Customer Reviews

Infinite Crisis (DC Comics)

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(13)

 

 

I hated the original Crisis on Infinite Earths. It was too long, too convulated, the conversations bordered on cheesiness etc...the only redeeming factor in my opinion was that it cleaned out the multivese and set foundations for a more coherent continuity. Fast forward 20+ years and the Crisis has returned. This book has a lot going for it and has foundations based on many previous events. The plot is not simple but I will try my best to provide a synopsis.

After the original Crisis, the four surviving memebers were Superman and Lois Lane of Earth 2 (from The Golden Age type comics ); Superboy from Earth Prime (the Superboy from the early Superboy stories) and Alexander Luthor of Earth 3 (son of Lex Luthor who is actually a good guy amongst the CSA which has evil versions of the JLA, Owlman, Ultraman, etc). After surviving and playing pivotal roles in the original crisis, these folks have been on a self-imposed exile in "paradise" and have been watching Earth 1 (this is the Earth with our regular characters). But much to their disappointment, despite their sacrifices, the heroes of Earth 1 have lost their ways...i.e. Batman being mindwiped, JLA is disbanded, Superman can't lead, Wonder Woman kills Maxwell Lord, Batman's Brother I satellite turning on the superheros etc.). They decided to break out and return to Earth 1 to teach the Earth 1 heroes what it means to be heroes...at least that's what Earth 2 Superman wants. Superboy Prime simply misses his old world, his parents, his girl and wants to return home. The real culprit here is Alex Luthor who channels these emotions as a fuel to get what he wants....a perfect Earth.

We also find out that Alex has been impersonating the real Lex Luthor and creating the Society of Villains to round up heroes such as Powergirl, Black Adam, Martian Manhunter to fuel a tower he is building to restore the multiverse and then pick and choose the Earths he wants and combine them to form the perfect Earth.

That's as far as I am going to go with the synopsis, since I felt that this was the ultimate motivation for Infinite Crisis going off the ground.

There's many more stories going on. You have Superboy prime vs. everybody, Superman Earth 1 vs. Superman Earth 2, Supermen of both Earth 1 & 2 vs. Superboy Prime, Batman vs. Bother Eye, Alex Luthor takes on the Titans...it's basically an epic battle where every DC characters are thown into. There are also changes that occur as a result of the Crisis. The big three, Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman are taken back to their roots. I can go on but there's too much stuff and trust me that it's well worth the read.

The story is very well done. As someone who was not very familiar with the original Crisis, Geoff Johns does an excellent job of filling in new readers on the stuff that has gone on before. And he manages to tie up almost all the loose ends from The Omac Project, JLA: Crisis of Conscience, etc. This is not an easy task to do but Geoff manages to do it and excels at it.

And let's not forget the art. Phil Jimenez and George Perez are masters at drawing small panels featuring hordes of superheroes in action and they are pushed to the limit. I also love that the had Jerry Ordway for the Supermen vs. Superboy sequences. I have heard complaints with the art when it was originally issued in the monthly format but the editors went back and corrected and added a lot of new art work to make the story flow smoothly.

If you managed to read thorough all of this and are still here....go get this book. "Add to shopping cart" right now and read an excellent epic story with excellent art. Highly recommended.

Do you have a degree in the DC universe? If not, don't bother with this. I'm a fan of Batman, know a little about Superman, and have read all of Birds of Prey, the latest volume of Teen Titans, and a lot of the JLA from Morrison onwards, and I had a hard time following Crisis. That it's overflowing with minor DC characters who I didn't recognise and references to events that occurred decades ago are only two of the problems. From a storytelling perspective, it's a complete mess. There are so many different threads that not one has any real depth to it and all move slowly. And it's all a bit anti-climatic at the end. This was going to supposedly change the whole face of the DCU, but it hasn't really.

To illustrate how incomprehensible Crisis will be if you're not an avid DCU fan, take a look for those internet sites that trace all the comics that are related to Infinte Crisis. There's a huge number of titles that you need to read just to understand what's happening in the first issue of Infinte Crisis. All in all, not one for the casual fan.

Having just reread this, I have to say it is one of the best 'event' books any publisher has done to date. It's a tremendously enjoyable and exciting story, very intense and very well crafted by Geoff Johns.

Before getting further into the story, I would also like to say this book shows how collections should be done. It is a very nice volume that actually addresses some of the problems and concerns from the original work. The book collects all seven issues of Crisis (each issue seperated by both the Jim Lee and George Perez covers,) but it also contains corrections and changes designed to make the story read better. Several pages have been added to flesh out certain sequences, a confusing sound effect has been removed from late in the book (greatly improving the scene it was in,) and dialogue was added in other places to better explain what is going on (as well as to explain the condition of a certain character.) Several other pages were redone to take advantage of the extra time the art team now has as compared to the time they had while under deadline -- the double page spread at the end of the book showing the remaining heroes being a notable example.

The volume also contains an introduction and a long (approximately ten page) interview with the writer, artist, and editor primarily responsible for the work discussing each issue, the importance of the events, what worked, and what didn't.

Finally, the cover itself (not the dust jacket, but the actual hardcover of the book) shows a glossy, wrap around, enlarged version of the art from the dust jacket, minus the text. Normally I don't care about such things, but in this case, it is a nice looking cover that shows this is a high quality product. The art is beautiful, and the cover looks really sharp.

All of the above, to me, is how a collection should be done. It shows that DC read the reviews of the original work (which was very well recieved) and made note of the few complaints people had, then actually addressed them when collecting the work together. It shows that they actually cared enough to put out the best product they could. The inclusion of the interview and the nice cover art just adds to the overall prestige of the story. With collections coming out as often as they do now, most of the time they are just exact reprints of the issues with no improvements, introductions, afterwords, interviews or anything -- this volume sets a better standard.

Again, I really applaud DC for making changes/additions to the story in order to address reader confusion or complaints and to improve this collection. None of the issues they addressed had overly damaged the story when it came out originally, but the changes do improve/polish the story and make it read more smoothly. I'm glad DC took advantage of the chance to make the changes, and hope that policy becomes the standard for these sorts of collections

As to the story itself -- it's a good, exciting, emotional story. The art is beautifull throughout, and the coloring is fantastic (really elevating the already good art.) The art also tells the story very well. It's a good read that's even better collected up in one volume (the story flows better without the month long wait between issues.) Overall it is well worth reading, a good fun ride from start to finish with some very stong moments. There are parts of the story that aren't as self contained as they could have been (relying on back story from the preceding crisis mini-series,) and characters that are shown early on that are never seen again (they aren't central to the story, but it would have been nice to see how things turned out for them as well.) And while the action of the main story line is intense and exciting, some of the later fight scenes (like the battle with the villians in metropolis, or the fight between the two Supermen) are very rushed. The reason for all these complaints, of course, is the length.

The book is a pretty solid 246 pages of story, but it should have been longer. In the interview section, Geoff Johns (the writer) mentions about three seperate times that he would have liked the book to be longer, and both the artist and editor mention it as well. Johns once mentions wishing they'd had twelve issues (as opposed to seven) and once says they could have filled a thousand pages if they'd had the option. From the stuff I would have liked to have seen fleshed out more, I think twelve issues would have been perfect, and I'm not sure why DC insisted on a seven issue series instead. It's a sequal to a twelve issues series. In the past, these universe changing stories often were twelve issue series (although suddenly seven seems more common.) The story is currently 246 pages, another fifty pages would probably have allowed Johns to flesh out most of the background action and character scenes he had to cut short, another one hundred would probably have allowed him to do all of that and also make the book more completely self contained. As it is, it's still quite good, but the length (and the consequences there of) are what turn this from five stars to four for me.

Overall a very good and entertaining book. You don't have to know DC lore to follow it, but you'll certainly get more out of it if you do.

I went through a lot of the reviews and saw a lot of very insightful comments coming from many people. All I can do is share my own thoughts on the product. I refuse to claim anyone's opinions are right or wrong. All I can do is share my own thoughts and explain why I didn't care for Infinite Crisis. If you liked it, cool. If you didn't, that's cool too.

When I read comics, I see nothing wrong with looking back at what previously happened or closely examining a scene which occurred. To me, a comic is meant to be read slowly and appreciate the art. The artist plays a huge part in telling the overall story, as comic books are primarily a visual medium along side the storytelling. So, it makes sense to take a close look at the picture and examine it to see if it makes any sort of sense along with the story.

The only nice thing I can say about the story was that they tried hard to tell it. I admire the effort DC went through to put this together.

Visually, the story did not work. There were many instances where events happened which doesn't make sense in the context of the DC universe. In DC, Batman may be the smartest man in the world, but he is still only a man. At one point, Mongul was fighting Superman, Wonder Woman, and Batman. Batman was backhanded by Mongul. He took the full force of a hit and was knocked far away. Keep in mind, Mongul is strong enough to fight both Superman and Wonder Woman at the same time. He can take hits and give them without problem. And Batman may be wearing some reinforced costume pieces, but he is still just a man. That backhand should have killed him. The fact he lived made no sense at all.

More on the visual aspects of the story! For some reason, the artists got very lazy and decided to use photoshop to create alternative earths. That's all fine and good, but they got really lazy. In art, the artist has to take perspective into account. It's not enough to draw, or present, something. The object has to be positions properly so that it will give the impression of distance. Every Earth presented appeared to be exactly the same size, which indicates they were all equidistant from each other. But that is impossible, because they appeared to overlap. Also, look at the shading for the multiple Earths. They are all shaded exactly the same. This makes no sense. The only light source is the Sun. And if they are positioned in different locations, which they are, they should be shaded differently. The only way to account for this is that the artist was very lazy and/or didn't care enough about the product.

In the build-up to Infinite Crisis, Batman's Kryptonite ring was lost right next to the Sun. Wonder Woman used it in an attempt to defeat Superman. They were next to the Sun during the fight when Superman hit her quite hard, and she lost her grip on the ring. The ring was not of a significant size and, given the size of the solar system, should not be easily found. There wasn't any story which indicated that the ring was found, or that Batman retrieved it. For no apparent reason, Batman had it with him when the Superman from Earth-2 talked to him.

Space is 2 degrees above absolute zero. I remember reading multiple DC stories which confirmed that. Yet Superboy's breath was able to freeze multiple Green Lanterns and shatter them.

Early in the story, Superman was seen staring at a news article of himself. It was pretty clear to the reader that it was a picture of him lying dead. If you were to look at the other newspapers around, one of them was about the Crisis on Infinite Earths. The Crisis was not remembered by anyone but the Superheroes who were at the beginning of time. This was established in the DC Universe. This was canon. But, for no apparent reason, there's a newspaper story dealing with it.

Why was the sky red?

How did Doomsday get knocked out? He's virtually a force of nature. In fact, he was point blank on Green Arrow, but Green Arrow was able to say two sentences before Superman showed up to knock out Doomsday. Doomsday is incredibly fast and should have plowed right through Green Arrow over 50 times by the time he finished his two sentences. Doomsday should not be knocked out. He doesn't have the nervous system to be knocked out. That would contradict what was written about in Hunter/Prey.

Why in the world were Superheroes watching Earths get destroyed at the new center of the universe? Shouldn't they have been doing something to stop it? Why weren't they trying to stop it? They only did something when Superman and Wonder Woman were about to die. That makes zero sense.

There were hundreds of OMACs surrounding Luther's tower. It was established that one OMAC was powerful enough to give Superman trouble. Now, there are hundreds of them. They didn't play a role at all in the defense of the tower at all. Superboy, Wonder Girl, and Nightwing were easily able to fly right in, fight off over 100 OMACs, and free the heroes with no difficulty whatsoever. That contradicted everything that is known on the OMACs. Everything.

Why did Alexander Luther kiss Power Girl? Why did that knock her out?

In Crisis of the Infinite Earths, Anti-Monitor's body was destroyed at the end when it fell into a star and the star went supernova because of the anti-matter in the Anti-Monitor. Yet, somehow the body survived for no apparent reason.

Why did Wally get sucked into the speed force? I'm sure there is a great story to explain it, but while reading the story, it seemed to happen for the sake of it happening rather than it adding to the story in any meaningful way. The event just suddenly happened for no explainable reason. It is the responsibility of the author and/or artist to communicate ideas to the reader. To have an event as important as that demands some sort of explanation within the story which it happens.

Earth-2 comes back and is hovering over Earth-1. So do the heroes rush over and investigate? Nope. They go and pray. Heroes. Going to church and praying. An Earth appeared right over the only Earth the heroes knew about...exactly at the time time quite a few heroes disappeared, namely the entire Justice Society of America, and they go and pray rather than investigate? The heroes claim to be concerned over the disappearance of everyone. If they had time to contact everyone to meet in one specific city and at one specific church, they had more than enough time to go to that Earth to investigate. Why didn't Superman rush over there immediately to see what happened. The fact that the heroes did absolutely nothing was just insulting to the intelligence.

These are only some of the problems I have with the story. This isn't including the story structure, the retcons from the comic books to the tradeback. To me, the problems are just too much for me to take. But I saw other reviewers love it.

Thanks for reading. I shared my opinion. What's yours?

I hate cross overs, I really do. For so many years, there have been so many cross overs that promise to change the status quo of the universe they take place in and they hardly ever deliver. They all follow the same formula: a horde of heroes either face off against a horde of villains in a "final" battle, or a horde of heroes unite against a common threat that wants to wipe out said universe. Now, last year's Identity Crisis set the stage for things to come, as Elongated Man's wife Sue was murdered by someone in the JLA circle, and it was revealed that certain JLA members were involved in mind-wiping villains throughout the years, and even some of their own as well. Infinite Crisis picks up after the events of Identity Crisis and a number of lead-in mini-series', and comes on the 20th anniversary of Crisis on Infinite Earths, which was one of the few cross overs that actually delivered on it's promise and changed everything about the DC universe at the time. Fan favorite writer Geoff Johns, best known for his long run on the Flash as well as JSA and Green Lantern, is at the helm here with the great Phil Jimenez (New X-Men) providing the art; as Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and the rest of the heroes unite as those thought long gone make a stunning return to make the universe what it once was: no matter the cost. The sacrifice of a hero and the tragic descent into insanity for a golden/silver-age icon are just two of the highlights of this collection. Now as I said before, I hate cross overs. But the way that Johns balances everything going on in this collected edition of the seven issue mini-series is simply amazing. The art by Jimenez isn't half bad either, actually, it's spectacular. The only real downsides to Infinite Crisis are that if you are in no way, shape, or form familiar with Crisis on Infinte Earths or the lead-in mini-series', well, you might be a little lost. Not to mention that you can tell Johns and Jimenez and co. tried to pack so much material into these seven issues that it just cries to be longer. If this was twelve issues, like the first Crisis, much more of the story would be more coherent. As it is however, Infinite Crisis is a rare treat in mainstream, superhero comics that tells an epic story, racks up the body count, and makes good on it's promise that the universe will never be the same.

First, these are some of the great artists and writers in the comic book world. It almost doesn't get any better than these men.

Now, you had to know this was coming. There's no way DC could let those 'alternate' characters just continue to live in exile, especially since one of them is a Luthor. It had some weak moments and flaws, but overall, a welcome addition to the DC lore. Let's just hope they don't screw it up from here.

I'm a big fan of the Golden Age characters. If you enjoy these original heroes, and their continuing stories, you might not enjoy the last few surviving characters acting without good judgment. I'm one of the people that think the outcome of Crisis was poor. The multiverse was not so messy that we have to lose all our golden age characters. Earth 2 was a place where it was okay for heroes to age, retire, and train the next generation of heroes.

This book gives us northing original, it's boring, and abuses good characters to no good end. It uses the time tested gimmicks of having a "Hero Go Bad", "Bringing back characters that seemed forgotten", "involving everyone", "Wonder Woman kills someone(gasp...yawn)", and so on.

Been there, done that, have the bumper sticker, T-Shirt, coffee mug, snap shots, and the key chain.

Unless you read DC comics religiously, you will not enjoy this book. One of the main complaints I hear from people that try to read these massive DC events is that they are inaccessible to regular people. Nothing in this book will make sense to you unless you know about 30+ years of DC comic history. If you excuse the lazy writing, the art is pretty good. The only other problem is that you won't care about any of the characters in the book because you wont know a thing about them....Except maybe the 3 different versions Superman. You did know there were 3 of them right?

This book is a mess. There are too many characters and not much of a story to follow. I'm not quite halfway through the book and I don't know if I can finish it.

There are dozens of characters involved in battles all over the Earth and out in space. You get little snippets of each battle and you get to hear the names of famous heroes and villains, from Superman on down to Nightwing. Really naming all these famous heroes is the only thing this book has going for it. There are no reasons given for the battles, no build up to the battles, and no resolution to many of the battles. Very little has happened except descriptions of villains coming out and causing chaos for no apparent reason. So far there has been one memorable fight between the wizard Shazam and the Spectre. I can't even remember much else, though I've just been reading it.

I do remember a couple of scenes, only because they were bizarre and irritated me. One involved the super duper strong villain Mogul. Mogul punches Superman so hard that Superman smashes up out of a building into the sky. Then Mogul picks up Batman and tries to crush Batman's neck but is unable to do so because Batman has a titanium gorget protecting his throat. I just can't believe this. Anyone who can stand toe to toe with Superman can surely crush earthly metal such as titanium.

There is also a scene where the Amazons of Paradise Island are defending their island with uzis and other modern small arms. Is this normal for magically powered women, or is it just Wonder Woman who has magical strength? I don't actually read comics much so maybe this is normal. Normal or not, the whole scene is ridiculous.

As a person who enjoys comic book characters through movies and video games and the occasional graphic novel, I give a thumbs down to this novel. I am especially concerned because this book is written by Geoff Johns who is the writer for DC Universe Online, a game that I have high hopes for.

Let me preface this review by saying that Infinite Crisis along with Marvel's "Civil War" are the two series that succeeded in completely destroying my love of comics. It begins with the big three of the DC Universe (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman)having given up. Understandable since the writers of all these series have heaped so much misery on 'em that anyone would wash their hands of any "neverending battle." Enter the "Original" Superman who, manipulated by the now-corrupt Alex Luthor and Superboy Prime, embarks on a "misguided" mission to restore the original DC Universe. Of course, Luthor has his own agenda and etc. etc, resulting in a convoluted story that destroys any hope of long-time fans making any sense of DC continuity from this point on. OH! And lest we forget, DC tries to sever all ties with that outdated "Truth, Justice and (it's not a dirty phrase, folks) THE AMERICAN WAY" stuff by killing off the original Superman and Lois. Great. I'm sorry, but was I the only one who wanted Alex Luthor to succeed in creating a more perfect world, or at least in his defeat, the return of the original DCU? Call me a radical here, but what's so wrong about super-heroes INSPIRING people rather than all being dark avengers or constantly in a state of despair because they made a villain's nose bleed or something, and therefore spend the entire issue whining to their wife (CURRENT Superman, the Hamlet of comicdom). But no, we're going to get more of the same. Oh, you don't like it? Well here's more of it until you do! This, along with Marvel's atrocious Civil War was one of the two titles that forever made me wash my hands of the comics medium. They made the "passe" ideals that made comics worthwhile irrelevant (Y'know, stuff like aspiring to be more than what you are). And worst of all, they took all the fun out of comics. I'm sorry if I seem a little venomous here, but I'm disillusioned with some childhood friends right now and I need to vent.