Generation Zero #7 Review

Written by: Fred Van Lente 
Art by: Diego Bernard

Cover Price: $3.99

Release Date: February 15, 2017

Publisher: Valiant

Review by: Repairman Jack

Now that the last issue and it’s role as the catch-up, or jumping on point, is out of the way it’s time for this book to get moving again. The last issue wasn’t all bad, but it really left me wanting more. It honestly didn’t feel like we had any kind of conclusion before that so the idea that we were starting a “new arc” felt a little misleading. With that being said I come into this issue pretty excited, we left off with the gang in a new heroscape and going to confront the Corner Men. So will this issue come back after the minor hiccup and live up to expectation or will I once again finish wanting more?

Right away we jump into the book with a Corner….Woman? I’m sold! You won me over pretty fast. This Corner Woman is the first time we see one of them talk coherently and it’s to tell, what I can only guess is abducted children, a twisted take on the tale of the Golden Goose as the children’s heads are hooked to some sort of device. It seems later when they’re set free that they are all children but going from this early panel the art leaves it a little hard to tell. I like these starting panels we get as it really bolster the already creepy tone we get from the Corner Men.

We move on to Cronus, Telic and Keisha killing some Corner Men and we find out that, like the monsters in the movie Little Monsters, they just become empty clothes for the team to accommodate. After some Star Wars references and talk of Netflix password sharing the crew dons the clothes of the Corner Men to see what they can get up to. But not before we find out that James, one of the Zygos twins, is rapidly decaying in both body and mind as he is away from his sister longer. Passing a random floating body in a cube they move into what seems like a lab with what we find out is where Rook has been getting their futuristic technology. It seems Jason Poole has his own personal portal to this Heroscape and has become pretty buddy buddy with the Corner Men and seemingly the creator of this Heroscape, Rasa.

Jason gets a blueprint that he was there for and our heroes head for James’ sister and this Rasa character. With a Corner Crow coo’ing the team runs into the Corner Woman from before only now she is no longer coherent and she is packing another surprise in what can only be described as a head cannon which Telic seems to punch out of existence. The art leaves a little to be desired in some of these panels. In what should be a surprise, but doesn’t come off that way, Keisha finds her brother Kwame hooked up to these head machines as well. He is then in turn able to share with Keisha who the dreaded Rasa is and it turns out to be another one of the captives as well. Or maybe she is only pretending to be a captive because upon being pointed out she runs and starts to also talk in the same nonsense speak of the Corner Men.

With the Zygos twins reunited James quickly assumes his regular appearance, and with the renewed connection they realize together that the children were being tapped for their dreams. In this we get a pretty nice answer for the nonsensical speak of the Corner Men and it gives the team a way to possibly defeat them. They destroy the dream machine and the tower of the Corner Men seemingly disappears.

The last bit of the Heroscape aspect leaves me a little confused because we come to Keisha in what seems like the rubble of a city and she seems to find Rasa huddled in a corner. When she gets up to go to the child she looks down to find another child in some sort of stasus chamber but almost as if we’re seeing it through a similar portal to the one Jason uses to get to the Heroscape. Before we can linger too long though, Cloud is pulling Keisha out of the Heroscape, with Telos, James and Chronos but without James’ sister and Kwame, as they are now under attack by the newly powered Adele Poole.

Bits and Pieces:

Overall I really liked the pace of this issue. The start with the twisted nursery rhyme shed light to some pretty creepy things going on but it didn’t feel wasted as it gave space for the needed action to take place. I did think the art was a little off at some times and just made for some light confusion where there shouldn’t be, but that would probably be my only complaint. The issue really got off the ground running and I feel like we got a lot of answers and small details while also getting some more questions to move forward with.

7.9/10