With yesterdays comics, the two I most eagerly waited for was JLA #97 and SUPERMAN #204. This is Brian Azzarello and Jim Lee's first issue and must say,it's very dissappointing. This book has 28 pages, 6 more than a standard book and nothing happens. Here's a comparison.
JLA #97 has 22 pages with 121 panels. In the 121 panels JB uses 12 single head shots, 9 double head shots, and 3 multiple head shots. 24 head shots total. Superman #204
has 42 single head shots and 8 double head shots for a total of 50. Also on those 28 pages there are only 129 panels. With six more pages we get a more panels than JLA.
I guess I'm just dissappointed that with all the hype the new SUPERMAN team might actually produce something. This issue saw the story never really leave a room with no story happining. Thank God JLA came out this week.

I disagree. I had planned on hating it. I enjoyed it a great deal. It set up the entire arc and explained/introduced Azzarello's Superman to the reader. I thought it was very good. Come on go buy Action comics or adventures of superman and then compare them to Superman.

I had no intention of liking it as I don't like Azzarello, but I was pleasantly surprised. The rest of the new teams have been horrible with the exception of the Ivan Reis art in Action. Granted, more could have happened, but I think more will in the next 3 issues..after all ******spoiler******.

Well, I flipped through the Azzarello/Lee Superman yesterday, and was very underwhelmed. There was absolutely nothing within that made me want to pick up the issue. Can't say much for the story, as I didn't read it, but none of the things that would make me want to pick it up and read it were there.

Action Comics on the other hand had a great deal that made me buy it and want to read it, starting with a great cover of Superman about to throw Kalibak through something. The issue had tons of Action, good artwork, and a fairly written story, which was more than I expected with Austin as the writer.

I thought it was pretty decent, much better than Azzarello's Batman, but I do think that very little happened for a 28 page book. The four page introduction with a backstory on the priest may have been a nice scene, but does it propel the story? Part of the job of an editor is to excise nice scenes that drag a story along. You often see deleted scenes on DVDs where the director says something like "this is my favorite scene that I shot and it was a hard decision to cut it out, but it was unimportant to the story and needed to be cut so the story could move along." Unless this priest is going to be a player in the upcoming story those were four wasted pages.

>>Unless this priest is going to be a player in the upcoming story those were four wasted pages.<<

Guess you didn't read the preview blurbs where it said the character was going to play an important role in the book.


I liked this issue OK, but I liked Rucka's book last week the best.



Mike Nebeker - Super Genuis
Good Judgement comes from Experience and Experience comes from... Bad Judgement.

>>Unless this priest is going to be a player in the upcoming story those were four wasted pages.<<

>>Guess you didn't read the preview blurbs where it said the character was going to play an important role in the book<<

Nope, I try to avoid such things. If I know what is going to happen, why should I read it?

crw

Not thrilled by the story yet. I wasn't planning on buying SUPERMAN #204 but my local comic shop was selling it for $1.00 so I gave it a shot. (Wow! A retailer MARKETING his wares!) I enjoy Lee's art but Superman's personality always seems off-model to me unless JB is writing him.

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Did anyone else think that Superman was explaining why he wasn't there to prevent the 9/11 terrorist attacks?

Brendan Howard

I thought the same thing about the terroist attacks...glad that wasn't the case.

An OK first issue, but I'm a bit lost...I don't know if that's the way the story is building or that I don't read any Superman titles.

~Bob

Only flipped through the issue, but from what I understand, the basic idea behind the story is that something bad happens and the story picks up one year later. What that something bad is and how Superman dealt with it is the basis for the story.

I have to say . . . I find Jim Lee's art on the latest Superman book to be very, very ugly. It seems sloppy and lacks fine subtleties of shading and tone. He tends to have two shading schema: fussy hatching and hard blacks (with little, if anything, in between) . . . which gives his work an odd flatness must be fixed through computer coloring wizardry.

I find Ivan Reis' work far more expressive, natural and true-to-life.

Jim Lee's seems amateurish, by comparison, in my opinion. I was not impressed in the least.

As for the writing . . . too early to tell, I guess. Though if what I saw is any indication, I am not expecting much from this new team -- pencil or script.

i really enjoy Jim Lee's artwork but that story SUCKED. as i mentioned elsewhere, i haven't picked up a Superman book in probably 15 years, and there are probably a lot of other people out there who can say the same. this issue was a TERRIBLE jumping on point. boring, whiny, preachy, yuck. i will NOT be getting the next issue.

and just to continue the rant, DAREDEVIL: FATHER #1 was just as bad. talk about boring. holy shit, nothing happened. and the art sucked! Quesada used to be good but his Daredevil looks totally misshaped. His upper-toro is HUGE and then he has these tiny legs. wtf?!?

Quesada's old stuff reall was better- I used to enjoy his art but I looked through the Daredevil and would never have guessed it was by him!

Dwayne
http://www.whatashock.com