Action Comics #1017 Review

It's About to Get Ugly

Written by: Brian Michael Bendis
Art by: John Romita Jr., Klaus Janson, Brad Anderson, and Dave Sharpe
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: November 27, 2019

I am taking over Action Comics for Eric since he has a bunch of books to review this week and that's fine with me since I have been enjoying Action more than Superman.  That is a bit of a backhanded compliment since I haven't been liking either actually, just don't hate this one as much. So, how was this issue?  Let's find out...



Going into this issue, I figured we'd get some Leviathan and while I still am a bit pissed that we got six issues of an "event" just to have the big bad go off to a monthly book, I was hoping that Bendis might redeem himself a bit here.  That didn't happen.  Not even close.  The problem is that we barely get any Leviathan in person, just a lot of chatter about him and while we all should be pretty used to that by now, we get a ton of other crap loaded on top of it.

Yep, Bendis gives us the kitchen sink of comics writing this month and some of it just feels flat out wrong.  We start out with the Legion of Doom and it doesn't make a lick of sense with what's been going on in the Justice League book.  I usually can look past this sort of thing, but this is way, way off.  Not only that, but the art is pretty atrocious as well.  I think we have a nominee for worst looking Grodd ever!  Has John Romita Jr. ever seen the character before?  Throw in the Young Justice team and I just don't know what's what here.  I mean, that's a Bendis book so who else is to blame for them showing up here?  The worst part of it, though, is that it amounts to nothing at all in this issue...something that keeps happening in this issue.  The Legion of Doom is more worried about the sincerity of Superman's surrender than sounding like themselves, but who cares as we go back in time a day to see...well, not much at all.

At the Daily Planet, Perry yells, Jimmy snaps some photos, Lois is M.I.A. and Clark interviews Leone.  The day is interrupted by a flaming meteor of energy that Superman chases right before he is teleported to Gorilla City.  It's all supposedly a plan by Leviathan (who is never actually seen) to make room for them to take out the Silent Mafia.  The Silent Mafia was a pretty cool concept about 17 issues ago, but now seem to be taken out of the game before really doing much of anything.  At least Rogal Zaar got to yell a bit before his story ended with a thud!

Superman does get to talk to Melody Moore before heading back to waste two pages with Lois saying nothing, but taking a ton of words to do so.  The sing-song dialogue ends with the conclusion that Luthor is the baddie as he always is, even though he is kind of involved in some bigger things at the moment.

This issue is a total mess of half baked ideas that don't jive well together with the naked eye, let alone under a microscope.  There are too many ideas, but not enough.  Too many words, but nothing said.  The biggest issue, though, is nothing happens.  We end back at the beginning and everything in between is a bore.

I mentioned the art already, but I will just say it again...this is not a good looking book.  Characters we've seen for issue after issue look nothing like themselves and I just wish Romita would let Brad Anderson do some of the shadow work because the over penciled bit does not suit Clark.  If this was a Marvel book, Superman would be tagged as a Hound immediately!

Bits and Pieces:

Brian Michael Bendis tries to put way too much into this issue and becomes a convoluted mess very quickly.  John Romita Jr.'s art doesn't help at all and while things have to get better from here, Bendis needs to thin things out a bit before that's going to happen.  Luckily, not much at all happens, so I can easily recommend you skip this issue and come back next month for the issue name-dropped at the end of Event Leviathan as the return of Leviathan himself.

4.0/10