Written by: Phil Jimenez
Art by: Phil Jimenez, Matt Santorelli, Joe Prado, and Jeromy Cox
Publisher: DC Comics
Superwoman #2 goes to some surprisingly weird places. There’s some surreal imagery and the whole book feels fairly high concept, and that’s all kind of cool on its own. In fact, there’s a lot of things I like about Superwoman on a conceptual level. I mean, the twist in the first issue alone was really cool, especially because of how they managed to keep it shrouded in secrecy. The focus of the book has entirely shifted from what I was expecting it to be.
This book offers another legitimate surprise, in that Jimenez actually follows through with the cliffhanger from last issue. It makes sense in the context of this rebirthed universe, but I don’t think that makes it any less surprising. It all feels rather abrupt, and the fallout doesn’t feel earned. There were some really good moments between Lana and Lois in the first issue, but their relationship just hadn’t been developed enough to really justify the responses to the events of the last issue.
Of course, there’s still time to do more flashbacks, and if those do show up in future issues, that will retroactively improve this issue quite a bit. For the time being, though, a lot of it feels kind of hollow. The pacing of the character arcs and relationships are super accelerated, and I was left feeling like I had missed something. Which I don’t think is possible, because I’ve read at least a couple issues of every Rebirth book thus far.
That’s actually the biggest bummer about Superwoman. There are things here that are certainly likeable, there just isn’t any emotional connection. There’s not really anything to ground the series, and that’s problematic. Obviously Superwoman and Steel (oh, it’s rad to see him by the way) are supposed to provide that, but they’re both kind of overwritten. Sure, it could just be that I haven’t seen enough of them yet to be entirely sold.
I’m willing to buy into that, if only because the characters are on the verge of being relatable, sort of like how Superwoman is on the verge of being good. There’s also just so much going on in this issue, so much that we spend a very limited amount of time with the villain and Lex. These characters aren’t the focus, but they seem to be playing important roles in this book thus far, so relegating them to just a couple pages doesn’t seem optimal.
And yes, I get that there’s only so much you can do in a twenty page comic. I think that’s the real problem here – Jimenez doesn’t have enough room to get everything he wants to into one issues, so it ends up feeling kind of convoluted. I wouldn’t go so far to call it a mess – it’s certainly far from the worst of the Rebirth books. There’s nothing offensively bad about it, I simply haven’t been able to really get into.
That being said, I’m probably giving Superwoman another issue, regardless of whether or not I review it. Considering it’s just the second issue, it feels a bit unfair to write it off for not fully living up to its potential quite yet. I’m certainly not forgiving its flaws for that reason, but considering Jimenez’s past work I wouldn’t be surprised if this book turns itself around a little bit.
