Comics Fondle

Trinity’s opening–the one previewed on the internet–is the kind of goofy thing one would have assumed a professional writer was beyond. Busiek has DC’s big two (and Wonder Woman, since they’re trying not to be sexist or something) having coffee in order to discuss their dreams. Busiek explains the reasoning later–Superman wanted to see his peers’ eyes–but it’s nonsense. Basically, it’s a way to open a book about the three with them all together. Seeing each experience the dream would have been a far better way to go in the traditional sense, but maybe not for Trinity, since Busiek’s obviously doing something different.

Oh, his Superman is that excellent Superman he was writing in Superman, but his Batman is something else entirely. Busiek’s Batman comes off as Frasier Crane. Busiek’s Wonder Woman? She’s along for the ride. Trinity needs to prove there’s some reason for a Wonder Woman focus and it’s off to a bad start. Busiek’s mildly hampered by DC’s idiotic “One Year Later” story for the character, but really… he just isn’t showing any interest.

There’s some decent stuff–Wally West wife’s wife telling Wally Batman had a sexy phone voice, that one’s gold–but it’s a rocky start for a three dollar, weekly comic book. Bagley’s art isn’t exactly making it worth it either. I know he’s rushed, but Clark’s glasses look like he added them in Photoshop.

The back-up story–to make the price-tag worth it–is a mess. I guess it’s not badly written, it’s just an obvious waste of pages. Scott McDaniel’s art is, obviously, atrocious. And Fabian Nicieza does try too hard to be hip in the details and it comes off, with that bad art, as a goofy 1990s comic.

The second issue is the action issue. It’s got a little Batman and a lot of Superman and Wonder Woman. Bagley’s faces are real rushed here, which is distracting. Busiek touches on Wonder Woman’s still-foreignness to the boys (which makes no sense, given they’ve known each other for years) and it’s kind of dumb. Amazons see everything as a chance to excel, something like that. It reeks of subtext (overcompensating in a man’s world), but I guess I shouldn’t have expected feminism in a DC comic book. Either kind.

But the hampered page format is already problematic. Busiek has Superman up against a micro universe or something and it feels good for a moment (like All-Star Superman) but then it ends. Not enough time. The Wonder Woman fight is a cheap video game–Wonder Woman versus robots–and the Batman thing is just dumb. It’s clear, as it was in the first issue, Busiek can’t really fit all three characters in each issue, so one gets the shit end of the stick. Here it’s Batman. First issue, I think it’s probably Batman too.

The worst thing about the second issue is how much better the back-up story–Green Lantern versus an alien threat–is than the front. It’s a fast, decent superhero story, obviously a back-up but not a second-class one. I wonder if this phenomenon will prevail–the marginally connected back-up stories will be better than the front, since they aren’t constrained by pages, Bagley’s rushed artwork, and the overall, inevitably goofy plot.

Maybe I’m just being a pill–but using tarot in a comic book after Promethea feels like using Also Sprach Zarathustra in a movie after 2001. It just feels lame. Again, in issue three, the back-up story is better than the front. The back-ups about some tarot reader in LA who’s going to have something to do with the main story. Whoop de doo. But it’s got Jerry Ordway over Mike Norton layouts and it looks good. It looks like something worth spending three dollars on.

The front, guest starring the Justice League and giving Bagley the opportunity to draw some more faces exactly the same and poorly, not worth three dollars. It’s a fight between the JLA and the bad guy from the second issue’s back-up (see, it’s all connected!). Then the big two and Wonder Woman show up and Superman gets knocked out. Riveting drama.

There’s some more of the bad guys–there’s going to be a trinity of them too, I’ll bet, we just have to see who the third one is… oh, I bet it’s this big bad guy everyone’s fighting. The suspense. The idea of the series–Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman–is fine. But Busiek’s story to get them together seems idiotic at this point. Kind of 1990s drivel, to some day be summarized in a sentence on wikipedia. There are less ideas here than in Jeph Loeb’s Superman/Batman, which is something.

Thayer’s Notch, Massachusetts. Stamford, Connecticut. Wonder if the New England setting is intentional?

The fourth issue is in some ways the best so far and the worst so far. The back-up is tripe–ruined with Scott McDaniel and a lame alien world sequence, not to mention the whole thing turning into third-rate supervillains against the earnest inner-city volunteer (wasn’t that story an episode of “The Flash”?). But the front is better than usual, if only because I’m on the third beer and the whole thing has stopped offending me.

It’s a big fight scene with the JLA. Superman is not knocked out (though he does disappear for a bit) and it’s an okay sequence. It kind of reminds me of something Gerry Conway would have done in four good pages in the 1980s, but here it’s a whole issue and it’s a passable mediocre.

I don’t remember a single good thing about the front story, but not a bad one either. It’s just a shrug, which maybe shouldn’t be what Busiek and Bagley are going for. I mean, this whole thing is going to cost readers over a hundred and fifty bucks. Maybe they should at least try for a single memorable moment each issue.

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