Cover art for Mark Waid's SUPERMAN: BIRTHRIGHT #1.
© 2003 DC Comics

Mania Grade: B-
Authors: Mark Waid, Leinil F. Yu, Gerry Alanguilan
Publisher: DC Comics
Price: $2.95

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SUPERMAN: BIRTHRIGHT #1

An infant named Kal-El was sent to Earth by his parents from the doomed planet Krypton...yadda yadda yadda. Fast forward twenty-five years. In West Africa, a young reporter named Clark Kent is assigned to cover the story of Kobe Asuru, the favorite son of the Ghuri Tribe and a well-known activist hoping to break down tribal barriers. But Kobe's life is at risk, and Kent is unable to avoid his birthright as a hero...

Trust Mark Waid to make even the obligatory retelling of the voyage from Krypton, a tale that's been said many times, many ways, into something fresh and interesting. With such a strong opening - a surprise, given the relative staleness of the material - is it any wonder you'll want to keep reading? But by the time we join Clark Kent as a young reporter out of Ghana, the interest dies down just a bit. It's not that the concept of African tribes marginalizing each other's cultures isn't both fascinating and shocking - not to mention something that most American readers will never have heard of before - but it's at this point in the book that things slow down, even with Clark's lightning fast rescues. Still, there's a lot to be said for the way Waid handles Clark himself. The influence of SMALLVILLE is clear here, even down to the two page spread for the credits that depicts the Kents and Lex Luthor very similarly to their on-screen incarnations. The Clark Kent we see here is Tom Weller, grown up a bit and slightly more mature, but still recognizably the gung-ho Boy Scout who throws himself in front of bullets first and asks questions later.

Unfortunately, Yu and Alanguilan's depiction of Clark isn't Tom Weller, or anything like the Clark we've come to know and love. Much like all the other characters in this book, Clark looks a bit too rough-hewn and world-weary, and at times downright frightening. This is an artistic style straight out of AEON FLUX but without the softening effect of animation, resulting in faces that are almost too grotesque for their own good. The Clark we read in Waid's dialogue is a likeable guy, trying to do the right thing at the same time as he's confronted with the sheer lack of fairness in the world. The Clark we see looks disturbingly like he's been hitting the crack pipe once too often. There's also seemingly no consistency to the artwork, either - Jor-El and Lara in the opening scenes, for example, go through a variety of different faces without ever settling properly on one. By the time we get to Clark, it's hard to know exactly what this kid looks like: fresh-faced cub reporter? Travel-hardened booze hound? Leering pimp? There's at least one panel devoted to each of these looks, and it's disturbing. This style works well only in the backgrounds, both in West Africa and on Krypton - on Krypton, at least, the artists seem to feel at home - but the main characters suffer for it.

Whether the style will calm down a bit or whether the story will become more engaging are open questions at this point and best left for the remainder of this series. But if the point of "reimagination" is to take a completely different look at well-established characters, then Waid and company have succeeded in their task...to a point.