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Mild Mannered Reviews - "Superman" Comics

Superman #8 Superman #8

Superman #8

Scheduled to arrive in stores: April 25, 2012

Cover date: June 2012

"The Outsider Option"

Writer: Keith Giffen & Dan Jurgens
Penciller: Dan Jurgens
Inker: Jesus Merino
Cover: Ivan Reis, Joe Prado & Rod Reis

Reviewed by: Adam Dechanel

Click to enlarge


Clark lets Lois down again. On this occasion Clark fails to escort Lucy to her sister's apartment and though she defends him Lois barely hides her disappointment in her friend and her sister's quick judgement of him.

Superman in the meantime is destroying Metropolis and battling law enforcement. Civilian and structural damage at a high. He ends up in orbit around Earth before being defeated and wakes as Clark at his desk in the PGN Newsroom. There he finds that the Justice League have vowed to destroy him and that his job is in danger for writing pro Superman articles. Jimmy rambles on and something he says draws Superman out of his state of enforced hallucination.

Superman is still in Helspont's base and temporarily was implanted with an entity that had induced the strange vision. He listens to the villain detail the Daemonite empire history. When Superman declines his offer of life servitude to the empire Helspont crushes him with a boulder and the villain continues to talk to his dead opponent. Superman blasts his way from beneath the rubble with heat vision, showing he is far from weak.

They banter with a lot of words, exchanging tit for tat blows very so often until Superman loses patience and levels the Himalayan base over his foe. Scanning the rubble the Man of Steel can find no trace of Helspont and races back to Metropolis unnerved by the news Helspont is just one of the evil race that will return.

Bruised and aching, Clark returns home to his apartment and finds Jimmy Olsen on his doorstep. Jimmy has to room with his buddy for a few nights while his bed bug infested apartment is fumigated. The two discuss Lois and her very unhappy sister as Jimmy unpacks.

1Story - 1: So the fourth revamp inside the New 52 relaunch ends and what a disappointment. Superman encounters an imaginary story and the big villain that talked all the way through last issue... talked some more. Clark doesn't seem in the least worried about the threat the Daemonites represents beyond some arrogant one liners rivaling his foe's chatter and even less about alienating another member of Lois' family. The much publicized return of Dan Jurgens to Superman has been terribly lackluster but from this terrible effort the only way to go is up... I hope.

3Art - 3: Helspont looks the part. Superman's anatomy and body mass is up and down like a yoyo but he has some panels where he looks like he is back on form, specifically when he struts out of the rubble and then explodes from the base. There really isn't anything that stands out as spectacular which is a shame as I, like many fans, wanted this to be a success in story and art.

5Cover Art - 5: If only the cover was representative of the story and equal to the press releases. If it were I would have really enjoyed this issue. Sadly the cover promises a Darkseid level threat that we never experience.

Mild Mannered Reviews

2012

Note: Month dates are from the issue covers, not the actual date when the comic went on sale.

January 2012

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