Generations Forged #1 Review

Time Of Your Life

Written By: Dan Jurgens, Robert Venditti, Andy Schmidt

Art By: Mike Perkins, Marco Santucci, Paul Pelletier, Norm Rapmund, Bernard Chang, Joe Prado, Colleen Doran, Bryan Hitch, Andrew Currie, Dan Jurgens, Kevin Nowlan, Hi-Fi, Tom Napolitano

Cover Price: $9.99

Release Date: February 26, 2021

It feels like it's been forever since we stepped into the time-shattered Universe of Generations Shattered but we're finally back and we can find out if our team of superhero misfits from all points of time can lay the smackdown on Dominus, the unmaker of worlds. When last we left this story we saw that Dominus had thrown our heroes into different times, not only separating them but stranding them so that time would continue to be Dominus' plaything. Let's jump into this issue and see where our heroes went and how they'll make their way back to Vanishing Point to end this would-be crisis. Let's check it out.

So while I thought that the first issue of this story was really interesting in not only showing a weird new way to look at comic book time that made me think that this story was doing something new and maybe important that would affect the rest of the DC Universe as we know it, not to mention bringing back the villain Dominus, who hasn't been seen for two decades, when you get into this issue you realize that the overall story isn't all that elaborate and the majority of the page space is made up of our heroes just surviving in the different times that they were trapped in, before finding their way back to Vanishing Point, some easier than others so that they can just come together to take on Dominus in his Wandavision-Esque world. For anyone who doesn't have a familiarity with Dominus, you don't get much here and it even feels like they tried to make him a sympathetic character even though that's not the case with what he's done previously, and ultimately, he's just pushed aside with barely any fuss or muss.

The biggest problem with this issue is it just doesn't follow the large feel of the first part of the story because, in this one, things just happen-to-happen to get to our final conflict with Dominus, like some of our heroes have elaborate means to get back to Vanishing Point, while Steel just manages to make a time wristband work, while nobody else can do this, Kamandi's Skeets gauntlet just shows back up out of nowhere and is functional again and in the end, the destroyed time is just moved away and then moved back into place to make things work out and it all just comes off rather thrown together and that's so disappointing to me for how the first issue felt and what it could have meant to the rest of the DC Universe. It's because of this limited ending that makes this story feel less consequential in the end because it makes it something that felt inclusive to the DC Universe as we know it, just exclusive to this story, and all the characters involved just go about their days as if this little jaunt never happened.

All in all, the art is strong throughout...... even if Kamandi's Skeets gauntlet was supposed to be with him the whole time but was forgotten about until the end, the art is really fun in this book and I loved the classic feel to the way that this was drawn and the way that the colors were used. I just wish that the story remained as strong as it was previously because I was really into this story initially, but this finale was a bit of a letdown with how forced it became to get to the ending that just kind of ended without a real explanation about why Dominus was doing this to time because it doesn't really add up to who the character was before this.... or how our heroes even defeated him in the end. Speaking of the end, we put our heroes back to where they belong but this ordeal doesn't seem to affect them going forward, even though the majority of this issue was our different heroes pairing up and learning about each other but this concept is just kind of forgotten about by the end even though it could affect time going forward..... but doesn't.  

Bits and Pieces:

While I love the art in this book, I feel that the story took a big dip in what it was previously doing because the majority of this issue is padded out with our heroes just trying to get back to Vanishing Point to take on Dominus, while never really setting up the villain's motivations beyond a Wandavision-Esque angle that doesn't fit with who the character was before this story. There's still some fun nostalgic fun to be had out of this story, but the scope of what we had previously was seriously diminished here and ending up just being underwhelming overall.

6.8/10