Reviews: Countdown Edition

All Countdown, All the Time.

Well, it feels that way lately.

Countdown to Adventure 3
I'm really enjoying the Kory/Animal Man/Adam Strange tale. The killer cult has gotten to the point of "very scary," with Animal Man's son, Cliff, infected. And things look bleak for the Strange family. And yet, I'm more worried about Buddy's marriage. I skipped the Forerunner chapter this time.

Countdown to Mystery 2
I'm really enjoying this new Dr. Fate. Talk about a character with issues. Yet, despite being screwed in nearly every way possible, he's trying to do the right thing. Fun stuff. The Eclipso story took a bizarre turn with Plastic Man turning bad, and now we have to worry about Creeper. Plas sure won't win Father of the Year, but seeing him stretch just made me miss Ralph Dibney.

Countdown... 25
Lots of action and plotlines coming together and I finally realized why, much as I've been enjoying this, I haven't been enjoying it as much as I did 52. I never read the New Gods books and except for Big Barda's appearances in recent years in books I read, I don't really know them. I've seen Darkseid around, of course, but never much cared about him. There are so many other big bads that I prefer to read about. And clearly, Darkseid and the New Gods and their mythos is a big part of Countdown, so that cuts into my interest a bit. Still, I liked the whole Bludhaven angle with Firestorm and Karate Kid and discovering Martin Stein's predicament and having the neato cliffhanger of Desaad becoming Firestorm. This bodes well for the excitement level of future issues. The action, the danger, the tension should all be ratcheted up now.

Not an official Countdown book, but the Crime Bible: Five Lessons of Blood came out of 52, which set up Countdown, so I'll review it here. This is pretty scary stuff. The 5 chapters of the story will each focus on one of the Crime Bible's lessons, presumably, and this issue was Deceit. Lust is next up. It was nice seeing Renee back as the new Question, confident now but still finding her way. She underestimated her adversary, and it cost a life. There's a real creepy feel to this story because on some level, it could be real. Greg Rucka, always a good writer, did a great job with this and Tom Mandrake's art was properly moody.