Greetings Boils And Ghouls!
Jimmy Palmiotti, Saladin Ahmed, Brandon Thomas
Continuing from Dark Nights: Death Metal #5, where we saw the Darkest Knight's worlds coming to take on our heroes we find ourselves in the middle of.......... an anthology story? Yeah, it's kind of weird that this would simply be random stories, supposedly showing us some of the people and events that make up the Darkest Knight's newly formed worlds, especially after having other Death Metal tie-ins tell more of the story than what seems like the actual event is doing but for whatever reason, we have a book that feels more like Tales From The Dark Multiverse than an actual tie-in to our event, but let's jump into this issue and see if this book, hosted by the Robin King is worth reading. Let's check it out.
Since this book is tales from random worlds of the 52 Earths that the Darkest Knight created, you'd think that we'd get some weird far-out shit that you'd never think of since there's nothing to really hold these stories to anything that we've seen previously, like the Tales From the Dark Multiverse is all about doing but instead you get some really random entries here that don't feel like they deserve to be included in anything that we've been dealing with.
You've got a strange Zsasz story by Patton Oswalt that I was interested in reading but by the end of the story, I don't understand why this would be a world or a story within that world that would be deemed necessary for us to understand what's going on there since all it came off as was a Tales From the Crypt just desserts tale featuring Zsasz. After that, you get a spooky story featuring the Super-Pets, which with the ridiculous aspect that is the Super-Pets and the great art that accompanies it, this is the best story in the batch because... Well, because it actually plays out like a full story. That's about it though because then we're thrown into a world where the Guardians of the Universe take over Earth as New Oa, which seems cool as hell but right when it's about to get started..... the story is over and we move on to Steel dealing with a world that's been plagued with the Scarecrow's fear toxin and this really does nothing. After seeing what these worlds that the Darkest Knight has created have to offer, I really don't see our heroes having any kind of trouble in taking them down because they aren't anything special or interesting at the end of the day.
All in all, who would have thought that anyone would ever say "Tempus Fuginaut did it better"? Yeah, there isn't much to this issue but a steeper price tag and at the end of the day, I'd only recommend this book to people who want to see a messed up Super-Pets story or the Robin King acting like the Crypt Keeper because that's the only thing that feels put together in this book and that's a shame because I was genuinely interested in learning more about these worlds and all I got instead was a writer's workshop. The art is serviceable throughout, but it really shines with the Super-Pets story and I would say is also really good in the Green Lantern/Green Arrow story, but that's over so fast that it doesn't really matter. Overall, this was a huge disappointment because it could have been something really interesting but instead just comes off as a cash grab.
Bits and Pieces:
Where the end of Death Metal #5 made it seem like the Darkest Knight's worlds would be not only interesting but also something to fear, we're given an anthology book about them that just comes off as thrown together and lacking in anything really entertaining. I do have to give it up to Connor and Palmiotti for showing us a messed-up Super-Pets story but beyond that, there isn't anything here that makes this feel more than just a writer's workshop.
My LCS guy threw this one into my pull for free (He does that with a comic once a month for good customers to see if there's something they might like that's not on their radar) and I have to say that I got it at about the right price. Your review was spot on. The only story that really grabbed me was the GL/GA story that sort of ended before it even got going.
ReplyDeleteI'm not saying that I need to see the rest of the Darkest Knight's worlds after this Tales From the Dark Multiverse wanna-be issue, but if was had to then please show me more of this Hard Traveled story because the idea of the Guardians taking over Earth and for whatever reason Hal going with it....... I could stand to see some more of that. Especially if Green Arrow is our one true savior in the long run.
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