Comics / Comic Reviews / DC Comics

Brightest Day #3

By Hervé St-Louis
June 12, 2010 - 08:50

Deadman meets the villainous Anti-Monitor while Ronnie Raymond remembers murdering  Jason Rusch’s girlfriend when he took over the body of Firestorm. Aquaman continues to summon dead animals and both the Martian Manhunter, Hawgirl and Hawkman get closer to solving a case involving their return to life. But is solving a case the same as surviving it to tell the tale?

The story continues to be very good although I have some reservations about the depiction of Ronnie Raymond. Here, he appears to be much younger and immature than he should really be. Raymond, by all accounts should be about the same age as Wally West and Dick Grayson. He’ hasn’t had as much experience, but he should have just a bit more experience in the field as Cyborg. Here, he seems much younger and almost at the same point in life as Jason Rusch. This is similar to how BeastBoy/Changelling was de-aged a few years ago in the Titans. This series seems to be about fixing and reintroducing old plot points that have been forgotten. For example, the mention of Mera’s original world seems to be an avenue that I hope is explored. However, my fear is that Johns will try to create an overall logic out of everything, the way he did with the Speedforce and the various coloured Lanterns. When he does so, he sucks all of the possible creativity and imagination in other creators can bring to the table by imposing his own vision which is not always very creative as it’s more focused on making a grand universe and adhering to older established concepts. He may just want to that with the Martian Manhunter and the Hawkgirl and Hawkman. He usually redefines and rebuilt stuff. Now there’s nothing wrong with that, except he often acts like John Byrne and unilaterally imposes his limited vision on creative material and purposely blocks off any point of exit for any other writer to change what he’s done. It feels like the reader is being spoken to instead of being entertained. There is more value in the organizing than in the actual entertaining factor. Tomasi which understands how to entertain readers is a good counterweight to Johns, but I wonder if he can have enough sway with his new boss to curb his tendencies to want to explain everything until there is no sense of wonderment.

The various artists do a good job as usual. I don’t feel that there were weak parts although I prefer some more than others.

Rating: 8.5 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12