Pick of the Brown Bag
March 3, 2021
by
Ray Tate
Greetings, and welcome to the first marathon of reviews by yours truly, Ray Tate. Why a marathon? Because of the new DC thing called Infinite Frontier.
So, here's the deal. I plan on reviewing each Infinite Frontier title soon after I finish reading it. You won't be getting a smattering of POBB per month. You'll be getting big globs of it per comic book week.
This criterion solely applies for the premieres. I will also alert you at the end of each critique what I decided to do: subscribe, browse, ignore or wait for the trade. As always should these in depth examinations be too much for you, you can always check me out on Twitter: #PickoftheBrownBag.
In the nineteen sixties, "The Flash of Two Worlds" unleashed the multiverse. In the nineteen eighties, Crisis on Infinite Earths destroyed that multiverse. Another twenty years, Diane Nelson arrives at DC and repairs the damage. This occurs in the surprisingly influential Flashpoint by Geoff Johns. Its finale, the strongest science fiction Johns ever wrote.
The Flash from a multiverse yet to be born travels to the past to stop his doppelgänger from altering time and space. This cosmic staunching generates the powerful, stable and sensible New 52. From whence the Flash came. Here, the Joker's bullet cripples Barbara Gordon for only a few years before cutting edge technology discovered by Batman in South Africa permits her to walk again and kick high as Batgirl. Thus, the New 52 eliminates the core of DC's problems. Courtesy of Gail Simone.
Rebirth will later amend some of the New 52. This includes reestablishing the relationship between Green Arrow and Black Canary. Restoring Superman's history and his soul mate Lois Lane. The reformation of the Titans, whose memories of the pre-Crisis return, and an irritating rewrite for Wonder Woman.
If you're like me, you ignored Dark Nights: Metal. It turns out that this series continuously becomes a directing force in the DC Universe. It occurs without warning and upsets the apparent independent evolution of the DC titles.
Because of Dark Nights sequel Death Metal, the DCU apparently dissolved and spored Future State. However, Wonder Woman did something spectacular in Death Metal, and that reshaped the DCU into its next stage. Infinite Frontier.
Infinite Frontier begins with a Big Bang occurring 13.8 billion years ago if not earlier. Each of DC's Universe or Multiverse can only be the same age or older than our own. Neither option can be younger. Too much stuff happens. At the center of this renaissance gravitates Wonder Woman. Diana is not alone.
The Quintessence is a supremely dumb name for a band of cosmic power brokers. You've got the old wizard Shazam, the Phantom Stranger, the Spectre, Ganthet of the Guardians, Hera and Highfather from New Genesis. That's two gods, an alien, an enigma and a New God.
The Quintessence invites Wonder Woman to join them. It's a bad move on the Quintessence's part, because should Diana accept they will need to change their name to the Sexessence, which sounds like a shampoo aphrodisiac.
The deification of Wonder Woman is nothing new. Artist/writer John Byrne killed Wonder Woman, only to briefly transform her into the Goddess of Truth.
Wonder Woman though flattered by the offer believes there's a catch. She wants to make certain this new multiverse is safe from any threat she might have thwarted.
The Spectre thus takes Diana on a tour of the the newly minted Infinite Frontier. The conceit first leads to a trademark issue called Captain Marvel.
Once upon a time, DC sued Fawcett Comics over Captain Marvel, whom you may remember as this guy...
...and his semblance to Superman. After winning the court battle, DC began publishing the new adventures of Captain Marvel. However, Marvel already owned the trademark. No idea why it took twenty plus years, but DC rechristened Billy Batson's alter ego Shazam and Captain Marvel, Jr. as CM cubed. Righto. Mary Marvel? Still Mary Marvel thank goodness.
This first jokey tale lasts about three pages. The Flash who shows up at the end spouts dialogue that could have been spoken by Grant Gustin. That Flash moment is better than everything I've read in Infinite Frontier so far.
From the bright and shiny, we go dark. Dark of course means Gotham City. This story interweaves throughout. Officer Mahoney discovers horrors in Arkham Asylum.
Don't worry if you've never heard of Officer Mahoney. He's a nobody designed to be somebody. So, keep your eye on him. He's probably going to become a new hero in the Infinite Frontier era.
The first Gotham sequence segues to Barbara Gordon back at the clock tower.
Not a great future for Batgirl, but good. No blue-eyes and she's color coordinating with green, but I'll trade them for sustaining mobility. Also happy they ditched the stupid robot Oracle that didn't make a lick of sense.
Barbara is the database. She remembers everything. The computer is there for hacking and if she runs into something she never encountered before. I may loathe the Oracle persona, but yes, I know how it should work.
I have no idea who the Huntress is these days, and Infinite Frontier is stingy with the clues. Is she Helena Wayne? Helena Bertinelli from One Day at a Time? The Helena somebody from...SPIRAL? Yeah, that's it. SPIRAL. Wait a minute...What's SPIRAL again?
The weirdest Future State carryovers occurs on the next page and only that page. Grifter is in Gotham City.
Previously his association with the Batman Family amounted to this snatch of conversation from JLA/Wildcats.
Renee Montoya shows up on the next page. She's working for the one-eyed Mayor introduced in Detective Comics as generic police officer number one.
Let's refer to this lame Batman antagonist as Jason Bard II Electric Boogaloo.
No idea if Renee is the Question. For those hankering for Renee as the Question, check out the fascinating, exciting and often hilarious Lois Lane trade paperback by Greg Rucka and Mike Perkins.
So far the most substantiative characters are the Flash and Mahoney. That's really not a good track record. Perhaps our luck will change when Diana pops in on the Amazons.
Yes, this is where the book starts to become mildly entertaining. We have definite change amongst the Amazons and the brunette Hippolyta, from the Golden Age and the post-Crisis, once again venturing out into the world of men.
John Byrne retrofitted Hippolyta as Wonder Woman to a fill a hole left by George Perez. Byrne's Hippolyta joined the Justice Society and fought Nazi agents in World War II. Perez's Diana burst onto the scene as a fresh, never before seen character.
Nubia and Yara Flor put some much needed color in the Amazon gene pool. Though to be fair, Nubia is a Bronze Age creation. Yara Flores however is a brand new, vivacious Future State character created by Joelle Jones. It's no surprise she reappears in Infinite Frontier. Given the complexity of Jones' art, it's also no surprise that she only appears in three pages.
That would have been a bombshell Alan if not for James Robinson beating you to it: Earth 2 in the New 52 where we meet a younger Justice Society.
Still, it's nice that the Powers That Be at DC are progressive enough to keep such a change for a venerable figure of justice. Furthermore, the return of Jade and Obsidian is welcome.
I'm also happy that nobody at Fox knows who or what a Green Lantern is. Funny, since Hal Jordan used to be an old, conservative sexist white guy. Anyway, Republicans are still preoccupied with the non-cancellation of the Muppets.
After a very brief two page whatever moment in the Teen Titans' lives, we learn that somebody dislikes Jonathan Kent more than I do.
Boy, does the Spectre hate Jonathan Kent. Here's the thing. Superman, Jr. actually looks really good in this story. He becomes a true hero in this short. I usually don't give a rat's behind about Kent, but I actually cared about him in this tale and thought he earned the right to wear the shield. It's a shame this tale happens to be one of the few fresh, lightly toasted bagels in a cupboard full of stale bread, but I'll take what I can get.
After a gratuitous post coital moment from Black Canary and Green Arrow, we discover how the Infinite Frontier redeems Wally West, revealed to be the killer in Heroes in Crisis. Oh, hey. Spoiler ahoy, I guess. Look, it doesn't matter now.
Somebody at DC loves Speedy. Speedy came back from drugs. In the post-Crisis he bounced back from having his arm ripped off. He got a cybernetic replacement because he's a dude and at the time only dudes could get cybernetic parts or magically healed. Something to do with estrogen-based rejection or so I heard. Post-Crisis Testosterone like a lubricant.
Now, Speedy returns from the Undiscovered Country in Infinite Frontier. I wonder if the Creature from the Black Lagoon's kid and the nondescript Black youth fricasseed by Wally are bopping around somewhere in the Infinite Frontier. If not, I doubt anybody else will remember or miss them. So, Wally gets a free pass, without even hiring Perry Mason as his attorney.
Next comes the second best story in Infinite Frontier. Written by creator Geoff Johns, illustrated by Todd Nauck, whose style I recognized immediately, Stargirl returns with STRIPE.
The vignette's funny, packed with acrobatics and informative for anybody who doesn't know the history of the two characters. The successful television show is likely the cause of Stargirl's return to the DCU. Don't care. Just delighted she's here.
Ooops. Too much joy. Back to Gotham, with the most iconic illustration in the whole anthology.
That's sweet looking art by Jorge Jimenez and Tomeu Morey. Still can't forgive Morey for Batgirl's green eyes, but yeah, that's pretty cool. We also get a glimpse of who in Gotham City survived the whateverclysm while Batman's speeding to the rescue.
I see Ex-Commissioner Gordon--what exactly happened to him, Harley Quinn, Catwoman, Red Hood, Nightwing, Riddler, Penguin, Clayface and characters I do no recognize nor care about. Mind you, Jason Blood in drag looks hilarious.
Now, we get to the nitty-gritty of Future State Dark Detective. In that decent if not groundbreaking mini-series, Batman needed to stop the Magistrate, who took over Gotham City and turned it into a Big Brother franchise, um, the Orwell character not the television series. Batman and Gotham City appear to be back to normal. However, events leading to Dark Detective seem to be repeating. Batman, in fact no cape nor cowl, is welcome in Gotham City, as per order of Mayor One-Eye.
Simon Saint, never seen in the Batman mythos. Possibly inspired by Simon the Zealot, the Skippy of Apostles. May also be a kind of Birdman of Gotham. He's apparently the progenitor of the Magistrate. The Big Brother. Nevertheless, his audience is far more visually arresting.
From the urban we go to the universal. The Green Lantern section of the tale is the most informative. Through the eyes of Keli, the Green Teen Lantern, this is the first I've heard of her as well, we get the gist of DC's cosmic landscape.
Everything Lantern related remains intact. That probably includes the needless death of Katma Tui.
The Flash zips to the headquarters of alternate universe leader President Superman, inaugurated by Grant Morrison in The Final Crisis. The Flash makes an announcement that should surprise absolutely nobody.
See that? Speedy's alive by default. He's just a lucky son-of-a-gun. That person who loves Speedy probably whispered into the ears of the dudes getting boners over Wally West.
"If you resurrect my precious, it will be as if Wally West never committed a murder."
"What about Blue Jay?"
"Who?"
After a walk on the firma of the Frontier depicting more scenes from the next episode, Spectre asks for Diana's answer. This also should surprise nobody, but it's a stylish "No. No, thank you."
Of course, we can't just end it on a double splash page of everybody who matters in the Infinite Frontier. Nope there's gotta be a gotcha. One, I cannot buy.
Phantom Stranger? Sure. He's been beaten by Tannarak, a dime store wizard among the magical elite. The Phantom Stranger's no slouch but sometimes mortal. Spectre on the other hand? No way, does the Spectre fall so easily to Venom.
Okay. Okay. It's not Venom. Just suspiciously looks like the parasitic pair of pants. The villain of the piece is an old school heavy, yet still not capable of felling the Spectre. So, the gotcha is poorly researched grandstanding and really unnecessary. Neither is this clutch of errata.
Diana could not have sent Steve Trevor back home alone. This is really basic stuff, and it hasn't changed all that much over the years.
That sloppy bit of writing stands out because overall Infinite Frontier is a polished co-ordinated effort. The art supplied by numerous illustrators is uniformly attractive. The writing by a number of scribes technically competent.
Do you need Infinite Frontier? No. You do not. Save your money. Is Infinite Frontier at least entertaining? A little. Bits and pieces here and there and about two really good short stories total. Is it necessary for comprehending the rest of the books yet to come. No.
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