Superman: War of the Supermen #4 (of 4)

I have to admit that I lost interest in the whole "New Krypton" storyline early on, for a few reasons.

For one, having a city filled with Supermen seemed like a great way to make Superman less special.

For another, for the story to have conflict, people would have to do stupid things. Should General Lane have attacked a planet filled with Supermen? Is it smart to send an assassin against the planet's leaders? That sort of thing.

Finally, there seemed to be a limited number of ways for the story to end. They could restore Kandor to its "bottled city" status. They could send it into another galaxy (perhaps under a red sun). Or they could destroy it.

Sadly, as we saw in the first issue of Superman: War of the Supermen, (and on the news page of every other DC Comic last month), the creative team opted for the last option.

Of course, that still gave us time for the 100 minute war, which filled this brief mini-series. This final issue gives us the wrap-up to the battle, which involves a bit of a cheat, a near-death of one of my favorite characters, and an out-of-character death for the main villain in the story (and one that sets a distasteful example for readers, frankly).

I expected more from writers James Robinson and Sterling Gates, who are better than this. The artwork by Eddy Barrows, Cafu and Eduardo Pansica has its moments, but there are also lots of panels that are jumbled and confusing.

The good news is, this will (hopefully) mean a return of Superman to his own comics and DC's regular continuity, where he's badly needed.

But that's about the only good that's come out of this series. The story took Superman away for more than a year and we end up with thousands dead, the Earth in shambles and we're pretty much right back where we started. Was this trip necessary?

Grade: C+