Saturday, August 24, 2013

Superman Unchained #3

   Given the talent working on this series, I was surprised that I didn't like the last issue of Superman Unchained much at all.

   Sadly, this issue doesn't do much to rise above that effort.

   Once again, we have Superman fighting the United States military for no good reason. The Man of Steel shows up at a secret military base, asks questions which General Lane (Lois' dad) refuses to answer, he fights a powerful alien and then they all calm down and answer his questions. So why were they fighting?

   This is also one of those comics where I think I must be losing my memory. Among the side stories are one that follows Lois Lane as she attempts a crash landing in a big plane - I have no memory at all of why she's in the plane, and we get no clue here.

   There's another sub-plot that has a mindless, exo-skeleton-wearing Lex Luthor being somehow piloted by himself (you read that correctly) for reasons I can't remember. And some drones are attacking Tokyo, but I have no idea why or where they came from.

   Forgetting elements like that indicates that either I'm losing my mind (always a possibility) or the setup in the last issue wasn't memorable at all. (I'm hoping it's reason #2.)

   The art by Jim Lee is as impressive as always, and it's great to see a new character who's powerful enough to go toe-to-toe with Superman - but I think that character's name has been used more than once before in comics.

   At any rate, it's another split effort, as the art is impressive but the story seems to be spending all of its efforts in making Superman a badass.

   Personally, I always liked him when he was just the world's greatest hero.

Grade: B-

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