- Written by Patrick Gleason & Peter J. Tomasi
- Pencils by Patrick Gleason
- Inks by Keith Champagne & Mick Gray
- Coloured by John Kalisz
- Cover by Patrick Gleason, Mick Gray & John Kalisz
“IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER” part one! For the first time, the Man of Tomorrow and the Boy of Steel team up with the Caped Crusader and the Boy Wonder in a father-son adventure you won’t want to miss! Damian Wayne has been hearing a lot about this mysterious new Superboy, and now’s his chance to find out who he is…
Pickup your copy of ‘Superman’ #10 at Comixology now!
Time for a particularly convoluted and complex issue of ‘Superman’. On the one hand it’s as complex as the young boys on whom it focusses. On the other hand it’s perhaps a symptom of a relatively contrived plot line to bring together DC Comics youngest heroes.
Jon Kent is the antithesis of Damien Wayne which I’ve said before. Much like their fathers the two character balance each other out very well. In many ways this issue is like ‘Batman v Superman: The Next Generation’. Only there’s just so much going on that it’s hard to decipher any meaning from it.
The plot essentially boils down to Damien spying on Superboy and the two ending up in a bit of a punch up when their fathers intervene and have issues of their own. The issue would probably work better if it were played for comedy rather than as a straight drama. Unless there was comedy which I missed. In which case it could just have been written better.
It’s not a bad issue it just gets too caught up in all of the action. Scenes are drawn overly intensely and the action is so much from such small characters that everything becomes a little lost.
The highlight for me was a conversation about pets where Damien is at his arrogant best when showing off his menagerie of animals. It’s a small moment in a very big issue and showed how the interactions between these characters could be played for laughs rather than as slapstick.
Patrick Gleason feels a little toned down at times here. This is some of his least distracting work for me and I like it. As the action escalates so does the artwork to the point where it begins to resemble ‘Damien: Son of Batman’ which is only fair given the subject matter. This book is also very red in colour, again possibly to match the appearance of Robin.
Its artwork is as complex as its story but as a whole the issue comes off as well produced just because the artwork compliments the story so well.
Verdict
‘Superman’ #10 is fun but convoluted. It’s most likely a consequence of the huge personality of Damien Wayne dominating the book so it will be interesting to see where the story goes from here.
