Countdown - The Next Six

DC's Countdown... to Final Crisis!

At Comic Con this year DC announced that with issue 30 something, they would be officially changing the title of Countdown, to Countdown to Final Crisis. I know, I know, about a thousand petty little jokes just roll off the tongue. Like, "how original. Where'd ya come up with that one?" That's not what this is about, this is about the next 6 issues of Countdown. If you didn't read about the first 6, then click away!

Going through each issue is frankly very boring and since there's not a whole lot happening in this book yet, and some issues feel completly tacked on, I'll save you the details and just hit key points of issues, and overall story lines. One major inconsistency that I don't think a lot of readers may have picked up on; Mary Marvel only has half of Black Adam's powers, even though in issue 46 she receives all of Black Adam's and his wife's powers. In one of the issues she meets Billy, now the Wizard Shazam! and her powers are now half of what they were... The only foreseeable reason DC would have to do this is if they decided they couldn't get rid of Black
Adam. After all they did make him a big deal in 52 so why end his Villainous career? Several people already pointed out the fact that Piper and Trickster claim no responsibility for Bart Allen's death, even though in All Flash (I think someone reviewed that) they clearly participated. Again one of my major grips with this book is that Paul Dini is only plotting a lot of it and guest writers are doing their best at making the characters inconsistent from issue to issue. Probably one of the worst comics I've ever read was issue 43. This issue is a memorial for the late Bart Allen; several boring speeches are giving that do nothing more than fill the page. They have no heart, they have no meaning and they don't do Bart's character any justice. The worst speech, which I was hoping would be really good, was given by Robin. Now I thought that Batman had remained out of the spotlight of the JLA in order to keep the villains of Gotham guessing if his existence is real or not. In fact it's part of his character archetype. Well Robin pretty much announces his existence to thousands of people in attendance and to who ever may be broadcasting the funeral service, then Bart does it himself when Robin puts on a lame ass DVD where Bart speaks from the dead. So the Robin speech was a disappointment, but then Bart's on, and you're thinking, "Hey this will be alright". Nope! Not a damn chance, his speech sucked so bad and had no point. The worst part is that it really left his character feeling shallow and one dimensional. Also in the same issue the Monitor for New Earth proves to be the worst and most annoying character ever! He says the same line over and over for like three issues. Also there's a female character, I have no idea who she is, why she's on the run or what she has to do with anything. Frankly even if I did know anything about her I probably still wouldn't care because she hasn't done anything the entire book.

Here's a quick hit list of the good that happened: Darksied showed emotion, Jimmy Olson became a superhero, Forerunner took over and Army, The Bleed was featured (Even if DC had no right to use it), Batman told off Karate Kid and had a bad ass line, "What were you expecting? A sidekick job?", Comments on Mary Marvel's new outfit, Clayface getting thrown into space, Deadshot... doing stuff. I just like Deadshot even if he shows up and just smokes, he's cool. (But no smoking is not cool... unless you're Deadshot of course). Harley Quinn shows up as a Amazon woman's rehab manager... or something like that.

For me the book really isn't doing much, I know a lot of DC's history and what not, and I'm very up to date on what's happening in the DCU (Since I read almost everything they put out (You think there's a lot of comic reviews? Just think of how many there could be!)) so I have to say I'm disappointed so far. I can only hope that the next 6 issues will pick up. I will say the the quality of art was much better than some of the first 6 issues, but not by much. Maybe a title change is just what the series needs... nah!