Art By: Juan Ferreyra
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: September 10, 2014
The Power of Fate Compels You, The Power of Fate Compels You
Since Constantine is a main player to the Futures End weekly I finally feel like I have something to talk about. Now you might be thinking that this is a direct tie-in, but no. This story appears to be a prequel to the adventures that Constantine is having in tracking down Kal-El and the robot monster Brainiac, that is leaving a slew of bodies in his wake. But that doesn't matter because this cover is our cover of the week and that's because it's so badass for one and for two it involves both Constantine and Doctor Fate. That's just an amazing combination in my mind and if we want to judge a book by it's cover than this issue should be really grand indeed. So let's check out what our brash Brit is doing Five Years From Now.
Explain It!:
Our story begins in a shady abandoned apartment building...... Or an active one where the neighbors keep themselves to themselves. Either way that's where we are and that's where Constantine is and it seems that our anti-hero is planning one final showdown with Doctor Fate, well the helm of Fate. It seems that Constantine has a little bit of a grudge against Fate for things that happened during the Earth 2 war, but they keep the exposition on that pretty vague. Also I'm a little confused on whether Constantine actually wore the helmet during the war or if we're just seeing images that the helm is showing Constantine about what they could do together. It doesn't seem to matter either way because all we need to know is that Constantine is out for Nabu blood and the Earth 2 war is shrouded in such mystery that I doubt we'll ever know the full background for each individual character, especially a gutter mage like our boy here.
After a bit of arguing between Constantine and Nabu, our hero makes the mistake of grabbing a hold of the helmet and apparently for Nabu to use you all you have to do is touch it, because it takes control of John and magical tendrils wrap around him, forcing the helm onto his head. But something that Doctor Fate wasn't counting on was the trap that John had set for him. You see all this bickering and threatening was an act that Constantine had to sell to Nabu so he'd let his guard down. Now that Nabu and Constantine are joined we see that this was John's grand plan all along and Nabu and John are inside John's heart for the setting of their final showdown, The Auditorium of Anubis. Here the god Anubis sits in judgement over the challenged and here Constantine has challenged Nabu to prove that he ever gave a damn about anyone besides himself. Now this normally would sound like a challenge someone would place against our title character, but it seems that our two heroes here have a lot more in common than you'd assume. As you know magic always has a price and a big bad spell like The Auditorium of Anubis is no exception. Either Nabu is found unworthy and is killed, or the accuser is killed instead. Either way someone's dying.
The piece of evidence that Constantine uses to prove his point is that outside his apartment we have a callback to one of my favorite issues of this title, Constantine #5, where Constantine and Shazam swap voices in a bar and Constantine becomes the mightiest mortal, but that doesn't matter, what matters is the man that ran the bar Lloyd Ortiz is back and he's waiting at the entrance of the apartment building and taking down anyone that comes through the door. You see since our story began, Nabu has been calling out to people to wear the helm of Fate so that he can use his magic against Constantine, but everyone that attempts to become the good Doctor has been stopped by John's good friend Lloyd. You see where Constantine is going with this? Nabu doesn't give a shit about them and keeps calling them even though they keep being stopped. After this point is made, Anubis reaches down, picks up Nabu and eats him.
In the end we find out that Constantine didn't have the juice to actually pull off The Auditorium of Anubis, but he did have a demon he made a deal with that set up the illusion, all it took was for John to convince Nabu that it was real, for the illusion to actually kill him. So Nabu is gone and now the demon resides in the helm of Fate and it would appear that it'll continue the legacy of Doctor Fate. Fun is fun, but done is done and that's all I've got for you this month for Constantine. That's right folks we witnessed the gutter mage out smart DC's sorcerer supreme and it really was something to behold. Now next month we'll be looking at Constantine in Earth 2 as we saw him get transported there last issue, but during my review of it I thought we'd be seeing our present Constantine transported to Five Years From Now, looking back I don't know how I could of thought this unless it was just me with some wishful thinking, but alas I was wrong and I have another notch against me. So see you then when we might actually have the first meeting between John and Doctor Fate.
Bits and Pieces:
I really dug this issue. Everything from the art, to the setup, to the surprise ending, it was all just excellent. Just the idea of pairing up Constantine with Doctor Fate was something that tickled me in a strange way that I'm not ashamed to say that I liked. But like a lot of these Futures End titles they keep giving tidbits of exposition about the mysterious Earth 2 war and I find myself caring about that more than what led from it. Don't get me wrong, this issue was enough without the explanation, but after reading all these event titles, I want that story more than ever. So go check it out and see what this Dark character is doing Five Years From Now.
8.7/10
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