Earth 2 #0
Written by James Robinson
Art by Tomas Giorello and Nathan Eyring
The short of it:
Six years ago the war with Darkseid raged on, but despite what we knew about Earth 2…there were more heroes. We all knew about the Ternion of Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman; and we even knew about the sidekicks known as Supergirl and Robin…and Robin’s mother, Batman’s late wife, Catwoman. But there were eight of them, eight wonders. And Terry Sloane was the eighth and final of them group, Mr. 8. The world’s smartest man, a freelancer for the government, and the living strategy engine of humanity in their war with the dark Gods of Apokolips. Unfortunately for the heroes, depending on your views, being the smartest man on the planet doesn’t make him empathetic, and it’s a lesson they have to learn the hard way.
You see, Terry wants to win, and collateral damage means nothing to him when weighed against actual results. This means that the people across the world afflicted by the Anti-Life Equation, the ones that the Ternion seek to free from Darkseid’s influence, are completely expendable to him. It means that his allies are pawns to move into place and play as needed. It means that the craters that scar the world are of his own making.
Meet Terry Sloane, he’s here to save the world, even if he winds up being remembered as the darkest villain of all time.
What I liked:
- Terry has an interesting setup. He’s not evil, he’s just amoral. He sees a way to save the world, and he enacts it. What if millions die? Who cares, billions more will live. He doesn’t break a sweat at the kinds of decisions that Superman wouldn’t even discuss.
- The little differences are still fun. Like the trinity being called a “Ternion”, Wonder Woman’s armor, Batman with a gun, or even kryptonite’s subtle renaming. Red Kryptonite becomes Ruby, Purple becomes Opal. Using gemstones for color names is inspired.
- It only takes one line to have me on the edge of my seating eagerly awaiting the reveal of who the seventh wonder is.
- I love that Batman is willing to pull out all the stops. He uses a gun, he throws a bomb at another human, he may not kill Terry, but he would have. That’s what war should do to Batman, it should make him overlook his no killing rule.
- The pages of Earth getting scarred by Terry’s actions are brutally awesome. Tomas really nailed the scope of what was happening.
What I didn’t like:
- I understand that Nicola is probably busy staying ahead of herself on the main issues of the series, especially since in the present we’ve got the team that will one day be the JSA going to war with the avatar of the Rot, GRUNDY! So I get that she probably was too swamped to do this issue, but man, it suffers for it. Tomas Giorello doesn’t do a bad job, but when the bar is “Nicola Scott”, there aren’t a ton of artists that can measure up to it.
- While I dig that Terry is supposed to be so smart that he’s taking steps that nobody else realizes are impending, it’s a bit annoying to have a character so far ahead of the reader that I’m not fully aware of what the hell he’s doing. Things I imagine will be revisited and filled out later, but they were headache inducing here.
Final Thoughts:
I heard a lot of controversy around Lois being killed off panel coming from the feminist blogs I frequent, well, some, I know I read two articles going on about it. In the context of the issue, I’m totally cool with the blowing off of her here. Her death is referenced as a means of amplifying the dire nature of the situation our heroes are in, while at the same time, her death coming on panel would have just distracted from the rest of the story. If there was a flashback mini series, then yeah, bring on Lois. In this context, however, with this much focus being spread across everyone else she would have just distracted.
Oh, wow, that final thought was for Worlds Finest, wasn’t it? I read it hand in hand with Earth 2, great little companion series. I know, some people reading this are probably wondering why I didn’t just delete the paragraph once I realized I was final thoughting the wrong book, but I’m standing by it. Lois Lane’s contribution to the world of Earth 2 is that her death sparked Superman going to war, and given that he’s dead in the series as well, I don’t see why she needs more page time there. Action Comics and Superman, on the other hand…
For all the Apokolips talk, we haven’t seen Darkseid, and we keep hearing about, and again, not seeing, Steppenwolf. I keep expecting some sort of redesign.
I like how Terry’s ‘get rid of the anti-life afflicted’ plan left Earth with FIRE PITS.
I would like to see more of what he sees in other dimensions. He sees Earth One, right? Could he have shifted Peeg and Huntress to Earth One with the knowledge that the dominos would eventually give him Michael Holt?
Overall: 7/10
