Review: Superman Vol. 4- Psi War

Quick Summary

Pros: The beginning of the book is filled with some good intrigue and plenty of great action sequences.

Cons: The ending of the book does not pay off on the intrigue it introduces. The book’s reliance on mind tricks gets repetitive and old quickly. The ending is lackluster.

Overall: Though better than the last Superman story arc, this is still an average book at best. The first half is a somewhat fun and low stakes story but things change quickly. The second half ends up being a mess of psychic manipulations and twists for the sake of twists. As a whole, this book is not horrible but it also is not good.

 

Story

Superman Vol. 4: Psi War is an improvement on the Superman series after H’el on Earth (Review) left it close to rock bottom. There are some cool concepts here and the beginning of the story presents an interesting start. However, this does not mean that the book is that great as numerous flaws and a lackluster ending severely hamper this work. Overall this book takes the series from being downright bad to just mediocre in a volume that is already feeling forgettable.

(spoilers start here)

The beginning of the story starts out with a lot of mystery, generating quite a bit of interest along the way. Brainiac has a secret plot hatching on Earth, mind control is affecting Superman’s life, and the New Gods are involved in everything. It was enough to get me interested in this story and compel me to continue reading.

Along the way fun action sequences are peppered in to keep super-heroics at the forefront of Superman’s life. Lobdell is great at writing action so most of these prove to be very effective. Even Superman’s mostly inconsequential fight against the Sunturians is an enjoyable little side story, as Superman dousing his enemies with water was an unexpected and creative way to defeat them.

Things start to go downhill around the book’s halfway point, when the “Psi War” itself begins. Both Hector Hammond and the H.I.V.E. Queen go back and fourth in assaulting each other with mental tricks. However, all this ends up being is a series of cheap twists veiled behind the “it was all a dream” trope. On multiple pages, readers see Hector and the Queen defeat each other only to discover that this victory was little more than an illusion. Using techniques like this once would have been enough, but they are used so often that readers are kept in a constant state of confusion over whether what they are reading is real or not.

Then the Psycho Pirate shows up and Lois Lane gets super powers, causing a confusing story to become even more messy. The book’s final moments see the Psycho Pirate defeat Hector and the H.I.V.E. Queen, only to later be defeated when everyone teams up against him. The real problem with all of this becomes scaling. Hector is more powerful than the H.I.V.E. Queen, but Psycho Pirate is more powerful than her, but Lois is now more powerful than him. Instead of characters outwitting or outperforming each other, it becomes a game of characters being introduced at higher and higher power levels until someone eventually wins.

In addition, the way Lois discovers Superman’s identity destroys any suspension of disbelief behind Clark Kent’s secret. If she is able to realize this with absolutely no justification then there is no reason the rest of Metropolis doesn’t as well.

Another part of the book that really stood out as a negative is the way Lobdell writes thought processes. Every character’s thought process, in this book, features the exact same quirky and lighthearted writing, no matter who the character is. This is something that worked out alright for Lobdell in Red Hood and the Outlaws because both Red Hood and Arsenal could be characterized in this way. However, when he does this to characters like Superman and the Psycho Pirate it comes off incredibly inauthentic.

(spoilers end here)

Art

The artwork in this collection jumps all over the place. While none of the art is necessarily bad in terms of quality, the inconsistent style is so radical that it becomes bothersome. Nearly every issue is drawn by a different artist and no consistency is developed.

For example, the Hector Hammond that Kenneth Rocafort draws is sickeningly thin and almost alien in appearance while the very next issue sees Eddy Barrows drawing him as he is usually depicted. Neither style looks particularly bad but going from one to the other in such quick success is jarring.

However, there are some standout artistic moments found here as well. Kenneth Rocafort brings his typical level of high quality to the series and draws a fantastically creative H.I.V.E. Queen.  Aaron Kuder also brings a particularly nice looking issue, drawing a great fight sequence between Superman and Orion. These moments are great in their own way but are so short that they can become lost in the swamp of other artists’ work.

Continuity

Superman Vol. 4: Psi War flows directly out of the events of Superman H’el on Earth (Review)/Superman Vol. 3: Fury at World’s End (Review). The story then continues in Superman Vol. 5: Under Fire.

This volume also references and continues the stories from many other comic books, all of which are detailed below.

• References are made to Brainiac and The Multitude’s invasions. Brainiac invaded in Action Comics Vol. 1: Superman and the Men of Steel and The Multitude invaded in Action Comics Vol. 3: At the End of Days.
• Wonder Woman and Orion know each other from their adventures together, starting in Wonder Woman Vol. 3: Iron (Review). Orion also specifically talks about a kiss they shared, this happens in Wonder Woman Vol. 4: War.
• At one point Superman’s death at the hands of Doomsday is mentioned. This happened in Superman: The Death of Superman.