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Info:
  • Title: Action Comics #892
  • Written by: Paul Cornell
  • Art by: Pete Woods and Pere Perez
  • Colors by: Brad Anderson
  • Letters by: Rob Leigh
  • Cover by: Ivan Reis
  • Publisher: DC
  • Publication Date: August 25, 2010
  • Cover Price: $3.99
  • Series:

ACTION COMICS #892 Review

We want a beginning, middle and end.

By Ben Johnson     August 27, 2010
Source: Mania


ACTION COMICS #892 Review
© Mania

Maybe I’m just cynical. Perhaps I’m unnecessarily interested in dark tales. I might even be down right evil to the core. All because I get absolutely giddy as a school girl (a really hot one wearing a catholic school uniform... you’ll need to bleach your brain to wash that image away) when a bad guy gets the spotlight, a chance to shine, or their day in the sun.

My interest was piqued when I saw Lex Luthor has recently received this treatment in the pages of Action Comics. Unfortunately, comics cost a lot and I haven’t been able to pick up the first few issues due to me being dirt ass poor. Luckily, fortunes change and I found myself Oprah rich this week with an extra five in my pocket as I entered my new local comic shop.

I decided to blow my greenbacks on Action Comics #892. After all, it’s starring the original bald baddy, himself. I realized I was coming in smack dab in the middle of a story, but really, what is there to know? Science, saving the world from Superman, ruthlessness, it’s Luthor and even a bit of Deathstroke thrown in for flavor. I could fill in the gaps as I went. And I did.

Turns out L.L. and friends are looking for a big black energy ball. They find it, fight each other for a few panels and then everyone leaves. That’s absolutely it. Oh, and the cover is pretty sweet.

My job as a critic is to critique, so here goes: I spent $3.99 plus tax on twenty-some pages of filler. It’s not crap, it’s not good, it’s just there, and I just didn’t care.

Luckily, there is a back-up starring one of my guilty pleasure characters, none other than Superboy... who also happens to be in the middle of a story, one that leads into Superboy #1 and has no resolution this ish.

What the hell DC? I realize long-form stories of the incredibly decompressed variety are the new black, but c’mon. These books aren’t cheap, and going home with this garbage makes me not want to take a shot at one of your products unless I happen to start on the first page of the first issue. I keep hearing publishers crying about slowing sales. I wonder why that’s happening guys? You know what? Take away the question mark, take them all away, because that was totally rhetorical.

People are staying away from comics because they are just like this issue, boring, and totally without merit and only accessible to readers with encyclopedic minds able to follow narratives drug-out over several months. If a customer drops this much money on a few very short minutes of entertainment, it should at the very least be a full experience. We want a beginning, middle and end.

Perhaps I’m being unfair to judge this practice in mediocrity so harshly. After all, it’s little more than a symptom of a greater disease. Then again, I wouldn’t give a herpes breakout a pass just because I already had several in the past.

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1 
Inferno 8/27/2010 4:44:41 PM

I've been skeptical about Superman comics since New Krypton volume 3. So I can't really blame you about the rating this issue got. I was thinking about picking it up but changed my mind and picked up Matt Wagners Demon #4 for a dollar instead. :)

I must point out though that the issue's cover is by David Finch, the variat is Ivan Reis.

dbrock06 8/27/2010 5:14:04 PM

Is it getting to the point where DC is making Superman Irrelevant.  I don't know I really don't read anything with the character.  It seems to me that ever since the death and rebirth the character has sort of petered out.  I  may be talking out of my .... because of my lack of knowledge on the subject, but there just seems to be a lack of any interest anywhere...just no buzz.  I don't think anyone even wants another live action movie that badly.  there have been 5 of them and 3 of the 5 have sucked, and the 2 were really one mobie that were broken up into 2.  What can DC do with this character to get some interest? You have this all powerful character.  He's been dead and came back.  Has very few weaknesses.  I don't know.  Maybe he needs to be put on the back burner for a while to have people want him to come back.  Maybe they need to cut back on the 15 Superman books that are out there.  I don't know.  Sometimes you just need a break from a character.

Inferno 8/28/2010 6:03:12 PM

Some Superman comics have been good these past few years. I think back to Godfall and Camelot Falls and the begining of Johns and Robinson's first few issues but when Johns left, whatever they had going just went along with him.

dbrock, they need to do two things - Like you mentioned, the large amount of books they keep pumping out has got to go and they also need to modernize his costume. There's no reason why they shouldn't.

What they need to do to get people interested is more space travel. He needs to travel outside our solar system and fight evil everywhere. The writers today are good with plots and words but they lack the imagination that stemed from the silver age. They're just not bold enough. Kurt Busiek did a great job with Camelot Falls when he applied some original characters.

okonomiyaki4000 8/30/2010 6:12:21 AM

 Since Dark Reign, I can't look at Lex Luthor without thinking how much more fun Norman Osborn is. They're similar on so many levels but something about Osborn is just better.

Inferno 8/30/2010 4:53:28 PM

You mean that everything Osbourn does Luthor did a decade earlier? Sure, Oko.

okonomiyaki4000 9/3/2010 8:49:56 PM

 I'm not concerned with who did it first, I'm concerned with who did it better. Norman FTW.

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