Starfire #5 Review and *SPOILERS*

Just Another Day

Written By: Amanda Conner, Jimmy Palmiotti
Art By: Emanuela Lupacchino, Ray McCarthy, Hi-Fi, Tom Napolitano
Cover Price: $2.99

Release Date: October 14, 2015

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

Here we are again, going south and getting some Key West Kori.  I've been having a hard time enjoying this series because of how Starfire is portrayed in this book and before you roll your eyes, I know, everyone wants certain characters written the way they think they should be written and while it's a pretentious thing to say...... Yeah, I do want characters written a certain way and the way I want them is written well....... Yeah, that was pretentious as hell.  It's just very weird for me because I come out of this series each issue loving every damn character in the book except the title character herself.  It's a classic fish out of water story that everyone should be able to get behind, but this damn fish we're presented with has been out of water for a long ass time and it seems like she refuses to learn.  In case you didn't know, Fish=Starfire.  Hopefully, this series proves that it's more than a one trick pony with it's hilarity in misunderstandings and Starfire making everyone awkward with her sexiness....... I guess, that's two tricks......  But with less focus on those two aspects and real character development, I think this book could become something special...... maybe with just a little bit of sexiness.


Explain It!:

Our issue begins with what I think is really the only interesting thing in this book besides for the cliffhanger, which also plays into this issue's opener.  We have Starfire and Soren Hook........ you remember Soren Hook right?  He was that dashing dude, who mentally killed all the crew on a cruise ship a few issues ago.  Well, Starfire and him are having drinks and surprisingly, there doesn't seem to be anything villain-y about this interaction....... It looks like Soren is just into really hot exotic looking women.  Before Soren could get to second base though, something happens that allows Starfire to see Soren's Secret Origin.  I say "something" because I'm not quite sure how this works.  All Starfire does is put her hand on his and all of a sudden she sees that he used to be a doctor who had the ability to absorb cancer out of people until eventually, he began growing a tumor himself.  A buddy of his, who apparently was in on the secret that Soren had cancer absorbing abilities.......which sounds like the worst ability ever, checked Soren over after a fainting spell and determined that the former doctor only had a few months to live.......... and then beat his friend to death because his friend wanted to him to stop helping people and Soren wasn't about to let people die........ Does that make sense?  So with Starfire seeing this little flashback and Soren realizing that his hypocritical origin tale was seen by his date, quickly excused himself and Starfire goes on as if nothing really went down.

The next day, Starfire has to get ready for a job interview and we have ourselves some misunderstandings and Starfire trying to show off her tits at her job interview.......... which when she does go to the interview that's for an aquarium, she gets the job by making out with a dolphin so she can learn it's language and find out why it's sad........ This seems like something that would get you arrested more than get you a job, but maybe that's just me.

So with college graduates getting the shaft because a orange girl slipped the tongue to a porpoise, it's time to party down in celebration.  Too bad it just makes all the side characters that I really enjoyed before this issue just come off as annoying drunks.  Yeah, this might just come off as really negative and harsh, but this is all we have going on in this issue and it's not really interesting at all to read.

In the end, Starfire calls it a night and leaves the party.  I don't know if Sol was trying to get to Kori's right when she did and hope that she was drunk enough to make some mistakes, but when Kori shows up at her door........ She finds Soren Hook waiting for her and Sol laying on the ground surrounded by blood.  Let's just hope that he was bringing some ketchup by for one of those midnight ketchup rendezvous that I've heard about from certain circles and simply fell over from being a little too drunk....... Yeah, let's go with that.

That's it for this issue of Starfire and the misunderstandings and inadvertent/deliberate sexiness thing is really just getting played out because that's all the issues seem to be with just a smidgen of plot to keep the story moving along......... and it's just not enough for me.  The only thing worthwhile in this issue was the first few pages and the last page that makes me hope that something might actually happen in this series in the next issue, but I've been tricked down this road before and don't hold out much of that precious "hope" that's kept me going this long.  If you've read this series already, then you know what it's all about and maybe you dig that, but for me it's just not enough and besides for the excellent art and colors in the book, there just isn't enough substance to keep me interested in the series as a whole.

Bits and Pieces:

The Starfire series just doesn't have enough substance to keep me interested and I find myself dreading whenever it comes out because I know it's just going to be more of the same misunderstandings and awkward nudity that seems to be the selling point of the book and I just want more from the character than nonsense.  I do love the art and colors in this book though, but sadly without an interesting story, it just doesn't make it worth the buy.

5/10