Justice League: Road to Dark Crisis #1....3 stars

 Justice League: Road to Dark Crisis #1




There are five writers on this comic, which is the prelude to DC's big summer event; Dark Crisis, so I guess it's best to go through each of the writer's. 

Joshua Williamson does the first story with Nightwing and Superman Jonathan Kent (no, not Clark Kent another Superman...I'll touch on it later). It starts off with a brief battle with a supervillain, and leads into Nightwing giving Superman a pep talk on being strong & hopeful in the absent of the Justice League. Not bad I guess, but pretty ho hum. 

Next up is Jeremy Adams writing pretty much the same thing as Williamson, except this time it's Flash (Wally West) consoling Kid Flash (Wallace West) over the disappearance of the Justice League, and the presumed death of Flash (Barry Allen) A little more action in this one, Jeremy Adams is a pretty good writer, but overall the story is pretty ho hum as well. 

In the third story Chuck Brown has Green Lantern Hal Jordan team up with  Aquaman; Jackson Hyde, (no not Arthur, another Aquaman) to defeat a parasitic alien threat. This story is a little more interesting because Hal Jordan is unaware of what has happened to the rest of the league, and leaves Hyde to find out what happened to them. For me, the second best story in the comic.

Now the next story is the slowest but also in my opinion the best. I've only read one comic but Phillip Kennedy and it was really good. He's been killing it with Action Comics, and here's he's been assigned the duty of creatively explaining to us how Pariah turns to the dark side as a result of being tormented by a demonic force. This could have been a real sleeper, but Kennedy makes it interesting. When you have a skilled writer, sometimes the best story doesn't have any action. 

Stephanie Phillips writes the last story which features Batgirl; Stephanie Brown, (No, not Batgirl Barbara Gordon, or Batgirl Cassandra Cain, but another Batgirl) This is the weakest story in comic, and really not the way you want to end it. I've only read one comic by Phillips before, and I wasn't very impressed to say the least, but you can't judge a writer on two comics. The story itself was unmemorable to the point I found myself nodding off, which doesn't help me get excited for DC's big event. 


I think the thing that bothered me the most with this comic, is the confusion all the legacy characters cause. If I was a casual DC fan I'd be so confused as to why there is another Superman, Aquaman, or third Batgirl, I'd  be running back to Marvel or Manga after one issue. 

Small wonder that the only character that doesn't have a prominent legacy hero these days; Batman (I can't even remember the name of the legacy Batman) is the only superhero that sells at DC today. 


3 out of 5 stars 

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