This was pretty great!

Basically Buddy is just a dad/husband trying to be a superhero and provide the best he could be. If you don't know who animal man is he has the power to absorb the abilities of animals around him and use them as a weapon or to save someone. But when he goes on his hunt to be a hero he's face either another who can control animals. Leading to a brutal confrontation. We have various one shots after, one particular one that stands out about the road runner coyote like character who gets killed in panel and it's breaking the 4th wall but mostly as a way to show violence and why it's needed to invoke reaction in stories. It's actually kind of touching and really well done.

The rest of the stories are solid, not as strong as those first 5 issues but still good. Animal man being a hero for the animals and trying to protect them makes 100% sense and really works well for his character growth. I also enjoyed his time with the JLA and getting all the benefits of them. The origin story of how he got his powers and why is a little iffy though.

Overall this is before Morrison smoked a bunch of crack and made stories almost impossible to understand unless you yourself lit up or sniffed, but either way this is well worth the read. A 4 out of 5.