We continue to chug away to September 2014 and DC Comics’ 41 title New 52 Futures End 3D cover month and 5 year line-wide leap forward, the weekly series’ fourteenth issue hit stands today.
Before I get to my capsule review and spoilers for New 52 Futures End #14, let’s get you caught up on this series so far:
- The New 52 Futures End #0 with Batman Beyond’s New 52 debut and a BIG death.
- The New 52 Futures End #1 with the death of a Justice League hero.
The New 52 Futures End #2 with the debut of the masked Superman.- The New 52 Futures End #3 with the return of a different hero thought to be dead.
- The New 52 Futures End #4 with Lois Lane confronting the long-thought dead hero.
- The New 52 Futures End #5 with Firestorm no more and Constantine’s new mystery.
- The New 52 Futures End #6 with the return of a fan-fave anti-hero.
- The New 52 Futures End #7 with that fan fave maiming a hero.
- The New 52 Futures End #8 with Masked Superman as Justice League enforcer.
- The New 52 Futures End #9 with its massive Earth 2 prison unveiled!
- The New 52 Futures End #10 with a heroine’s return and Lois Lane vs. Superman.
- The New 52 Futures End #11 with the debut of the future’s Justice League!
- The New 52 Futures End #12 with a dead hero rising with his nemesis?!
- The New 52 Futures End #13 with Deathstroke vs. a New God!
Spoilers and capsule review follow for The New 52 Futures End #14.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
As with previous issues, the free preview contained the action of a full subplot; this week that is Deathstroke vs. Big Barda and Green Arrow’s Emiko!
When we delve into the issue, we see that Fifty Sue can be at two places at once?! She’s with Grifter with the OMACs and non-powered Earth 2’ers as well as in the opening scene with Deathstroke vs. New God Big Barda. How is this possible? I don’t have a clue… yet. Fifty Sue’s narrative leaves more mystery than answers to her abilities.
Batman Beyond continues to battle Plastique, the Key and Coil over the fact that Mister Terrific has outed him in the media and stoked anti-alien xenophobia even though his not an alien. However, they seem to grudgingly come to a détente… or do they?
We also finally get some major developments on the Lois Lane subplot as she discovers that one of the mystery items she received earlier in this series connects her with the Earth 2 (and New God) “Wonders” a.k.a. super-heroes… including her Earth 2 self as the robotic Red Tornado. And, from the middle image below, will Earth 2 Wonder Woman’s daughter Fury switch sides and leave Darkseid?
Unlike the heroes of Earth 2 and Prime Earth, the New Gods are universal constants living in the multiverse’s “sphere of the gods” just outside of the 52 earth multiverse (per Grant Morrison’s massive multiverse map for his new limited series The Multiversity). Speaking of The Multiversity, there was an “interesting” preview released for issue #1 today; very meta.
In addition, how these developments set five years in DC’s future – in The New 52 Futures End – spring from writer Geoff Johns upcoming Darkseid War event remains to be seen.
Overall, I am loving the Earth 2 subplot and the rollercoaster of the Batman Beyond arc. I would like to see more future Justice League and Masked Superman, but I would also like to see more of the farther future Joker from Batman Beyond’s 25 to 35 years era into the future that we were teased with a few issues ago.
As with all other issues, we get a tease of next week’s DC Comics The New 52 Futures End #15! It looks the Masked Superman is back and we get more Earth 2! Awesome.
Thanks for reading. All feedback welcome.
