Who's That Guy?
Written By: Dan Jurgens, Paul Dini
Art By: Doug Mahnke, Jaime Mendoza, Wil Quintana, Rob Leigh, Ian Churchill, Mike Atiyeh
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: March 8, 2017
*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*
Well, it's finally here. The moment we've all been waiting for............ Well, the moment that all Action Comics fans have been waiting for. We're finally going to find out who that mysterious human Clark Kent is and with that, hopefully find out what Mr. Oz' game plan is with our Man of Steel. Speculations and rumors have been all around concerning who the human Clark Kent is and probably by the time you read this review, it's already been spoiled for you, but even with that I'm going to get into this book, explain it and probably have some problems with the whole timeline of events. Let's get into this issue and check it out.
Explain It!:
Our issue begins with Clark and Lois flying to Metropolis in search of their missing son and the first place they look.......... and really the only place they can think of is the human Clark Kent's apartment. There, they find that their heartbeats are the only ones in the place so they decide to look around to see if they can find any clues to his or Jon's whereabouts and after Lois discovers a whole fridge full of junk food, that's when we see the human Clark Kent come out of nowhere and confront our hero about how he left him to rot in a cell. Yeah, that's a strange ass way to act to Superman, especially after it looks like you took his son, but human Clark Kent doesn't back down and starts changing the world around them to a sort of candy land as he completely adds filler to this issue by turning into one after another of Superman's villains until our hero finally calls out who he really is........... Which turns out to be Mr. Mxyzptlk.
Yeah, now pretty much anything is up for grabs or doable with Mxy being in the game, but the problem with all of this is........... it still doesn't make sense. Mxy tells Superman how he came to Metropolis for one of their play times when he was teleported away by Mr. Oz, who wanted to take Mxy off the game board because he has something planned and didn't need a wildcard like Mxy screwing things up. This led to Mxyzptlk stating that Oz was s dope because he took him on the first day he was allowed to come back to Metropolis after Superman defeated him previously and when he didn't show up Superman would obviously come looking for him. Yeah, that didn't happen and after an undetermined amount of time, Mxy kind of went crazy waiting and decided to say his name backwards to send himself back to the 5th dimension. Only thing is, it didn't work the way he planned. Instead of sending him home, it caused an explosion and with that Mxy decided to keep saying it until he could escape his captor and he wound up back in Metropolis with Mr. Oz hot on the trail. The only way he thought he could get away was to become someone so completely as to get off Oz' radar and that person turned out to be Clark Kent, he even put a whammy on himself so he'd forget who he was and actually become human.
In the end, Mxyzptlk leaves Superman and Lois and says that since he didn't care about him, he's going to make it so no one cares about Jon and as he leaves we see he wasn't bluffing because Lois has no idea why her and Clark are standing in his old apartment or who this Jon character is that Superman keeps talking about. We also have a backup in this issue, where Mxy tells Jon about where he was and gives the backstory I just relayed, but it's kind of wonky with the whole ten years missing deal of Rebirth, because this seems to be the New 52 Mxyptlk, but he knows that Superman is a different Superman and that he was somehow written out of time. Ultimately though, he plans on spending a lot of time together with Jon so that Superman can know what it's like when someone is forgotten about.
That's it for this issue of Action Comics and for all the hype that this issue had going for it....... I have to say that our big mystery surrounding the human Clark Kent turning out to be Mxyzptlk seems a little silly to me. Yeah, he's a classic character, but I have no idea how this version of the character goes with Grant Morrison's backstory of him back in the early days of Action Comics in the New 52 or how the timeline makes sense because we saw Tim Drake, Doomsday and Prophecy already captured by the time that Mxy escaped because they were taunting Oz about it, but here it seems that he was captured well before them and should have escaped before they ever got there because human Clark Kent has been around since the beginning of Rebirth. Yeah, things don't quite add up here, but at least we know that whatever comes of this, there's a heavy hitter like Mxy out there to do the impossible with his 5th dimensional powers. I just don't know what his place in this world is because of him being this higher being and if he knows about Flashpoint and all that because time altering shouldn't mean anything to him or if this will somehow tie into the early days of Action Comics because in that his wife was Clark's landlord, who granted him a do-over with his secret identity. For all my complaints and not understanding how everything works, I do have to say that the art in this issue was great and I loved looking at it. That being said though, I don't know exactly how Mxy will fit into everything going on, all I know is that this story can now do anything and get away with a total reversal or just silliness because Mxy is involved and that kind of turns me off.
Bits and Pieces:
Well, we certainly get a reveal in this issue and while I'm not totally on board with it because it doesn't make sense to the timeline that we've been given, I'm sure a lot of people are all happy about it because it brings a legacy character back onto the page. Personally, I feel that it cheapens the story overall, but with that I had a good time reading this issue and I thought that the art looked great the whole way through.
7/10
ReplyDeleteI really liked this issue, and the art was great, but it is one of those times when you were expecting something different. I was expecting that the prisioner and "Clark Kent" were not the same character, and being the prisioner Conner and "Clark Kent" Superboy Prime. But well, let´s see how the story continues.
And I suppose that when Mxy escaped from Oz, he actually arrived to the past. So at one point there were two Mxys, the one that was a prisioner and the one that escaped. But i didnt think much about it for now. It´s almost 4 a.m. for me XD
Well, you've done it again Eric Stray. I completely agree. The issue felt flat. It wasn't bad but the build up made me feel like I was going to get more... and we didn't. You want a summary: Here and now! Mxy promised to love faithfully. Cause Supes is all he needs. Here and NOW!!!! Luther already knew this story. Alejandro, I thought the same way as you but reverse. I thought Mxy was in prison.... I was right, but I thought Clark was Superboy prime... I was wrong. Eric is again spot on with his bits and pieces. I'd go 6.5 myself
ReplyDeleteI feel like this issue creates more confusion and more of a mess than it answers anything. Oz now just seems stupid and confusing. Why is he just happening upon an empty cell in Superman, but in this issue he is supposedly chasing Myx as a ball of light or something like that? Then he's easily confused by him pretending to be Clark, but Oz has already been making comments on Clark and Superman the entire time? This is all just dumb and a complete mess.
ReplyDeleteI was hoping the reveal was going to be Superboy Prime and/or a revived New52 Superman w/o powers (which would eventually result in a Superman Red / Superman Blue merger.) The Mxy reveal didnt pack the punch I was expecting. I think Lex or Brainiac pulling the strings would have had more of an impact to me, but hope that it all comes together over the final half of the arc.
ReplyDeleteI don't know, it was my pick of the week. Glad it wasn't spoiled for me because the twist was something I honestly didn't see coming. As someone who's been reading DC since 1978 and gone through all the various Crisis and timey whimey stuff my best advice to you Eric is just go with it. New 52 drove me away from characters I had loved for decades, but Rebirth has reignited my passion. Best way to go moving forward when you start thinking about how this fits in is that when when Wally came back it triggered paradoxes that no one has noticed. Like Amanda Waller being the Wall again and not some anorexic looking super model....it got overwritten and no one noticed (except us the reader)...I know it's hard to let it go....I couldn't have in the 90's and 2000's, but just go with the flow and don't think about time. I tried to when new 52 hit and Batman made no sense with 4 Robins in 5 years...that's a worse time mistake than anything you've pointed out in Rebirth thus far. My 2 cents :)
ReplyDeleteSuperspic out
I do NOT like this explanation. It makes a joke of the last 9 months! I'm not saying I hate it. It's just kind of anticlimactic for me. When WAS the last time we saw Mxy anyway? In the early New52 when he was Clark's landlady? And does this mean he's Mr. Oz's escapee? That doesn't make sense unless he's been popping back into his cell in between appearances as human Clark. Like when he went through the door of his apartment building and the doorman told Lois no one had come or gone in the last half hour or something like that? This screwy.
ReplyDeleteWhile that does take off my Clark is ____ theories, it does continue to make me question what Oz is up to, especially with his captive list including A REALITY ALTERER!
ReplyDeleteWhile i like the idea of bringing back Superman legacy villians this wasnt the way to bring back myx he is a light hearted joke villian the theories of it being prime or conner hell before the reveal i was thinking it was the
ReplyDeletejon lane kent superboy any of those would have been better then myx imo
Big Supes fan here. Is it me or does the stock cover of this issue look pretty weak? I get that there are variant covers now, but come on. The covers of old used to have flair, even if they didnt exactly depict the action inside the book.
ReplyDeleteThose covers are awful...maybe a way to actually push towards a variant? It's a big story, have some good covers!!!!
DeleteAmen, brother.
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