Superman #43 Review and *SPOILERS*

Oh, That Bizarro Talk!

Written By: Patrick Gleason, Peter J. Tomasi

Art By: Patrick Gleason, Joe Prado, Stephen Downer, Rob Leigh

Cover Price: $2.99

Release Date: March 21, 2018

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

Last issue we were introduced to Boyzarro and got reintroduced to Bizarro World, which is known as Htrae........ you know, backwards all the way around there and with that, I was frustrated as all hell because I can't stand Bizarro talk.  With that though, I realized for my review that there are probably fans of the concept and the characters so I just judged the issue on what we got and hoped that by the end of the issue, where Boyzarro came to our own world that things would become normal........ I hoped so much.  Sadly, even with our Bizarro version of Superboy here, the Bizarro talk continues and somehow....... I still managed to see a decent story in here.  Let's jump into this issue and check it out.

Explain It!:

Our issue begins with the concept that Robin's friend Maya, also known as Nobody has been employed by Superman to keep an eye out on Jon and his activities since he's become Superboy and as it turns out, she was there when Superboy and Kathy came back from Bizarro World and she continued to be there after Superboy left, which gave us our first real interaction between Kathy Branden, who seems to be going by a superhero persona herself now, known as "Beacon" and it's these two who first see Boyzarro enter this world and then have to deal with the portal between world continuing to be open....... including a romance obsessed, thin mustached Robzarro.  

Back in Metropolis, we see Boyzarro and Superboy having a pretty decent time interacting until Superman enters the room and this story......... even with all the Bizarro talk, actually becomes something of a very special episode, where it seems that Boyzarro is afraid to go home because it seems that Bizarro is abusive.  After a bit of superheroics, that stemmed from Boyzarro thinking that Superman was his father, we move on to the mission of getting Boyzarro home and Superman having a talk with Bizarro.  Now, I'm not going to tell you that I know anything about how things are done on Bizarro world, but besides for Boyzarro going missing, it seems that Bizarro has a lot on his plate that might be making him act out a little bit more than he usually would because it seems that his "Super Foes" have gone missing as well........... not including Hawkzarro though, who we saw Boyzarro possibly kill in the previous issue.  

In the end, Superman gets hit on by Bizarro's wife, faces off with his opposite counterpart and we leave this issue with something I never expected to see........... The Legion of Fun destroying the world by making it round so that they can all have some fun at Bizarro's expense.

That's it for this issue of Superman and while this issue is a bit easier to read than the previous one, the Bizarro talk is still excessive and characters who are trying to use it for Boyzarro's sake in understanding what's going on, go in and out of using it so really, I have no idea what they're going with here and may be confusing me more than Boyzarro himself........ I don't know, but like I said in my opening paragraph, there is a story here that comes off like a very special episode that deals with abuse and while I think it is downplayed to throw more Bizarro World characters in the mix, it's this story that I hope continues going forward because it's the most amount of substance going on here and I want to know if love is multiversal or if abuse on Htrae is the way they go around showing that they care for one another.  I love the art in this issue and I love seeing the many young characters that don't get a lot of panel play showing up in this book and hope it continues going forward.

Bits and Pieces:

Bizarro talk is abundant in this issue and where I was hoping that it would back off a bit from the previous issue, it did at least become easier to read.  While we have so many crazy things going on in this story, there's a nugget of something that comes off more interesting than the rest and I hope that personal bit is explored more, while also keeping the many characters that appear in this issue coming as this series continues.  I love the art and am enjoying the story enough, even with all that damned backwards talk.

7/10