Comics Fondle

Superman tackles religion (with Fabian Nicieza writing–seriously, I thought it was Kurt Busiek), specifically a church with a metahuman on tap to murder. The first issue works really well, with Superman investigating, but also doing lots of the iconic stills in the sky. The art’s terrible, so the iconic stills only work if Goldman isn’t drawing faces. The second issue, however, falters. After raising the interesting idea of church-sponsered “superheroes” (now, if Marvel had any balls, that was what Civil War should have been about), Nicieza cops out.

It’s a big cop out too, the kind to invalidate some of the better observations of the first issue. Superman puts the fate of… well, I guess only African nations in the hands of a community of people totally okay with murdering said Africans. Luckily, thanks to some really lame contrivances, everything works out.

The most disappointing part of the story is how well it was going until that point, until Nicieza had to wrap it up without offending DC’s Crazy Christian readers. There’s some great stuff with Superman talking about religion, an amusing visit to the Kents, and a wrap-up with him giving Lois the story of why Clark Kent stopped going to church. All three of those things made me think it was Busiek writing–not to diss Nicieza, but I simply had no idea he was able to do such fine work. Until the cop out, anyway.

As for the art–I cannot forget the art–Allan Goldman is a disaster. Lois Lane bending over in a nighty, Superman being built like the Hulk, Clark Kent and Superman looking like… well, I don’t know what. It occurs to me these three examples are not necessarily bad, but the way Goldman draws them, it’s clear he–wait, actually, I’m pretty sure he gives Lois a deformed posterior (an extra cheek). He’s terrible. Until the story falls apart, I was getting upset he was ruining it. And even after it falls apart, he’s still doing it undue injury. He’s awful.

C+

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