mysteriousmre's Reviews (1.22k)

Decided to pick up a physical copy and re-read this after several years. The plot and characters are fine. It's a pretty standard gangster story. What cranks this up to a 4 star for me is the sheer level of detail in the art. The lighting and sepia colors are fantastic, and the character designs are nothing short of purr-fection (sorry, couldn't resist the pun). If you like the premise, but you're still hesitant to buy a copy, you can read the series for free on the author's website. And if you like what you see, consider supporting them by buying a copy for yourself.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Scott Snyder needs to trim his word count. There are so many lengthy monologues in this volume that I often found myself turning my brain off and sifting through the story. Which is a shame since there are some genuinely fun character exchanges in this (I love his younger Jay Garrick, who’s equal parts polite and witty).

Probably the biggest causality of this story though is Lex Luthor, who I remember praising at the beginning of Snyder’s Justice League epic, but feels so out of character in this volume. I have a hard time believing someone as prideful and egotistical as Luthor would so willingly and blindly follow someone else. If this transition was intended from the beginning, I don’t think this series did a good job showing Lex’s transition into a kool-aid drinking lunatic. A disappointing end to a promising run.

The pacing is a little quick and it’s not the most faithful adaptation of the SNES classic, but for a short comic in the back of a magazine it does its job. The real draw here is Ishinomori’s artwork. His characters are depicted in this charmingly cartoony vintage manga style, and his watercolor backgrounds are beautiful. The artwork really benefits from being published in a large format, as its much easier to see the detail in Ishinomori’s landscapes. Not my favorite Zelda comic, but definitely one I can appreciate.

2.5/5 A good Flash story, just not a good origin story.

Mob Rule, the new villain introduced here is a decent foil for Barry when you compare how they responded to losing their respective father figures...but the story never tells you how Barry lost his father!

The updated powers for Captain Cold are neat (I REALLY love his new costume), but the story doesn’t do a good job showing why Barry thinks Cold isn’t acting like himself. We’re missing context.

Context you’d only KNOW if you were familiar with the source material.

I totally understand wanting to blow past the basics and get to the good stuff, but properly introducing us to your characters is a must. Especially in volume 1 of what’s supposed to be a jumping on point for new readers.

Couple this with some odd time jumps throughout the story, and this book becomes a mess to read. A real shame because I love the pairing of Barry and Patty, and the art by Francis Manapul is drop dead gorgeous.

There’s lots of great stuff in this volume, but some key structural problems drag it down and make it hard to recommend whether you’re a committed Flash fan or someone new to the character. I commend the writers for being ambitious in their first volume, but this book needed to learn how to walk before it could run.

Krul takes a page out of classic sci-fi stories to write a really compelling time travel story and a short story about dreams that feels like something out of a Grant Morrison book. The only drawback to this book is that it wraps up too quickly, an unfortunate side effect of this series’ cancellation. Otherwise it’s a huge step up from the previous volume and I hope one day Krul is able to return to this iteration of Captain Atom.