Earth 2: World's End #6 Review and *SPOILERS*

Written By: Daniel H. Wilson, Marguerite Bennett, Mike Johnson
Art By: Jorge Jimenez, Tyler Kirkham, Joe Weems, Eddy Barrows, Eber Ferreira, Jan Duursema, Drew Geraci, Eduardo Pansica, Waldon Wong, Jaime Mendoza
Cover Price: $2.99
Release Date: November 12, 2014

Is It Just Me Or Does Looking At Doctor Fate Make You Hungry?

Last week when we jumped the Einstein Rosen Bridge to Earth 2, we saw a bunch of things going down.  Doctor Fate, Flash and Hawkgirl were fighting Famine and it seems like our good doctor might have finished off the foe by casting a spell on her a lot like that Gypsy fellow did in the movie "Thinner".  Aqua Woman was calling up one of the old ones to try and save her people from the onslaught of Death and Green Lantern was told by the Green itself that if this world is to survive he must team up with Grundy and the two must recruit the other avatars of the world.  Finally we saw Batman, Val-Zod, Red Tornado and Power Girl going after Huntress, after she was taken by Desaad within a fire pit and in the end they found something that they hadn't expected.  The body of Superman.  Let's check out this issue and see if the hype they left us on last week seems legit.  Let's check it out.

Explain It!:

Our story begins with us seeing that Doctor Fate's spell has worked on the Fury Famine........ Since they kind of left us on that cliff hanger last week.  I thought that that choice of a cliff hanger was very weird because, well because who ends something like that?  Doctor Fate casts a spell...... The End.  But after reading this week's issue, I guess I can get behind what the writers were doing.  You see, even though Doc Fate's "Reflection Spell" worked on Famine and the Fury is now dead........ Well, I think she's dead.  It seems that the spell was also reflected back at our DC Sorcerer Supreme.  What does that mean?  Well, it means you don't want to hang around Fate because you'll probably wither away and die thanks to the back firing spell.  So now Flash and Hawkgirl are feeling the affects of the Famine Doctor Fate and instead of helping them, our hero decides that he needs to go to Jimmy Olsen and Mister Miracle's Mother Box to try and make this right.  It's kind of a long trip, so I don't know if I should expect Flash and Hawkgirl to survive this ordeal because they really withered away fast....... Well I'd like to think that the situation is dire, but come on.  Like they're going to kill off these characters just like that.  But let's put our knowledge of comics aside and still give ourselves that moment of doubt, so when they live we can drop our comics and give out a cheer and possibly high five the closest person to you.  

So Doctor Fate travels to Amazonia, but the World Army and all our heroes that are coming up with plans to take on Apokolips begin to feel the affects of Famine and they really believe that the Fury is on her way to breach their defenses.  Mister Miracle is about to take the Mother Box and boom tube everyone to Apokolips to start the fight early to survive the affects of Famine/Doctor Fate, but the Mother Box transports itself away from Mister Miracle to Jimmy Olsen and when we leave this portion of the story, Jimmy's getting real skinny as Doctor Fate hovers above him.  I don't know what a Mother Box can do to fix the power of Nabu, but I guess we'll find out.  Remember to keep that dread going for next week's issue so we can high five over it's resolution.

It seems like Aqua Woman is making good on her threats about unleashing an Atlantean super weapon, because it appears that she's unleashing an old god like Cthulhu out into the world to avenge her fallen people.  This can't be good for anyone and on the surface world Barbara Grayson and Dick Grayson are trying to rally up people to make a police force in the World Army refugee camps.  At first it doesn't seem to be going too well, but things might be getting better for them when they recruit Ted Grant into their services.  Woo!  Wildcat!  Woo!

Now we'll check in on the buddy cop movie that is the Alan Scott and Grundy team up.  Now this part tries to be funny with the two bickering back and forth, but it doesn't really come off as fun as it should.  It's like "you disgust me", "that's funny because you disgust me more", kind of banter when the two are supposed to be seriously trying to find the other avatars and their powers combined hopefully don't make Captain Planet, but you know, save the world and all.  Alan's ring is guiding him to the other avatars and he's shocked when he finds himself at his deceased boyfriend Sam's chateau and finds a letter that Sam had written Alan before he died.  Now you Earth 2 Green Lantern fans might recall that Alan had planned on asking Sam to marry him, but after Sam died and Alan was imbued with The Green, he used the engagement ring to channel the energy, so that's the ring that the Green Lantern of Earth 2 uses.  So imagine Alan's surprise when he discovers that Sam was going to propose to him and the shock when he discovers that Sam is now the avatar of The White.  I understand that stories need drama, but I'm a little put off by everyone being interconnected throughout this story, like in Worlds' Finest this week saying that Mercury imbued Lois Lane with the spirit of the East Wind when she was a child.  It's just too much.  Every character doesn't need a connection with the other.  We could of just as easily had a Earth 2 counterpart to a Prime Earth hero being the avatar for The White or since we brought her up, have Lois being the avatar since she's now an elemental robot and even that seems to interconnected.  We've got a whole universe people, use it!  I'm still intrigued to see where this goes so I guess I can't bitch too much, I guess I just expected more.

In the end we deal with Batman, Val-Zod, Red Tornado and Power Girl trying to find Huntress when they come upon Superman.  Now the cliffhanger to last issue would make us believe that this is the actual Superman, but no it's simply another clone who's dead and he's not alone.  The whole passage way is lined with tubes of Superman clones that make you think of that scene from Alien: Resurrection, where Ripley sees all of her failed clones......... Don't worry if you don't know this reference because really, no one should ever watch this flick........... It's just awful.  So Red Tornado seeing all these duplicates of her husband, gets her all............ what's that thing that people feel?  Oh that's right feelings.  She starts having all these feelings for Clark and she wants to see if he's still alive down in the fire pit since Desaad apparently has enough DNA to make all these clones.  Too bad that Batman doesn't want to hear any of it.  He's down there to find Huntress and to shut this fire pit down and that's it.  After a little hesitation from Red Tornado, the team get behind Thomas, but then he starts taking more Miraclo and when Val tries to stop him, this new Batman pulls out some Kryptonite.  Dick move Thomas.  So Power Girl flips out and Val-Zod heat visions Batman's drug supply.  It seems like there's going to be some cuts to this roster and I don't know if Batman will make it.  Time to get Batman out and bring Hourman in, but then we still have the problem with someone being a drug addict on the team.

That's it for this week's World's End and man does this issue make it feel like this series is starting to get on the right direction.  Yeah it still has the same amount of storytelling as it's had, but it's taken the characters that have been on the back burner for awhile and brought them to the forefront of the story and actually relegated the Batman/Superman story to only a small segment.  Some might cry foul, but this is the type of story that I want to be told.  We've got Batman and Superman all over the Prime Universe, I want the other Earth 2 characters to be able to shine and get some of those cape lovers a rude awakening that there are other heroes out there that kick just as much ass as they do.  See you next week as we continue our journey to this parallel Earth.  See you then.

Bits and Pieces:

Right from the get go the art in this book grabbed me.  There's a ton of artists and I don't know who does what, but for some reason this issue just really shined and I hope it continues.  Like the art, the writing here was top notch.  I got all the characters I wanted to see featured in this book....... actually featured.  I know I was shocked too.  All the battles we saw during the first five issues have somehow become stories and they're actually stories I want to read.  So for all my bitching the last five weeks, I guess I can just shut my jerk off mouth, because this book is really heading some place that I want to see.  You definitely gotta check this one out.

8.7/10