Review: Batman/Superman World's Finest Annual #1

Batman/Superman World's Finest Annual #1 came out this week, the third part of the We Are Yesterday story arc coursing through this book and JLU. The basic story is the villains from the past are time traveling to the future to vex our heroes. This issue gives us the beginning of the villains' plot as Gorilla Grodd puts together his team.

This was a fun issue for a number of reasons. World's Finest is set in the past and has that classic feel. Writers Mark Waid and Christopher Cantwell mix in a lot of Bronze Age fun. First off, the villains have a Super Friends Legion of Doom feel to them. Can't go wrong there. Then, we get the World's Finest team breaking off into three mini-teams to try and stop some villains. That felt like an old school JLA or JLA/JSA crossover stories. Throw in some great guest stars and a new character and this was a bunch of fun.

I also need to point out that this book seems to contradict a primary time travel rule from the Silver and Bronze Age which means our writers are breaking new ground as well as honoring the past.

Dan McDaid is on art and brings a sort of grittiness to the proceedings. I really liked McDaid's work on the recent Kneel Before Zod mini where things were grimy and violent. He then gave a way more polished approach, still as engaging, on the Shazam book. Here the work is appropriately rough to mirror a villainous tone. I don't know if McDaid subtly changes his approach based on the story but it feels that way. I liked his work here for sure. 

On to the book!

McDaid did a few Giffen-esque issues of Kneel Before Zod. I couldn't help but think of that with this 9 panel grid rundown of Grodd's team.

I also like how he calls out why he chose these 8 to join him. That Joker panel is great with a sort of almost Golden Age feel to it. And you can feel Lex's disdain on that expression.

Grodd describes how he is the future Grodd mind in the past Grodd body (we saw that in the prior JLU issue). 

He tells the villains how the habitually lose to the heroes. The Justice League is now a huge team, looking down on the world. He shows how inept or anemic the villains are in his time. I love the scowling Luthor sitting at a Starbucks in a flannel shirt. Hardly a world-breaker.

Kudos to McDaid for these pages which couldn't have been easy. 

Grodd's plan? Take all these villains to the future to attack the heroes of the present. So he splits his team into three groups to gather up tachyons from well-known time travel sites in the past DCU.

Our World's Finest team hears about the three threats and decide they will split up. But who will run the third? 

Conveniently, Wonder Woman and Supergirl are off-world. (I was hoping to see McDaid's take on Kara!) 

I do love how this Robin is eager to run a team. We have seen this version of Dick be champing at the bit to be considered an established hero in this book. So I liked this. Unfortunately, he's vetoed.

But there is a 10th member of the Legion of Doom! Pythoness! 

She is dead in the present and so joining Grodd in the future is a sort of way to cheat death. 

She is new to the DCU so I love it!

There is standard classic 'hero versus villain' fights in the three team battles, well worth reading. 

I do love how Grodd needs to try and keep some control over villains that are usually solo acts. Here, the Scarecrow wants to steal a time-travel ray gun rather than just drain it. But for Grodd's plan, nothing needs to be missing.

I love the exasperated Grodd screaming 'We don't need a ray gun!'

Too funny!

Similarly, it was great to see the non-World's Finest hero team being led by Plastic Man. Batman and Superman had some reservations calling in this then-unknown leader. Now it makes sense. Plas is a bit of a wild card.

But I truly love the set-up of this tachyon robbery. There is some 'time magnet' and it literally looks like a magnet from a Tom and Jerry cartoon. 

Nothing ... I mean nothing ... says Silver Age as much as something like this does. 

I'll also say McDaid does a great job with Plas' plasticity!

And back with the Scarecrow, he gets to use the time ray gun, blasting Robin ... away?

This is the second time in this book that Robin has been tossed in the time stream. 

Seeing the Scarecrow use the gun he lusted after before was a lot of fun.

I really glossed over the three missions but they are fun. Bizarro running on the cosmic treadmill and backwards-talking, for example. Well worth buying and reading. 

Interestingly but not surprisingly, knowing the past villains have been working in the present already, the villain squads succeed in grabbing up all the time-energy they need.

Then Pythoness' power ... magic ... comes to bear. She uses her magic powers, a rather lengthy spell over a couple of pages, to shunt the villains into the future. It also wipes out the heroes' memory of the skirmishes they fought. And it also makes the heroes believe that The Cheetah was behind it all. 

That is a powerful spell. Whoa! I guess Pythoness is a power to be reckoned with.

And McDaid gives us another Giffen moment, shrouding Luthor's face in shadow, Munoz-style!

It is the ending of the book that really fascinates me.

The past Robin also gets shunted to the future. He appears on the JL satellite. And he is standing right there with Nightwing.

It was only seeing the two Dicks together that made me realize that both Robin and all the villains are now existing in the same time period as their counterparts. Right now there are 2 Luthors in the world, 2 Grodds.

In the old, pre-Crisis DCU, only one version of a person could exist within a specific time. That was to stop weird paradoxes. 

I guess those old rules are gone! As I said, fascinating.

This was a good chapter of the arc and felt big enough to be an Annual. Lots of heroes. Lots of villains. Lots of battles. 

Throw in a new villain and art I like and you get a winner.

Overall grade: B