He Likes Me!Writer: Joshua Williamson
Artist: Clayton Henry
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: August 26, 2020
Joshua Williamson continues his run on Batman/Superman, and I am all about the Ultra-Humanite. He is a cool bad guy who doesn't get enough play and combining him with Atomic Skull (another favorite of mine), had me interested in this story arc from the get-go. While the story hasn't been a classic, Williamson still has this finale to stick the landing. Well, does he? Let's find out...
The last issue ended with Atomic-Batman ready for action, and we see a little beta test as this issue opens. It looks cool, but there is no way that Williamson will have Batman do anything evil, so it lessens the whole affair. It's something that makes a lot of what we get here fall flat throughout the entire issue.
Of course, Superman shows up to stop Ultra-Humanite and save Batman, but we have to pause the action to get everyone up to speed and set up the stakes. While Batman's life is as high a stake as you are going to get, again, we all know Batman will not be dying in this issue. So, the big thing is how Superman will save him, and Williamson stumbles a bit with a solution that is a twist, but not a very good one.
My biggest problem with the issue, though, is just the basic nature of the whole affair. Williamson made it a point to show that Bruce and Clark admire and care for each other in almost every issue of his run, yet he forced a bit of tension into this arc so that he could do again...this time with feeling. It's not a grand reveal and ends up feeling very generic by the end.
The ending also forces a clean slate for almost everything, and yet I was still a bit confused with Ultra-Humanite's overall plan. It seemed to change with each interaction and seemed way too complicated by the end to make much sense. Plus, how did Batman survive having his head on (atomic) fire, among other things that should have killed him? Plus, why are Superman and Batman trusting Star Labs???
Overall, this was a decent arc with a lousy ending that just made it all feel pointless. We learned that Superman and Batman are buddies and Batman can survive almost anything.
Bits and Pieces:
Joshua Williamson forces an ending to his Atomic arc that makes little sense and will probably be forgotten by most the minute they are done reading it. Clayton Henry's art was good, but it can't save the convoluted ending to a generic story. Batman and Superman are the World's Finest, I just wish this book would show that.
5.5/10
I like the Ultra-Humanite too and he's one of those supervillains who can be a lot of fun and very menacing if done well. But I think you brought up the biggest problem here, the lack of specification.
ReplyDeleteThere's no style, specific goal or ethos for the Ultra-Humanite here, at least nothing here we haven't seen done better. In the Justice League cartoon, the Ultra-Humanite was said to target the elements of society he felt were inhibiting higher learning, education and academic advancement, like movie theaters. He had a distinct personality, goals and moral code that made him interesting and distinguished from other burly villains like Grodd or Grundy. Here? I like his look, don't get me wrong, but that's it. Although, the angle of a body jumping, disembodied brain with a vindictive genius intellect is still pretty cool. Just sad to see it go to waste.