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Justice League of America #30 |
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Story Title: ‘Welcome to Sundown
Town’
(Chapter 3: New Moon Rising)
Writer: Dwayne McDuffie
Penciller: Jose Luis
Inker: JP Mayer
Colorist: Pete Pantazis
Covers: Shane Davis w/ Alex Sinclair
Letterer: Rob Leigh
Editor: Eddie Berganza
Published by: DC Comics |
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Reviewed by:
Bruce Logan |
After last month’s, to put it lightly,
slow issue things get back on track. The only thing carried over
into his issue is the villain, Shadow Thief. Even he was
already called out on the last page of issue #28. In light
(no pun intended) of this Justice League of America #29
was just another gimmick issue that served no purpose than
to derail this supposedly flagship series of DC Comics.
Moving on, another in a series of characters who have
received a power-boost Post-Infinite Crisis, the new
and improved Shadow Thief can now not only control his
shadow but also of others. He can then make those shadows
come alive and make these shadow creations do his bidding.
What that means is that major fight of this issue is the
Leaguers and Shadow Cabinet-ers facing off against their
shadow doppelgangers. On the positive side, even if this
rather mediocre fight takes most of the page space McDuffie
does make time for character moments. Even more, well,
positive is that he (hopefully) brings to end, or at least
closer to it, the daytime soap opera-esque pairing of Kendra
(Hawkgirl) and Roy Harper (Red Arrow) that Meltzer shoved in
for drama sake. Excuse me while I have a fanboy moment. YAY!!
Ahem, back to the review.
The League-Cabinet wins the battle-against-self and all
should be good if not for the fact that the Shadow Thief was
just a bit too happy to lose. The reason for that is shown
soon enough and this is where the story fumbled, big-time.
The gigantic planetary level threat that the Shadow Thief
sets forth as his final play, well, it didn’t feel quite
that threatening. It comes across as an obligatory “Oooooh!!
Lookit that” (wannabe) blockbuster moment, and a weak one at
that. Mediocre enough on its own its weakness is all the
more glaring in light of (once again, no pun intended) of
the show put forth by Dr. Light. Speaking of Dr. Light,
after the last few years of being in the doldrums it seems
Kimiko Hoshi has finally gotten her power levels back.
As for the ending, veteran Milestone readers will be able to
explain it better the significance of what happens but for
all purposes this isn’t the last we've seen of the ‘Cabinet.
Jose Luis provides the artwork and even though it doesn’t
have quite the definition and detailing of Ed Benes his
style is similar enough to keep with the general tone of the
story yet individual enough to make it stand out as its own.
As with the other titles that I got this month, I just
skimmed over this latest waste-o'-space gimmick i.e.
Origins & Omens. RATING: 7/10
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