17 February 2016

Faster than a DC Bullet: Project Crisis!, Part XLIII: Absolute Final Crisis

Comic hardcover, n.pag.
Published 2012 (contents: 2008-09) 

Borrowed from the library
Read June 2015
Absolute Final Crisis

Script: Grant Morrison
Art: J. G. Jones, Doug Mahnke, Carlos Pacheco, Matthew Clark, Jesus Merino, Marco Rudy, Christian Alamy, Tom Nguyen, Drew Geraci, Norm Rapmund, Rodney Ramos, Walden Wong, Derek Fridolfs, Rob Hunter, Mark Irwin, Don Ho, Lee Garbett, Trevor Scott
Color: Alex Sinclair, Tony Avina, Pete Pantazis, David Baron, Richard & Tanya Horie, Guy Major
3-D effects: Ray Zone
Letters: Rob Leigh, Rob Clark Jr., Travis Lanham, Steve Wands, Ken Lopez, Jared K. Fletcher

Final Crisis turns out to be one of those books I don't really know what I thought of. Grant Morrison always packs a lot into his stories, but this one packs in even more than most: it's a murder mystery, it's a trip by Superman in a forgotten realm, it's the triumph of evil over the world, it's about resistance and redemption, it's the death of Batman, it's the threat to all the multiverse, it's the return of Barry Allen from the dead, it's the death of the Martian Manhunter. There are a crazy amount of strands here, and one's never quite sure what kind of story one is actually reading. There was stuff I liked, obscure trivia that delighted me (the Green Man from The Omega Men makes an appearance!), and the themes seemed to be of interest when I could grasp them.

But I couldn't always integrate what I was reading into a big picture, so ultimately my response is more tepid than I'd like: this is one of those stories one ought to love or hate, and yet here I am, being lukewarm. Now that I know the shape of the whole, I'd like to reread it and see what I think. Some day, I guess!

Next Week: There's no possible way to make an exciting-sounding blurb for something called Final Crisis Companion!

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