Art By: Emanuela Lupacchino, Mirco Pierfederici, Ray McCarthy, Trevor Scott, Hi-Fi
Cover Price: $2.99
Release Date: September 9, 2015Making Friends
*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*
When we last sauntered down to Key West to check in on our favorite Tamaranian Princess, she was busy as hell dealing with a hurricane and even after that she really didn't have time to breathe...... you know, because of the subterranean monster that has come a ground and is tearing the town apart. It's a good thing that bars are the best places to find new friends because Kori finds herself with someone else who is special in the form of Atlee, a woman from the underground world of Strata, who now that she's on the surface works as a waitress at Ye Olde Watering Hole....... yeah, that's not the name but I'll go with it if you do. We discover that the monster is after Atlee and if you hit it......... it only makes the monster bigger. I didn't have a lot of faith going in because of Starfire coming off as a nitwit lately and the idea that it would take brains over brawn to take down this baddie, but let's jump and see if I can be pleasantly surprised. Let's check it out.
Explain It!:
Our story begins with our two heroes battling the hell out of the Chida monster and where I had been complaining about Starfire being a numbskull in this series.......... well, she still is, but thankfully we have Atlee taking the position as the brains of the operation. This new-ish Terra.......... well, actually I'm not sure if she'll even go by Terra so I guess we should just continue to call her Atlee. Anyway, she comes up with a great plan where they continuously throw the monster further out into the ocean and then Starfire blasts the hell out of the beast, making him too big and heavy to get back to land..... it works especially well because it becomes so heavy that the ocean floor breaks open and the beast sinks into a crevasse.
The rest of the story becomes all about acclimating Atlee to the series by explaining to us that she lives in a world inside our world named Strata, where the people have moved beyond all the terrible shit that we all do to one another and Atlee, using her superpowers acquired by the natural metal of Strata "Quixium" was sent to the surface to enrich all our lives....... So far she's enriched this book for me. The backstory continues and I really like this bit because while it uses continuity that is Pre-New 52........ it doesn't have to be. There was a point when Atlee and Power Girl were BFFin' it up and even though we never saw that in Worlds' Finest, it doesn't mean that it didn't happen. The inclusion of Power Girl to Atlee's backstory makes it mean a lot more to me........ for some reason and I love the way that Conner and Palmiotti added it without over selling it or under selling it. I think it's funny though how Atlee was sent above to save us from ourselves.......yet she's a waitress in a bar. I've appreciated a lot of waitresses in bars over the years, but I can't say that any of them made my life better. Once all of that is out of the way, it's all about Sheriff Stella Gomez freaking the fuck out because her nice peaceful town has out of nowhere been overtaken by super powered people....... Yeah, it's only two, but it's a whole lot more than she knew about three days ago.
In the end, it looks like Kori and Atlee become best friends, Stella calms down and Sol is put into more uncomfortable situations by Kori's love of nakedness...... It's here where I start to think that she's playing this whole dumb thing because Sol is right when he says to her that she has to know what she's doing to him. So the monster is defeated, Kori has a place to live and a new friend and all seems right in the world......except that she gets a Philly Cheese Steak on the boardwalk and the asshole put peppers on it like a simp and the psychic killer Soren Hook seems to have Starfire in his sights.
That's it for this issue of Starfire and while it might not be the best compliment to the series, I like this issue probably the best because it's full of characters that aren't Starfire. I love all of the supporting cast and can't wait to see more of Atlee in this series..... It's just Starfire's constant misunderstandings get on my nerves, but even that seems to have been downplayed at least a bit here. Let's continue our conversation about things that everyone likes and talk about Emanuela Lupacchino and her fantastic art. This artist and hell, the whole artistic creative team rock this book month after month and I love everything that I look at here. It seems that Hi-Fi has even kicked his game up a notch in this book because his colors just pop..... Not saying that they don't normally, it's just more noticeable here. I could really see this becoming a book that I really enjoy if Kori just acted like she lived on Earth for awhile, but right now I just roll my eyes at all naive thought balloons.
Bits and Pieces:
I really love the inclusion of Atlee in this title and I hope that she becomes a mainstay because I really love all the supporting cast to this series and the addition of her just brings a whole new level of enjoyment....... probably because she'll be the brains of Starfire and her superhero operation. While Kori still gets on my nerves, I found myself digging this issue more than I have in the past and it's really hard not to like this book when it's sporting such awesome art.
The rest of the story becomes all about acclimating Atlee to the series by explaining to us that she lives in a world inside our world named Strata, where the people have moved beyond all the terrible shit that we all do to one another and Atlee, using her superpowers acquired by the natural metal of Strata "Quixium" was sent to the surface to enrich all our lives....... So far she's enriched this book for me. The backstory continues and I really like this bit because while it uses continuity that is Pre-New 52........ it doesn't have to be. There was a point when Atlee and Power Girl were BFFin' it up and even though we never saw that in Worlds' Finest, it doesn't mean that it didn't happen. The inclusion of Power Girl to Atlee's backstory makes it mean a lot more to me........ for some reason and I love the way that Conner and Palmiotti added it without over selling it or under selling it. I think it's funny though how Atlee was sent above to save us from ourselves.......yet she's a waitress in a bar. I've appreciated a lot of waitresses in bars over the years, but I can't say that any of them made my life better. Once all of that is out of the way, it's all about Sheriff Stella Gomez freaking the fuck out because her nice peaceful town has out of nowhere been overtaken by super powered people....... Yeah, it's only two, but it's a whole lot more than she knew about three days ago.
In the end, it looks like Kori and Atlee become best friends, Stella calms down and Sol is put into more uncomfortable situations by Kori's love of nakedness...... It's here where I start to think that she's playing this whole dumb thing because Sol is right when he says to her that she has to know what she's doing to him. So the monster is defeated, Kori has a place to live and a new friend and all seems right in the world......except that she gets a Philly Cheese Steak on the boardwalk and the asshole put peppers on it like a simp and the psychic killer Soren Hook seems to have Starfire in his sights.
That's it for this issue of Starfire and while it might not be the best compliment to the series, I like this issue probably the best because it's full of characters that aren't Starfire. I love all of the supporting cast and can't wait to see more of Atlee in this series..... It's just Starfire's constant misunderstandings get on my nerves, but even that seems to have been downplayed at least a bit here. Let's continue our conversation about things that everyone likes and talk about Emanuela Lupacchino and her fantastic art. This artist and hell, the whole artistic creative team rock this book month after month and I love everything that I look at here. It seems that Hi-Fi has even kicked his game up a notch in this book because his colors just pop..... Not saying that they don't normally, it's just more noticeable here. I could really see this becoming a book that I really enjoy if Kori just acted like she lived on Earth for awhile, but right now I just roll my eyes at all naive thought balloons.
Bits and Pieces:
I really love the inclusion of Atlee in this title and I hope that she becomes a mainstay because I really love all the supporting cast to this series and the addition of her just brings a whole new level of enjoyment....... probably because she'll be the brains of Starfire and her superhero operation. While Kori still gets on my nerves, I found myself digging this issue more than I have in the past and it's really hard not to like this book when it's sporting such awesome art.
7.5/10
I thought for sure that Chida monster was on its way to Strata when it got sucked into the earth. This book is gorgeous... heh heh heh!
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