SUPERMAN/BATMAN #66 REVIEW

[Blake Petit]

Review by: Blake M. Petit Blake@comixtreme.com
Quick Rating: Good
Title: Night of the Cure Part One (A Blackest Night tie-in)

Bizarro and Man-Bat meet the Black Lantern Solomon Grundy!

Writer: Scott Kolins
Art: Scott Kolins
Colors: Michael Atiyeh
Letters: Sal Cipriano
Editor: Eddie Berganza
Cover Art: Scott Kolins
Publisher: DC Comics

Although Superman and Batman are both busy in their respective Blackest Night miniseries, that doesn’t stop the darkness from encroaching upon their shared title. Frankenstein’s crew is in Gotham City trying to capture the Man-Bat, not knowing that two other monsters are in town as well. Bizarro has decided to crash Gotham, and on the outskirts of town, a Black Lantern ring has found its way onto the finger of the corpse of Solomon Grundy.

This book acts as an epilogue of sorts to Kolins’s recent Solomon Grundy miniseries, a book that ended rather tragically for the title character, but the title of this issue seems to imply that all isn’t lost for him. Even as he does battle with Bizarro and Man-Bat, the black ring seems to be causing some real problems for the man. Kolins seems to be having fun with the character mash-ups in this issue. He makes very good use of Grant Morrison’s re-imagined Frankenstein character, and he draws on Grundy’s past with Bizarro to toy with that as well. The “Black Lantern” vision that we’ve seen in the other tie-ins actually gets played for a bit of a lark here, as it doesn’t seem to know what to make of the reversed Bizarro. His emotional states don’t seem to correspond with his behavior or his words, and that makes for some amusing moments.

I’ve always liked Kolins’ work, and he’s particularly well-suited to the four monsters that take the spotlight here. His Man-Bat is classic, and his Bizarro goes to the extreme. Frankenstein and Grundy, similarly, look very good here, and fit in with the larger crossover in a good way.

I like the idea of using this book to showcase team-ups between different members of the Superman and Batman “families” from time to time. We’ve gotten it before, with Superboy and Robin, and Supergirl and Robin. Using it to put together the dark opposites of our two heroes for use in this crossover was a pretty good idea, and while the result isn’t a home run, it’s interesting enough for a couple of issues.

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