the twists on familiar characters play out.
Some of the twists are simple role-reversals, especially where the minor characters are concerned. Seeing Carol Ferris and her dad transformed into military hawks (“If you want those radicals in Nanda Parbat leveled, General Brand, I’d suggest the Ferris B-1 Lancers… They’ll melt every snowflake on that mountain.”), or the Central City Rogues into cops, for example, is fun, but rather predictable. Seeing Hal—I’m sorry, “Harold”—Jordan reduced to a sniveling, trembling spy who is practically ready to kiss/lick his boss’ boots when he gets caught…now, that is a lot more entertaining.
Of all the Syndicate members featured here, Power Ring probably offers the most relevant details to the overarching story. There’s got to be some significance to his ring originating from “Volthoom,” and its constant demands to “[c]harge me.” It’s always been a little vague how charging works with the Power Ring, but from all appearances, it seems to run on the physical pain/psychological trauma of its owner—which does explain why Power Ring seems to really shine at his most horrified moments.
Perhaps even more important than all of the other’s origin stories put together is the absence of any information on Superwoman whatsoever. I may be over-extrapolating, but there’s something ingenious to the way Johns has treated Superwoman in this story. Like her Earth-Prime counterpart, Superwoman stands in the same top class as Owlman and Ultraman, yet her strengths, vulnerabilities, and overall interior is mostly vague and undefined. In the same way that Batman has yet to figure out a contingency plan for Wonder Woman, Superwoman’s greatest advantage may be her own unknowability.
But the most compelling character in the whole issue is no one from the Syndicate itself, but rather their mysterious, hooded prisoner. By physiological standards, he’s “a normal man,” which makes the possibility of him turning out to be Alex Luthor—traditionally the Syndicate’s greatest enemy—a lot stronger. It’s also possible that he’s the same enemy who recruited Deathstorm to investigate the Syndicate, and given this enemy just gave Deathstorm a new, high-tech lab, this has to be a person with a great deal of resources.*
This series must be taking a lot more out of Reis than we think, as it now requires a whole slew of inkers and colorists to do the job that Reis was once able to handle with Prado and Rod Reis alone. Despite the mess of cooks in the kitchen, we get a pretty consistent stew out of them, although Morey’s distinctively over-illuminated colors stand out against the much tamer hues from his peers. Anyway, Reis is such a superstar that I suspect it would take some truly heinous collaborators to bring his art down too much
Conclusion: If nothing else, it’s a load of parallel-Earth goodness, with just enough speculative material to keep it relevant.
Grade: B
– Minhquan Nguyen
Some Musings: * What would be really interesting is if the hooded man turned out to be Bruce Wayne, somehow saved from his apparent death in #25.
– To Grid’s insistence that “I still want to feel something,” I’d like to offer this response: “You are; it’s called desire.”
– Cyborg 2.0? Heck, yeah. It’s about time ol’ Vic got to shine on this series.
Grade
Conclusion