SUPERMAN/WONDER WOMAN / SECRET AVENGERS/UNDERCOVER [Reviews]: …And Justice For All.

Welcome to yet another edition of GHG’s Sunday Stash — a very Super Sunday Stash, that is.

Jump to:

-Astro City #10
-Secret Avengers #1
-Avengers Undercover #1

I’m Matthew McGrath, on behalf of the Daily Planet and this is tonight’s headline:

There is no Superman slug fest that could top Superman #75 back in 1992. The final blows between the Man of Steel and the unstoppable monster that is now known as Doomsday lead to the defeat of the monster and the death of Last Son of Krypton — an event so big that it took three full pages to display adequately.

SUPERMAN/WONDER WOMAN #6

…is a contender to match that bout.

The pacing of the story is fast — maybe too fast. A portal to the Phantom Zone is nearly complete. Supes and Diana need some divine armor and godly gadgets from Hephaestus, who has some words of warning for Clark. All of that sets-up a masterful battle between the four somewhere in the Pacific Ocean.

The fight is depicted largely in a 12-panel page of silhouettes — in which the only highlight is heat vision, Superman’s cape and blood.

The fast pace is slowed by that one page. There is no dialogue. There is no narration. There is just the apparent defeat of Superman and Diana.

Just one more mall, Clark. I promise.

If Charles Soule (Swamp Thing) offers a theme to the book, it is a question of whether Superman and Diana can work together as lovers. Clark brings the question up. It’s a little cheesy and a bit old-fashioned; but, hey, he’s Superman, and that’s why we love him. Diana reassures him that together they are better.

The weapon Hephaestus gives them can only work if they use it together, and after that beautiful pounding they set it off. Then, as with all tales with Greek gods, Hephaetus’ prophetic warning comes around.

The second round isn’t shown. You don’t need to see it. Superman and Diana fall. They are imprisoned. Weak, bleeding and poisoned they resort one last desperate attempt to stop Zod from reopening the Phantom Zone. They do it together.

The final splash page from Tony Daniel (Detective Comics) also one to rival the last image of Superman #75. It doesn’t take three pages to display it’s size. It’s just a sole page. In that classic ish, Kal-El’s cape caught a staff upright in the rubble. It waved in the breeze and flew at half-mast for the fallen hero. In Superman/Wonder Woman #6, that cape is used as a shroud.

4.25 (out of 5) Bibles.

(Check the next page for more!)