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Mild Mannered Reviews - Superman Confidential

Superman Confidential #14

Superman Confidential #14

Scheduled to arrive in stores: April 9, 2008

Cover date: June 2008

"Signal to Noise" - Chapter 3

Writer: B. Clay Moore
Penciller: Phil Hester
Inker: Ande Parks

Neal Bailey Reviewed by: Neal Bailey

Click to enlarge



The toy soldier trying to kill Jimmy ties him up instead.

Clark wonders where Jimmy is.

Toyman ponders the signal watch, and extols his motives to Jimmy. Jimmy mocks them.

Clark goes out to lunch with Lois, and after they talk for a while he hears a signal watch, makes an excuse, and leaves.

Superman finds toys hooked up to bombs attached to his watch's signal. He disarms the bombs, follows the signal back to Toyman as Toyman gloats over Olsen, flicks Toyman in the head, and rescues Jimmy, who promises not to abuse the watch any more.

1Story - 1: The last issue of this series, according to the back, and good. I can certainly see why. Padded from the outset, rife with cliché, and an argument for why Toyman sucks. And I DIG Toyman. Toyman is one of my favorite rogues. This is the kind of issue that a casual fanboy reads and says, "Hey, see! This is why Superman sucks!"

Lame, one-note villainy with little plausible motivation (even the characters mock it internally) coupled with extrapolation through dialogue and unnecessary scenes.

Lois and Superman could have been cut. Lois and Perry. Point of fact, most of Jimmy and Toyman. Almost every page, as I read it, could easily have been condensed into one panel without losing any essential story.

A guy, I don't remember who, but he wrote me recently and said, "Neal, you're just being pathetically brief in the summaries! It's unfair." Truth is, it's hard to get motivated to be detailed when there are so very few details and when the story is unmotivating in any real way.

DC needs to get off its #%@ and make Superman exciting again when anyone is writing him other than Geoff. It's the reason this title was cancelled, it's the reason there's a general dissatisfaction, and it's the reason my summaries are brief.

I mean, look at the splash of Supes following a trail. Why was that a splash? Look at the pat ending. Look at the cliffhanger completely ignored in this issue.

Good riddance to this series. My only regret is that now there are only three, and Superman/Batman is a book I stopped reading for its lack of quality. Congratulations, DC, you have ostracized one of your most publicly dedicated fans on 50% of his Superman books.

SCARE BEARS? Cripes.

3Art - 3: Hester conveys the story, but this art isn't really geared toward a Superman story very well. The paneling is also very widely bordered and prototypical, there's nothing extraordinarily dynamic here. Hester is a better artist than this story makes him out to be, unfortunately, because I love his work.

1Cover Art - 1: Scare Bears.

Superman... fighting teddy bears.

ZOMG nerfed.


Mild Mannered Reviews

2008

Note: Month dates are from the issue covers, not the actual date when the comic went on sale.

January 2008

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