Black Adam | review by Stephen Theaker

This review originally appeared in TQF73 (April 2023).

Archaeologists in the country of Kahndaq, currently in the grip of a private security company, discover the tomb of an ancient hero. Betrayal leads mercenaries to the scene, but when Black Adam awakes, they die, most violently. The film then follows Black Adam as he connects with his country's current inhabitants, fights its occupying force, and battles a quartet of Justice Society members, sent from the US to bring him in line.

Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom | review by Stephen Theaker

It’s a shame that Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, Jason Momoa’s sixth appearance as Aquaman, seems likely to be his last for now. In his cameos, in Batman vs Superman, Peacemaker and The Flash, and his full appearances in Justice League and Aquaman, his exuberance and commitment to the role made him a joy to watch. I wish there were more films to come, but at least we got more of his Aquaman than we did of his equally enjoyable Conan the Barbarian.

Whether this film takes place after the multiverse-changing events of The Flash or not isn't established, but doesn't make a great deal of difference. Sensibly, it's a direct sequel to the first Aquaman film, continuing its storylines and themes. Many of its actors return. As this film begins, Aquaman is thoroughly bored of his job as king of Atlantis. He is nodding off during audiences, and frustrated by the constraints on his power. He has much more fun playing with his baby son and battering pirates.

Blue Beetle | reviewed by Stephen Theaker

When Jaime Reyes returns from college, having successfully graduated, he gets the warm welcome from his family (mum, dad, grandma, sister, uncle) he expected, but they have bad news for him. His dad has been unwell, and has lost his auto-repair shop, and the family is about to lose their home. Jaime sets his plans for post-graduate study aside, and via one twist and another his quest for a well-paid job brings him home with a cybernetic blue beetle in a takeaway box. As soon as he touches it, it crawls into his spine and transforms him into the armoured, agile Blue Beetle, able to create any weapon he imagines.

I was predisposed against this film. It was a tv movie released for some reason in cinemas. The trailer was nothing special. It wasn't my Blue Beetle, Ted Kord, the funny one from Justice League International – the guy who inspired Nite Owl in Watchmen. It was the new guy, albeit a new guy who first appeared in the comics 17 years ago. I read Blue Beetle: Jaime Reyes, Book One a few weeks before watching the film and wasn't that impressed. But then the title sequence of the film showed pictures of Ted Kord in action as Blue Beetle, and I was ready to give it a chance.

Turns out I loved it. The film is better than the trailer, and everything you see in the trailer works better in the context of the film. My favourite moment was the Cypress Hill needle drop during a marvellously kinetic fight scene, but there was plenty of competition, not least a visit to Ted Kord's secret lair. Jaime Reyes is played with immense charm by Xolo Maridueña, who was also immensely likeable in Cobra Kai. He proves himself adept at everything the film requires of his character: action, angst, grief, romance, humour, he does it all with panache. And those playing his family are equally good, each of them getting a chance to shine.

We saw it on an Imax screen, and you would never have guessed it began as a tv movie. The effects were superb, and the suit looked great, whether Blue Beetle was flying, fighting or throwing up shields to protect his family from a hail of bullets. The only hints of its television origins is perhaps that Blue Beetle had just one super-powered enemy to fight, Carapax, cursed with OMAC technology, and that there was just one big boss, Susan Sarandon as Ted Kord's evil sister. But the film was no worse for it. I'm amazed to see that it was 2 hours 7 minutes long, because it felt so streamlined.

Overall, a delight. I laughed all the way through. It will be a shame if there isn't a sequel. For a tv movie released in cinemas I think it's done very well, though nowhere near as well as it deserves. It knocks the likes of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and Eternals for six. My prediction is that it'll find its audience on television, Blue Beetle will pop up in upcoming DC universe films, and then we'll get another. Unlike Henry Cavill's Superman or Ben Affleck's Batman, the Blue Beetle refuses to kill, so I think he'll get on well with the new Superman. ****

Supergirl: Book Four, by Peter David, Leonard Kirk and chums (DC Comics) | review by Stephen Theaker

Reasonably enjoyable but surprisingly religious adventures of an odd Supergirl. Not Superman’s cousin, nor quite the protoplasm Supergirl either, she’s a mixed-up kid who merged with the protoplasm while dying to become, well, an angel. Trying to do good while keeping her secret identity under wraps, in this book she learns that her literally god-given talents have an expiration date. Though not so obviously aimed at men as earlier books, it’s still not the Supergirl you’d pick out for girls. Stephen Theaker ***

Joker | review by Douglas J. Ogurek

Other comic book-based movies laughable in comparison to masterpiece that emphasizes character, explores social stigma on mental illness

A Joker movie poster depicts the villain dressed in his full regalia and leaning back triumphantly at the top of an outdoor staircase. However, near the film’s beginning, Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix), depressed, tired and undernourished, sluggishly ascends that same staircase. Thus, director Todd Phillips establishes a pact with the viewer: I will show you, he implies, the transformation of this struggling nobody into Batman’s vibrant archenemy.

Aquaman | review by Douglas J. Ogurek

Tiaras, tridents, and explosions: latest DC Universe film goes deep into the ocean to achieve shallow, yet engaging story. 

After underwater princess Mera (Amber Heard) magically extracts water from Arthur Curry/Aquaman (Jason Momoa), then uses it to activate a glowing key, Arthur says, “You could’ve just peed on it.” Then Arthur watches the projection of a deceased king dramatically deliver a message. When Mera quizzes him on what he just heard, Arthur says, “Something, something, trident.”

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes, Vol. 1, by Paul Levitz, Mike Grell, James Sherman et al. (DC) | review by Stephen Theaker

The Silver Age Superboy has already been visiting the Legion of Super-Heroes for a while by the time this book begins. It may have only been a year or two for him, but from the Legion’s point of view he’s been visiting since 2959 and now it’s 2978. It’s explained that anti-aging treatments in the thirtieth century extend lifespans and youthfulness, so the Legion still appear to be in their early twenties. Sensibly, Superboy undergoes super-hypnosis before returning to the twentieth century, to avoid interfering with the timeline, though this means, tragically, that he forgets Supergirl every time, and goes back to believing himself the last survivor of Krypton. Originally founded by Cosmic Boy, Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad, the Legion of Super-Heroes has a lot of other members by this point, including Brainiac 5, Phantom Girl, Chameleon Boy, Dream Girl, Mon-El, Shadow Lass, Wildfire, Dawnstar, Princess Projectra, Timber Wolf and, my favourite, Matter-Eater Lad, though he doesn’t play a big role in this book. This volume runs from issue 234 to 240, but the Legion had joined the title of the comic much earlier, with issue 197, while writer Paul Levitz had come on board with issue 225; presumably this volume starts where it does because the previous issues were collected in volume 13 of the expensive Archives collections. It works fine: it helps that it begins with a story from DC Super Stars #17, telling the story of the Legion’s founding. Despite the promise of the sales description, the book does not include issue 238 (a reprint of earlier adventures), only its cover. It does however include the All-New Collectors’ Edition C-55, an extra-length issue featuring the marriage of Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad, in a future derailed by the Time Trapper, not that anyone believes Superboy when he tells them. An important story, it leads to them leaving the Legion, per the rules. It’s hard to review something that’s so precisely what I’m after in a comic that it dissolves my critical senses. It’s not the Legion at its peak, but it’s building up to it, and if the actual plots (e.g. four legionnaires are combined into one composite monster) are not always top notch, the characterisation and the groovy seventies costumes are getting there. Some great names contribute, as well as those on the cover, including Gerry Conway, Jim Starlin, Walt Simonson and Howard Chaykin. And masses of superheroes in space adventures: what could be better? I should say though that I bought it for £3 in a Comixology sale. If I had paid the current price of £25 for it on Comixology, or even worse the current Amazon prices of £32 for the Kindle edition and £45 for the hardback, I might have been significantly less happy with it. ****

The Legion of Super-Heroes: The Great Darkness Saga, by Paul Levitz, Keith Giffen, Larry Mahlstedt and chums (DC) | review by Stephen Theaker

This four-hundred page Kindle edition collects issues 284 to 296 (and the first annual) of the series that had previously been Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes, from 1982 and 1983. This includes the introduction of the team’s first brown-skinned human member (a new Invisible Kid) during an attack by Computo, and “The Great Darkness Saga”, a lengthy story whose long-teased surprise villain is rather given away by his appearance on the front cover of this book. This is what I think of as the real Legion. Reading these stories again, all these years later, fully restored, colour reconstructed, in the right order, with no missing issues, was little short of joyous. The stories stand up. Saturn Girl, Light Lass and Shrinking Violet can be a bit drippy in these issues, but to be fair the boys cry a lot too, and they are all going through a rough time. It has a huge, imaginative and entertainingly fractious cast of heroes, a universe full of danger and adventure, and a knack for switching from jokes to deadly seriousness as the stories require. A lot of the comics I read last year were perfectly decent, but this was a startling reminder of what it was like to read a comic I had truly loved for decades. *****

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Merry Christmas! Hope you enjoy your presents as much as I enjoyed this! – SWT

Justice League | review by Douglas J. Ogurek

Does the latest grandiose tribute to solidarity hold its own? Ye-ah!

One-dimensional bad guy threatens to take over or destroy the world. Good guys overcome their differences and unite to take on the bad guy. It’s a scenario that plays out in the most recent batch of superhero films. Justice League, the latest entry in this category, does not offer anything glaringly new. But damn, it was fun to watch! One can’t help but succumb to the spell that its action sequences cast – Wonder Woman spinning and deflecting bullets, Aquaman shooting through the sea, and many others.

iZombie, Season 2, by Rob Thomas and chums (The CW/Netflix) | review by Stephen Theaker

Liv Moore is a zombie, after being scratched by one at a really wild boat party a couple of minutes into season one. Luckily she won’t go “full Romero”, as they call it here, as long as she keeps snacking on brains. Since the brains work just as well if the owner is already dead, she got a job in a morgue, where she works with lovable Englishman Ravi Chakrabarti (Rahul Kohli), who soon learnt her secret and began to work on finding a cure. In season two Liv continues to use her brain-visions to solve murders with Clive Babineaux (Malcolm Goodwin), a grumpy detective. What she doesn’t know is that Vaughn Du Clark (Steven Weber), the owner of Max Rager, the energy drink involved in kicking off the original zombie freakout on the boat, is experimenting on zombies and has ensnared someone close to Liv… At nineteen episodes this series is perhaps a bit longer than it needs to be (season one was a tidy thirteen), and having a couple of arch-enemies in the main cast means that (like the second season of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) we check in with them very frequently, even though the meat of the programme isn’t the ongoing arc, it’s the stories of the week, where the humour of Liv dealing with her new brain-given personalities make it come close to being the replacement for Psych that I really, really want. This season includes episodes where she eats the brains of a fraternity brother, a real-world vigilante, a librarian who writes erotic fiction, and a country singer, always with amusing consequences. The funnier it is, the more I like it. ***

The Lego Batman Movie, by Seth Grahame-Smith, Chris McKenna, Erik Sommers et al. (Warner Bros) | review by Stephen Theaker

Lego Batman was one of the funniest things about The Lego Movie, against strong competition, and the three Lego Batman games were all terrifically successful (and great fun to play), so it’s no surprise to see him back in a film of his own. It doesn’t refer back to his adventures in the previous film, but Batman is still a master builder who knows that he is made of Lego and can rebuild and reshape the world around him at high speed. This is in addition to his usual Bat-powers: money, gadgets, fighting skills, acrobatics, and (in these films at least) the ability to shred on the electric guitar. For all his success, though, he’s very lonely, and this really comes to a head when Commissioner Gordon announces his retirement. Barbara Gordon (Rosario Dawson) is going to take over, having cleaned up Bludhaven (this is a film made by people who have paid attention to the comics), and she’s not so keen on vigilantes. Batman also upsets the Joker, by denying the two-way nature of their relationship, and that inspires the Joker to team up with some of the greatest villains of all time, some of them (not giving away any spoilers, because the identity of these villains was a wonderful surprise for those of us who didn’t know in advance) British. A daughter of mine described this as one of the best films she has ever seen at the cinema, and it’s hard to deny that it’s a great deal of fun. Batman himself gets a little less funny as the film goes on and, as so often happens with comedies, the plot kicks in, but his brand new Robin Dick Grayson more than makes up for that, and that the two of them are played by Will Arnett and Michael Cera (a.k.a. Job and his nephew George Michael from Arrested Development), only adds to the enjoyment, as do many references to Bat-stories of old, including the Adam West film. The animation is gob-smackingly detailed, with dozens if not hundreds of characters on the screen at the same time, the cast excellent, and the script very funny, not at all the mess you would expect from a film with five credited writers. So much about this film made me happy, and a lot of it I wouldn’t want to give away, but part of it is that Billy Dee Williams, who played Harvey Dent in Tim Burton’s Batman and Batman Returns, finally played Two-Face. It’s not the best Batman film there’s ever been, but it might be the best one not directed by Christopher Nolan. ****

Wonder Woman | review by Douglas J. Ogurek

Resolutely she enters the fray.

Finally, a female has joined the contemporary pantheon of high-profile cinematic superheroes . . . not as a peripheral wisecracking vixen or troubled outcast, but rather as an ass-kicking, yet empathetic lead.

Wonder Woman is tearing up the charts—fourth highest opening weekend for a solo superhero origin film, and the highest-grossing opening weekend for a female-directed (Patty Jenkins) film—with good reason.

Green Lantern: The Sinestro Corps War, by Geoff Johns and chums (DC Comics) | review

This is a story from what I think of as the “real” DC universe, the time between Crisis on Infinite Earths, to which this book is in many ways a sequel, and Flashpoint, which reset everything for the New 52 universe. For a long time before the crisis the DC heroes lived, like Archie or the Bash Street Kids, in an eternal golden present, but a Teen Titan called Robin wanted to grow up, and he couldn’t do that unless other people got older, and so time began to flow. The hair of Green Lantern Hal Jordan went grey at the temples, and during The Return of Superman he lost his mind, after Mongol and the cyborg Superman destroyed his home Coast City while building a base. He betrayed the Green Lantern Corps, became the villain Parallax, and gave his life to save the world from the Final Night, the attack of a sun-eater. What a life! But it wasn’t over! He then became the new Spectre (god’s spirit of vengeance) but it didn’t stick, and eventually, like so many Silver Age heroes, he too returned from the grave, to lead the Green Lantern Corps once again, his misdeeds as Parallax retconned as a kind of possession by a fear monster by that name.

Forever Evil, by Geoff Johns, David Finch and Richard Friend (DC Comics) | review

After the superheroes get sucked into Firestorm, that leaves just Batman and the supervillains, led by Lex Luthor in his seventies-chic power-armour, to fight off an invasion from another dimension! It’s the Crime Syndicate of America, evil mirrors of the Justice League like Ultraman and Superwoman, fleeing the destruction of their own world. Most of the villains are happy to join the Crime Syndicate in ruling the world, but Captain Cold, Black Manta, Sinestro, Catwoman and Lex’s newly decanted Bizarro will join Lex (and Batman) in taking them down. For a big DC event this has a tight focus for the most part, the confrontation taking place within a downed JLA watchtower by the sea. The art to my eyes isn’t very attractive, a bit rougher than I prefer, but I suppose that fits with us seeing the world from a villain’s point of view. Batman looks good. Sinestro comes across very well, his method of dealing with the cowardly Power Ring being particularly decisive. Stephen Theaker ***

Arrow, Season 2, by Marc Guggenheim and many others (Warner Bros Television) | review

Oliver Queen was a sleazy rich kid who took his girlfriend’s sister away on a disastrous yacht trip, leaving him marooned on an island, from which he was rescued five years later. He returned with a new set of skills, and a new sense of purpose, determined to use his archery and acrobatics to take down the wealthy one percenters who have been bleeding the city dry. Unfortunately, the first season of Arrow was in its early stretches often indistinguishable from stablemate Gossip Girl, but as its roster of costumed characters built up it improved, an episode with the Huntress attacking her father’s compound being particularly good, and it ended well, with a serious threat that pushed the fledgling hero to his limits. Season two is even better, putting Oliver and his night-time nom de guerre under an ever-tightening screw, as a friend from the past returns with a grudge. Flashbacks to the island continue, moving more or less in pace with current-day events, creating an unusual effect whereby the viewer must constantly rethink the Oliver we met in the programme’s first episode. DC fans will appreciate the introduction of a certain group of villains sent on deadly missions by (the remarkably slim) Amanda Waller, and by the end Black Canary is in it so much they could have put her name in the titles. Supporting characters Diggle and Felicity are also given plenty to do, though Oliver’s family and friends, especially his mother and Laurel, tend to zig and zag rather randomly whenever the plot requires it. The season draws on classic New Teen Titans, and from there brings us one of the best villains yet in a television superhero series. Despite Felicity’s best efforts, there isn’t much humour, and the dialogue is rarely more than functional; the thrilling story just about makes up for it, but one hopes John B. Arrowman plays a bigger part in seasons to come. In his few scenes here he displays a totally welcome cheekiness that was rather buried in season one. Stephen Theaker ***

The Flash, Season 1, by Andrew Kreisberg and many others (Warner Bros Television) | review

The Flash is a name that has been used by a series of DC Comics characters: Jay Garrick in the forties, Barry Allen from the late fifties, Wally West from the late eighties, and probably a couple more since. The Flash of this television series is Barry Allen, a police scientist who is struck by lightning and becomes the fastest man alive. Before that happened Barry appeared in episodes of Arrow, and so, like the forthcoming Legends of Tomorrow and Vixen animated series this is part of what’s sometimes called the Arrowverse. Gotham probably isn’t a part of this continuity, nor was Smallville, nor are any of the planned DC films, but Supergirl is in a nearby dimension, and Constantine was added after-the-fact once he had appeared in Arrow. That’s quite the little universe that has grown out of Arrow, a show with such unpromising beginnings. The Flash gets off to a much better start than its big brother. The big change from the comics (or at least the comics I’ve read) is that the lightning storm is brought on by an explosion at STAR Labs, after Harrison Wells turns on his particle accelerator against the advice of his colleagues. This explosion acts much like the meteor crash in Smallville, providing an origin for most of the superpowered beings we meet in the programme. (One whose powers don’t come from there is Captain Cold, played brilliantly by Wentworth Miller in several episodes.) Wells, along with high-flying assistants Cisco Ramon (Carlos Valdes) and Caitlin Snow (Danielle Panabaker), helps Barry to master his powers, as step by step he becomes the Flash we know and love. Grant Gustin is likeable as Barry Allen, determined to clear his father for the murder of his mother (he saw red and yellow blurs flashing around her in the room that night...), and in love with journalist Iris West, daughter of the police officer who became his guardian once dad was in jail. There is so much to like about the show: its confident handling of story arcs and mysteries, its excellent special effects, the speed with which it builds up a roster of great supporting characters, the diversity of its cast and characters, and how it draws on all the riches of the character’s history. This is Barry Allen, but there’s a lot of the Wally West stories in here too: fingers crossed for Chunk in season two! For those who have read Flashpoint, the risk that this Barry might create that dark universe looms over the season’s events. The main villain is properly scary, with his glowing red eyes and readiness to kill. I could live with less mooning over Iris in season two, but the programme originates on The CW so that rather goes with the territory. Stephen Theaker ****

Y: The Last Man, Vol. 1: Unmanned, by Brian K. Vaughan, Pia Guerra and José Marzán, Jr (Vertigo) | review

Every man and boy in the world starts throwing up blood and drops down dead, all at the same time. Is it because the Amulet of Helene has been taken out of Jordan, bringing on an ancient prophecy of catastrophe? Or because Doctor Mann gave birth to her own clone? Or because Yorick Brown proposed to his best friend with a ring he bought in a magic shop for half the money he had? The only man who might find out is Yorick himself, because he’s the only man to survive (at least so far as we know from this book). All the male non-humans died too, except for his capuchin monkey Ampersand. Others might have seen the resulting situation as a golden opportunity for a healthy young man, but not Yorick, he’s in love with Beth, and she’s in Australia, so like James Garner in Support Your Local Sheriff that’s where he’s heading, whatever else distracts him in the meantime. It’s a dangerous world for a man, where anyone he meets could want to sell, kill or enslave him, but his mother asks him to go with the awesome Agent 355 to find Dr Mann – together they might be the best hope for the world, especially if they can figure out why Yorick survived. This is an excellent book. It has a great premise, and this volume begins to explore the ramifications of that premise in fascinating ways. For example, Yorick’s mother is a representative in Congress, and because the Democrats have more female representatives there than the Republican, they become a majority when the men die. Pia Guerra and José Marzán, Jr’s art is perfect, reminiscent in its clarity and structure of Steve Dillon’s work on Preacher for the same publisher, but with character all of its own. The book’s weakest link is probably Yorick himself, who isn’t half as interesting and charismatic as the female characters that surround him. Stephen Theaker ****

Showcase Presents Ambush Bug, by Keith Giffen, Robert Loren Fleming and friends (DC Comics) | review

A 488pp black and white collection of comics, mostly from the mid-eighties. The bulk of it comes from two mini-series, Ambush Bug (1985) and Son of Ambush Bug (1986), plus a couple of specials, his story from Secret Origins, and earlier guest appearances in Superman titles. Ambush Bug is the costumed identity of Irwin Schwab, who knows he’s in a comic, talks to his writers and artists, and doesn’t necessarily go from one page to the next in the usually accepted order. His best friend and adopted child is Cheeks the Toy Wonder, a stuffed toy, and his greatest foes are the Interferer, who messes with comics continuity because he can, and Argh-Yle, a sock from a spaceship that got squashed by a radioactive space-spider, came to life and became a supervillain, and now tries to conquer the world with living socks from a chest of drawers (The Bureau) orbiting the planet. Reading that back, it’s hard to understand why I didn’t like it very much. It sounds like a lot of fun, and Deadpool has had great success with a similar shtick. But I laughed only three or four times in the course of all these pages (the best being when Keith Giffen’s famous nine-panel layouts are said to be inspired by Celebrity Squares). Maybe it’s the lack of colour in this edition, which makes all the busy, busy pages a bit hard to read, or that there’s so much frantically packed in, which might have worked better taken in single issue doses. A lot of the humour is aimed at comics and controversies in the field from the mid-eighties, and though I’ve read enough of those to get the gist, I didn’t find them funny. Maybe the clue is in the panel five pages from the end where Ambush Bug declares “I hate British humour”. Though I do appreciate the cleverness there of spelling it with a U. Stephen Theaker **

Ex Machina Book One, by Brian K. Vaughan and Tony Harris (Vertigo) | review by Stephen Theaker

The mayor of New York isn’t a Republican or a Democrat. He was a superhero, and before that an engineer, sent to investigate something weird and green glowing underneath the Brooklyn Bridge. Whatever it was blew up in his face, and he gained the ability to talk to machines and (perhaps more usefully, since we can all do that) have them follow his instructions. He grew up reading Justice League of America comics, so naturally, with the addition of a rocket pack, helmet and alien blaster, he became the Great Machine. It didn’t go very well, and after his secret identity was blown he decided to run for mayor, to put himself in a position where he could effect real change. He won, though not for reasons he would ever have wanted, and now he’s trying to run a city where psychos want to kill him, the commissioner of police and the state governor both hate him, and a publicly-subsidised gallery is about to display a painting of Abraham Lincoln with a racist word scrawled across his chest. His powers are only going to help with some of those problems. This 273pp book collects the first eleven issues of the original comic, and it got off to a terrifically confident start. The narrative bounces around the mayor’s timeline without ever confusing, and mixes ongoing plots with shorter self-contained stories with an apparent ease that must have required a good deal of work. The artwork is striking and unusual, looking almost as if photographs of actors have been rotoscoped to produce it. However it was produced, the result can be peculiar, but only because it has led to such a surprisingly varied range of expressions, faces and poses. I’d read parts of this book before, out of order, borrowed from the library, but it’s a real treat to start from the beginning, knowing I have books two to five waiting to be read in my Comixology library. The entire set cost me just £15 in a sale. I won’t often get the chance to spend my money more wisely. ****

Brightest Day, Vol. 1, by Geoff Johns, Peter Tomasi and chums (DC Comics) | review by Stephen Theaker

At the conclusion of the Blackest Night, where Black Lanterns had laid siege to Earth, several dead heroes and villains were brought back to life by a blinding white light. Among them were Hawkman and Hawkwoman, Hawk (of Hawk and Dove), Aquaman, Martian Manhunter, Captain Boomerang, the Reverse Flash, Osiris, Jade (the original Green Lantern’s daughter), Firestorm and Maxwell Lord, the psychic who once brought together the Justice League International. It also brought back one character who had been dead since his debut, Deadman, who will presumably need to change his name now. This book follows them all as they adjust to being back in the world, and in the case of Hawkman and Hawkwoman, out of it in what seems to be another dimension. I’m not a particularly huge fan of any of these characters, and I wasn’t even aware that half of them were dead, so their return to life didn’t get me all that excited, but it was very good fun to read a DC comic that followed a bunch of characters in its universe without jamming them together into an ad hoc group. It’s a network drama of the DC universe, letting their stories unfold and bringing other guest stars in as the story demands it. There’s a connection, the light that brought them back having coalesced into a white lantern, which sends Deadman off to check in on each of the others, but each storyline gets its own room to breathe. The art does its job well. It’s very gory at times, with people being stabbed and skinned, and one incident (on a ship) is very unpleasant in a different way (even if Aquaman and Mera do come to the rescue), so this isn’t a book for children. People who have read quite a lot of DC comics are likely to get the most out of it. Stephen Theaker ***