Writer Mark Russell and artist Clayton Henry handle this main story where Pa and Alfred share their take on being a father to these heroes. In fact, part of this is story is Alfred wondering is he a butler or is he a father figure when he at times he feels like both. But what I like here is how these two have to save the World's Finest heroes. Funny.
Henry has such a polished look. I have enjoyed his stuff whenever he is on the super-books. But here, he sort of ratchets up the emotion and the humor.
There is a back-up story by Mark Waid and Tyrone Finch with art by Pat Boutin. In this short story, Superman is jealous of Batman when Bruce Wayne has to take Lois Lane out on date to keep an eye on her. It is silly, seeing Superman use super-breath to stymie Bruce's efforts to impress Lois at a carnival. And it is amusing to think of Batman as wanting to rile up Superman by play-flirting. The art by Boutin is close enough to Adrian Gutierrez to feel right at home.
Not a bad 5th week book, a summer annual of breezy fun.
It's Father's Day. So Clark and Bruce invite Pa and Alfred out for a steak dinner at a restaurant called Sir Loin's. Nice pun.
But you immediately see the different reactions. Clark with the bear hug. Bruce more formal with his manservant. You can see why Alfred might not feel like a father.
Almost as if to say that he knows one day Bruce is going to die in the field as the Dark Knight.
Funny.
But wrong.
I am sure Bruce and Clark want these two to hit it off. Clark here is just trying to bring up shared experiences for conversation.
But Pa makes a bad joke.
And Alfred seems rather maudlin.
This might not be easy.
But we need some hero action.
The Flash has gone missing. Bruce excuses himself from dinner and Batman starts investigating.
Batman finds him in a Luthorcorp trap room that you can enter but not leave without setting of an explosion in a city named above the exit. The two are trapped.
Then Superman goes out and dives into the room as well.
I love Batman face-palming. Made me laugh out loud.
With the boys out of the way, Pa and Alfred open up.
Pa says it hasn't been easy raising Clark. At times he has been afraid. At times he worried what the world would do to Clark. And what Clark might do to the world.
I have never heard Pa say he was terrified of Clark. Felt a little off.
And Alfred opens up about doing everything he can to protect Bruce, even minor medical procedures. But he knows whatever he does it won't be enough.
Almost as if to say that he knows one day Bruce is going to die in the field as the Dark Knight.
But he talks like a father in these pages for sure.
When their sons don't return, the dads decide they need to go on a rescue mission.
Alfred put a micro-chip in Bruce at age 8???
That also seems a little wrong.
Funny.
But wrong.
The two break into LexCorp and hand out some consequences.
Pa throws a mean left hook and uses steak leftovers to distract the guard dogs.
Alfred lowers himself from a skylight and bashes some heads.
You'd think these two might call in Kara and Dick rather than sully their own hands. But we wouldn't get this story if they did the sensible thing.
The heroes realize that entering the room must turn off the bomb switch momentarily. So Pa and Alfred throw the knocked out guards in the door so the heroes can leave.
Again, the response from Batman feels cold.
But then Batman says he has always worked hard to make Alfred proud of him, a sign he thinks of the butler as a father.
Nice ending.
And with that Alfred celebrates his first father's day. And these two dads are suddenly close friends.
This is nothing ground breaking. But it was fun.
As I said, it is funny to see Superman be a sort of stinker in the second story, foiling Bruce as he tries to win prizes and get into the Tunnel of Love boat. Mxy and Bat-Mite are there to witness the proceedings. Another cute tale.
This didn't blow me out of the water. But both stories were entertaining and a nice diversion.
Overall grade: C+
Who really wrote the lead story? I didn't' check credits when getting it since it was so automatic a thing to acquire it so I was surprised when another review said Russel wrote this. Since I wasn't preached at about anything sociopolitical once in the story, I refuse to believe he wrote this.
ReplyDeleteSteve, would I lie to you, Russell wrote the whole thing, honest!
ReplyDeleteGreat review Anj. I was less keen on the back-up art than you, Pat B drew two issues of FF recently and they were awful.