#Jonathan runs off or time travel villain both are fine

[adiraofthetals]

I haven't watched Ep 9 or 10 of Superman & Lois yet but I have peeked at its Tumblr. I think I know what going to happen tonight and its called tears.

[willidleaway]

Doctor Who, series 12, episodes 1 and 2

In short: I love two-parters and I’m glad Spyfall was a two-parter. The conclusion wasn’t entirely satisfying, parts of this felt like a retread of old favourite story elements (including from The Curse of Fatal Death—seriously!), and I think there was a bit of disjointness between the two parts, but this is still a very good start to series 12, and I’m 90% sure I’m not saying that just because he’s back.

In slightly less short, still without spoilers:

—Positives: good tension throughout part 1, including the cliffhanger (hangar?); loved seeing historical characters tag along and interact in part 2, in one of the better attempts of Chibnall!Who at being educational; strong performances all around from heroes and villains.

—Negatives: part 2 has me fearing for a regression from some of the positive aspects of series 11; the villains weren't really fleshed out enough, especially in their motivation.

Verdict: Go watch Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death. It’s quite funny.

Oh, you mean about this two-parter? It’s good. Could have been great, though—almost should have been with its set pieces—and it didn’t strike me as great.

In less short, with spoilers:

OK, so I don’t even have much to say about part 1 because it really is all setup. We’ve got weird higher-dimensional ghosty things, they’re attacking spies all around the world and swapping their DNA out with something else, except they either won’t or can’t attack Yas and send her instead to some weird alternate dimension. Yas and Ryan go off to find out that Google are involved [0] in some sinister fashion because their CEO is totally in league with the aliens and is himself 7% alien, but it turns out the real mastermind is ... the Master! Dun dun dun. Very much the Dark Water reveal, right down to the gender swap.

So at the end of part 1, the situation is that the Doctor is in the same realm that Yas had ended up in, and her companions are in a crashing plane. So how is this all resolved?

Well, the second one is easy. It’s a time travel show. Do the Blink gambit! [1] Just go back in time after everything’s done, plant some signs and a recording on the plane, and they can land completely unscathed! In Essex! (I’d say ‘unscathed/Essex: pick one’, but obviously Graham feels differently.)

This is fine, but ultimately the companions don’t ... do much from there? It’s the series 3 finale thing again where they’ve got to go off-grid, except in series 3 where Martha is planting the seeds for, well, that conclusion. But she’s at least got some kind of agency in the story. Here, Graham and Yas and Ryan are ... chased? I mean, it did give us Graham laser-tap-dancing his way out of those situations, and I will be forever happy that that was a thing that happened, but overall they had so little to do other than have villainous speeches and antics spouted at them. Frankly, from a purely logistical point of view, it would have made very little difference if the Doctor had just picked them up on the plane before it crashed, because of course the Doctor had sorted everything out about the Silver Lady and the Kasaavins and all.

So I found that fairly unfortunate, especially given Yas and Ryan’s crucial actions (and their rather excellent performances) in part 1.

Resolving the Doctor’s cliffhanger seems a little trickier, and it leads to some of the disjointness I was talking about at the start between parts 1 and 2. In part 1 we’re led to believe that these pointy-hat white ghosts [2] are alien spies spying on Earth’s spies today. Here it turns out that, no, actually, they’re also spying on the Who’s Who of Earth computing and telecommunications.

This includes Ada Lovelace [3]—why she was also known as Ada Gordon is baffling to me given she was Lord Byron’s legitimate daughter and it’s not like Gordon was Byron’s surname (not blaming the show, just baffled at the apparent historical fact)—and later Noor Inayat Khan, the pacifist SOE hero with expertise in wireless telegraphy. It was really good to learn about them and their contributions, however briefly (although I have mixed feelings about the episode avoiding discussing Noor’s ultimate fate).

Thankfully they also get more to do than the companions—Ada hijacks a gun and fights off the Master while he’s distracted, while Noor hides Ada and the Doctor from Nazis and later feeds information to the Nazis to trap the Master. They then both go out and track down the Master’s TARDIS (although given his hubris it turns out to be not so difficult). That’s way more than laser-tap-dancing and being rather ineffectual otherwise!

My main gripe is how the Doctor wipes both their memories at the end—it’s not like the Doctor’s wiped the memories of Dickens or Shakespeare or even Queen Elizabeth! Anti-STEM discrimination, this is.

But overall I very much liked the Doctor in this power trio of women, although I think Ada got the short end of the stick out of the three of them. I suppose it may have been difficult because her abilities are relatively abstract—computer science is a bit more difficult to get across on screen compared to telegraphy and disinformation, so she has to make do with a gun instead.

So: strong companions in part 1 (although not so much in part 2), strong Doctor and historical figures in part 2. All fine and dandy. But let’s talk about the villains, because of course that’s the meat of the story.

OK, first off: that’s Lenny Henry?! God he’s unrecognisable. Goatee suits him, though. He looks sharp.

Daniel Barton, though, seems not so sharp, and not terribly interesting either. First off, he has all the information in the world yet can’t seem to be bothered to run a face recognition routine on Yas and Ryan when they’re undercover in his office as journalists. (Maybe he’s wilfully ignoring it. Maybe he just wants attention.) Then it turns out he’s 7% non-human, which is intriguing at the start but gets rather casually dismissed towards the end of part 2 as just him test-driving the DNA replacement idea.

But the real trouble was that I never found it terribly clear why Barton would have been interested in joining forces with the aliens to wipe out humanity. Did he just find the idea of using seven billion humans as data centres really appealing? Maybe, but what’s the use of all that data? Barton is most powerful as the head of basically Google, and all his data becomes utterly useless without the civilisation that actually needs it, surely.

Oh, then there are the Kasaavins themselves.

At first, their basic plan seems like it’s to wipe out Earth’s intelligence network, which makes sense as a step in an invasion. But then it turns out the ultimate point of their invasion is all about ... computers? And disk space, basically???

Why did they attach themselves to people like Ada Lovelace and Alan Turing and Steve Jobs? Was it to influence the evolution of computing in ways that made today’s computer architectures more vulnerable to ... whatever it is the Kasaavins later do through the Silver Lady and all of our modern devices? Sure, Ada Lovelace’s notes on computing engines were prescient and unquestionably influenced her spiritual successors like Turing, but I would personally have said more in the abstract. You'd definitely want to go after people like Woz, doing design on microcomputers much closer to our modern laptops and phones. I guess they figured it couldn’t hurt, anyway.

What exactly were they going to do with all that disk space? Why don’t they have their own massive storage devices? Why do they need to overwrite human DNA? Can’t they just build more DNA?

I dunno, maybe I’m overthinking it. I thought they were building towards a Matrix-style thing where all of human civilisation was going to just be someone’s cloud computing instance—but no, it’s hard drive space. It seemed a bit weak.

I think the Kasaavins suffered mostly for being in the same story as the newest incarnation of the Master.

The good thing about the Master, at least, is that he needs little motivation. He’s just mad. If he wants to wipe out all of humanity and the Kasaavins needing storage space happens to mean there may be a common interest there, the Master can just do that. That’s how the Master works.

He cuts an imposing figure at the start, I suppose—maniacal slick sort of fellow, shades of Simm’s incarnation in series 3 but still his own thing. But the way he works in this episode is just ... goofy. I mean, really? He just keeps tracking the Doctor through time? Can’t be bothered to keep tabs on whether someone’s trying to sabotage his master plan?

And then there’s the way the whole situation with the Nazis gets resolved.

I really thought he was going to go ‘seventy-seven years ... in a sodding twentieth century ...’, à la Jonathan Pryce’s excellent Master from Steven Moffat’s Comic Relief special. You know, the one from all the way back in 1999 where for the first half-ish, the Doctor and Master basically try to outwit each other through increasingly ridiculous time-travel hijinks, ending up with the Master having to crawl out a sewer for over nine hundred years.

Totally unlike this story, where the second half-ish involves the Doctor and Master trying to outwit each other through time-travel hijinks, and the Master ends up having to crawl out of his predicament for almost eight decades.

I’m not sure that’s a complaint, myself, frankly. For one thing, of course, when a show has gone on for over half a century, it’s difficult to avoid new stories running into old ones. But for another thing, saying something feels right out of a Comic Relief special isn’t necessarily a, erm, fatal flaw for Doctor Who. I prefer it when Doctor Who isn’t taking itself too seriously, just seriously enough.

Still, when you look at the big picture and look at all the retreads, I can’t help but think we’re heading back into the worst excesses of past new!Who.

For all its faults, I really enjoyed series 11 for how the narrative focus returned to the companions after much of the Moffat era’s obsession with ridiculously overpowered characters—Clara as the impossible girl, the Doctor as the Hybrid, the Doctor as literally where we get the word ‘doctor’, and so forth.

Well, now we’ve got the Master back and he’s gone and destroyed Gallifrey (negating the big winning moment of the 50th anniversary special, to boot) and it’s all because of some mysterious lie and it involves the Timeless Child that was mentioned for a hot five seconds last series??? It smacks of past new!Who arcs, especially under Moffat—and at least in my eyes those arcs have never gone terribly well. Those arcs have come at the expense of good companion characterisation as well, so overall it has me a bit concerned about series 12.

Sure, all these aspects of pre-series 11 Who returning to the show—the Daleks last year, and now the Master—maybe makes the show feel more like itself, much like how having a functional rebel force that’s not just confined to a single light freighter makes a Star Wars film feel more like Star Wars. I just worry that it’s a instinctive reaction against some of the mixed reactions to series 11, and that ultimately it’ll be an overreaction.

Good start, though, this two-parter. I just hope it doesn’t turn out to be the best story that series 12 gets.

Footnotes:

[0: Sure, they’re called Vor in the episodes, but first off they’re clearly meant to be Google, and second off it’s very awkward talking about ‘Vor’ being everywhere on the Internet and on everyone’s devices ... so for the purposes of this write-up I’m going to call them Google.]

[1: I know that in Blink, the Doctor and Martha are trapped in the past and have to plant the message in DVDs to get someone to get them out of trouble. But you know what I mean. Timey-wimey out-of-order rescue plan.

Maybe I ought to call it the Arrival gambit, after the excellent film from a few years back.]

[2: Makes them sound like alien Klansmen, doesn’t it?]

[3: What’s the opposite of née for the purposes of distinguishing maiden and married names in time travel stories? I guess mariée is as good as any ...]

[emjenenla]

Certain Dark Things [A Mortal Instruments Fanfic]

Post-CoFA. He looked down at himself. The rune Lilith had put on his chest was still there, bright red, but he felt no panic. He was in control of his own body now. The spell was broken. Everything was okay. Or Jace and Sebastian in the aftermath of Sebastian's resurrection.

I don't own the Shadowhunter Chronicles. Title from "Sonnet XVII" by Pablo Neruda, which is also the title of part two of CoLS. Violence warning because these boys spend a not inconsiderable amount of time literally covered in Jace's blood.

I'm honestly not sure why I wrote this since CoLS is my least favorite book in the series mostly because I don't like not-Jace. I guess I'm rationalizing this story by saying that writing not-Jace will be good practice. Plus, Sebastian is a great villain. I'm not sure if I did him justice, but I tried.

For the purpose of this story, just accept that Jace has a stele through the entirety of the climax of CoFA and that Sebastian is wearing Valentine's teleporting ring. Trying to figure out how two blood-soaked teenage boys could get into the apartment and not get caught by the Clave without those two things gives me a headache.

Jace Lightwood woke up.

That was admittedly a little strange because he hadn’t been asleep, but somehow, he woke up anyway. He was kneeling in a glass box up to his waist in water that had turned red with blood. His blood. He remembered cutting open his own wrist and letting the blood run into Sebastian Morgenstern’s mouth. He remembered doing it, remembered not being in control of his own body.

He looked down at himself. The rune Lilith had put on his chest was still there, bright red, but he felt no panic. He was in control of his own body now. The spell was broken. Everything was okay.

He still felt strange, almost floaty, like the inside of his head had been rearranged and pushed around, like his thoughts weren’t quite his own. When he tried to consider the feeling more closely, a sense of peace swept over him. It was alright. Everything was alright now. It was a just a weird feeling, probably just because of all the blood he’d lost.

The surface of the water bucked, and Sebastian sat up, eyes wide, bloody water pouring off his body, sticking his colorless hair to his face and neck. Jace jerked back, more because he was startled than because he was actually afraid. Sebastian had just been dead and now he wasn’t; that was a little weird. Jace was allowed to feel startled even if Sebastian wasn’t a threat.

Sebastian gripped the sides of the box with desperate strength. At some point his missing hand had grown back, or perhaps been reattached was a better word because there was a ropey scar where Isabelle had sliced it off. Sebastian leaned forward, eyes squeezed tight closed. He coughed and retched up the combination of water and Jace’s blood that he’d been submerged in. His sides expanded and contracted in a ragged, irregular pattern, like he’d forgotten how to breathe. There was a slash on one of his palms right where Jace had cut himself mere minutes before.

Jace leaned forward, stretching out his hand carefully, not sure if Sebastian would be okay with being touched. “Are you okay?” He asked, and Sebastian motioned vaguely with one hand. The motion shouldn’t have meant anything, but Jace somehow knew Sebastian was saying he was fine.

Jace realized he was really worried about Sebastian. That was startling. Jace had been trying to keep Lilith from bringing Sebastian back, and now all he could think about was how Lilith had been planning to use Simon’s blood to finish the resurrection. What if Jace’s blood wasn’t good enough? What if there was something wrong with Sebastian as a result?

It was the same type of thought-spiral that happened every time Alec was injured. Jace was a bit confused by why he suddenly cared about Sebastian as much as he did his parabatai. Wasn’t Sebastian the enemy?

No, Sebastian wasn’t. He realized. It was all a big misunderstanding. Sebastian hadn’t meant to do those things. Max’s death had been an accident. Sebastian hadn’t meant to kill him. He was trying to do the right thing. What he wanted was right.

Jace couldn’t remember when exactly he’d learned all this information, but he knew it was true. He was more certain of it than he was of just about anything else. Sebastian was good, and Jace needed to help him.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” Jace asked again. “Do you need an iratze?”

“No, I’m fine,” Sebastian said, his voice gravelly like he’d swallowed a throatful of stones. “You’re the one who needs an iratze.”

“What?” Jace blinked in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

“Your arm,” Sebastian pointed with one finger, seemingly unwilling to fully let go of the box.

Jace looked down. Under Lilith’s compulsion, he’d cut into his arm very deeply. The wound was still bleeding, but not anywhere near as heavily as the severity of the wound would suggest. Perhaps that had something to do with the spell that had just been completed.

“Fix yourself up before you bleed to death or something,” Sebastian said. “Then we’ll get out of here.”

“Alright,” Normally Jace would have argued that he was fine, but strangely he had no desire to argue with Sebastian. Sebastian knew what was best.

He got to his feet and his head spun. He grabbed for the side of the box and someone grabbed his hand and held him up. When Jace’s vision cleared he found himself staring down at Sebastian. The other boy’s black eyes were not necessarily concerned, but he was still there helping to hold him up.

“Patch yourself up,” Sebastian said, letting go once he was sure Jace wasn’t going to collapse.

Jace clambered out of the box, found his stele and scrawled an iratze and a blood replacement rune onto his wrist. When he turned back, Sebastian was climbing gingerly out of the box, looking like he didn’t quite trust his legs.

“Jonathan,” Jace said, opting for that name because he wasn’t sure how the other boy would feel about being called Sebastian. “What happens now?”

Sebastian glared at him. “Don’t call me that. It’s not my name any more than its yours.”

“Then what am I supposed to call you?” Jace asked. “Sebastian?”

“That’ll do,” Sebastian said. “Give me your stele and we’ll get out of here.”

“What about Clary?” Jace asked.

“Clary,” Sebastian repeated. There was an odd expression on his face, not necessarily unfamiliar, just not the kind of expression someone normally got when thinking about their sister. Jace tried to place the expression for a minute then the curiosity floated away. It didn’t matter what Sebastian thought about Clary. He would never hurt anyone Jace cared about, not on purpose.

“Can she come with us?” Jace asked. “I want her to come with us.”

“How can you be sure we can trust her?” Sebastian raised a cynical eyebrow at Jace.

“She loves me. If I ask her to come help us, she will,” Jace wasn’t sure when his relationship with Clary had become so simple. He couldn’t remember ever being this certain about anything even remotely concerning her, but he wasn’t necessarily unset by the change. It was nice to think about Clary without drowning in a tidal wave of guilt and confusion.

“I’m glad you trust her so completely, Brother,” Sebastian said, “but we need to be careful. We will escape and heal and keep an eye on Clary. If she proves to be trustworthy we can get her then.”

“Alright,” Jace said, vaguely aware that he was agreeing too easily, but not particularly caring. He paused for a minute considering something else Sebastian had said. “Did you just call me ‘Brother?’”

“Yes,” Sebastian said. “We were both raised by Valentine Morgenstern, in a way that makes us brothers, does it not?” he paused for a moment then asked, “Does it bother you that I called you that?”

“No,” Jace said. It would have bothered him only a few minutes before, but now he was deeply thankful for Sebastian’s implicit trust and intimacy. He’d literally killed this boy and tried to keep Lilith from giving him another chance at life, he couldn’t believe Sebastian had forgiven him. “You can call me that if you want, I would be honored.”

Sebastian looked thoughtfully at him for a minute. He looked mildly confused, just as Jace felt, but after a moment the expression was gone. “Give me your stele,” he said. “The Clave is downstairs, and it will only be a few minutes before they make their way up here. We don’t want to be here when that happens.”

Jace handed over the stele. He was curious about how Sebastian planned to get away without running into the Clave, but he didn’t question him. He knew Sebastian would take care of it, Jace just needed to trust him.

Sebastian strode across the garden motioning for Jace to follow. Sebastian walked with purpose, but he was obviously unsteady. Jace ran a couple sets to catch up and gripped the other boy’s arm to give him some support. Sebastian gave him a look that was part confusion, part threat then relaxed. “Sorry,” he said. “This is… strange.”

Jace nodded in agreement. He knew that what was happening right now was right, but he still wasn’t sure how it he had reached this point, and that was odd and a little unsettling. “You said we needed to go,” he said quietly.

Sebastian nodded curtly and continued on. Jace stayed with him until they reached a wall. Then Sebastian moved suddenly using his arm to pin Jace’s hand against his side. Years of training made Jace stiffen, but he wasn’t really alarmed. “Sebastian?” he asked.

Sebastian didn’t respond, he reached to touch a ring on one of his fingers. There was a flash of silver light and Jace felt like he was being pulled after Sebastian into something, condensed down into nothing and shot through the air. A split second later Jace’s vision cleared and he and Sebastian were standing a horribly familiar cave system. It was near instantaneous travel, but it was nothing like portaling.

“Sebastian,” Jace asked again. “Where are we?”

Sebastian grinned, but the expression was a tried one, like it took energy to perform it. “I think you already know that.”

Jace knew. This was the cave he had followed Sebastian to several weeks before, the one where Valentine had released the demons from. “Why are we here?” he asked.

“Because this is where the door is,” Sebastian said cryptically, then he lifted Jace’s stele and drew a rune on the cave wall. After a second he pulled Jace forward and stepped into the wall. Jace stumbled after and found himself in an ultramodern apartment. He had no idea where they were, but somehow, he knew it was nowhere near the rooftop they had just been on.

“What?” Jace looked around, taking in the sleek black and white decor. There were no windows. “Where are we now?”

“This was our father’s safehouse,” Sebastian let go of Jace and pressed the stele back into his slack hand. “This is where we lived for years after he sent you to live with the Lightwoods.” There was no jealousy or gloating in his voice when he talked about the differences in the way Valentine had treated them. Jace didn’t think that was odd. He and Sebastian hadn’t understood each other before, they did now there was no need for jealousy now.

“Will they find us here?” Jace asked.

“Technically there’s no ‘here’ for them to find,” Sebastian crossing the room to lean heavily on the huge glass table. “This is an interdimensional pocket; the only way out is that stretch of wall behind you. They can’t track us, and they definitely can’t find the entrance let alone figure out how to open it. There is no safer place to be.”

Vaguely, Jace was aware that he probably should have been nervous since he was basically trapped in a place that wasn’t even part of his world, but he wasn’t. He trusted Sebastian. Everything would be okay.

“We should rest,” Sebastian ran a hand down his face, smearing Jace’s half-dried blood down his face in even more ghastly patterns. “We’re both exhausted.”

“I’m fine,” Jace said, automatically.

Sebastian gave him a look. It wasn’t like Alec’s exasperated but concerned expressions, it was the look of someone who knew he was being lied to and didn’t like it. There wasn’t any overt concern, but Jace still found it comforting. “You look terrible,” Sebastian said, matter of fact. “You look like you haven’t slept in the entire time I’ve been dead. My sister must be a fool if she didn’t notice.”

“She had other things on her mind,” Jace said. Things like worrying I was going to break up with her. Strangely, the thought wasn’t as painful as it would have been just hours before. Clary knew he loved her, she couldn’t really have worried all that seriously about him leaving her.

“Regardless,” Sebastian said. “You’ll be a lot more useful if you don’t look like you’re about to collapse. There’s a spare bedroom upstairs you can use. I’ve never been able to figure out if our father intended it for you or Clary, but I’m sure he’s in a place where it doesn’t matter either way.”

Jace eyed the stairs heading upwards. “Are you sure you can make it up those stairs?”

Sebastian frowned then straightened up and let go of the table. He swayed visibly but didn’t fall. “I’ll make it,” he said and headed for the stairs.

He did make it though Jace followed a step below just in case. At the top of the stairs, Sebastian gestured tiredly to one of the closed doors. “There’s the room. There’s an attached bathroom. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Wait,” Jace said as the other boy started to walk away.

“What?” Sebastian sounded tired and Jace felt bad for having to bother him.

“Do you have some clothes for me to borrow?” Jace gestured at his blood-soaked clothes. “These are ruined.”

Sebastian stared blankly at him, then blinked as if he’d just realized what Jace was asking. “Oh, sure,” he said and headed for another door, which presumably lead to his room.

The room was catastrophically messy. The clutter put Jace’s teeth on edge, but the feeling was tinged with fondness like he felt when looking at Izzy’s disaster zone of room.

Sebastian crossed the room and stumbled, catching himself on the dresser. He waved Jace away and pulled open one of the drawers. After a moment he yanked out ball of black clothes and tossed them at Jace. “There you go.”

Jace caught the clothes and studied the other boy. “Are you going to be alright?” he asked.

“Yes, I’m fine!” Sebastian snapped. “I just came back to life I think I’m considerably better off than I was two hours ago. Go shower or something!”

Jace wanted to stay and make sure Sebastian didn’t slip in the bathroom and crack his head open, but it was pretty obvious Sebastian wanted to be left alone to lick his wounds. Jace understood the feeling so he back out of the room and closed the door quietly behind him.

The room Sebastian had pointed out was simply furnished in comparison to the rest of the apartment with white painted walls and white sheets and blankets on the bed. It was calming after the messiness of Sebastian’s room. Jace crossed to the attached bathroom and poked around in the drawers. The room seemed to have been prepared for someone to live there--Clary maybe? --because there was a toothbrush, toothpaste and a hairbrush in one of the drawers. There was also deodorant which was a relief. Using Sebastian’s deodorant would have been far from the grossest thing Jace had ever done, but he was still glad not to actually have to do it.

There were a couple fluffy white towels hanging next to the shower and some shampoo and bodywash. Jace stripped out of his ruined clothes and stepped into the shower letting the hot water pound down onto his body.

After a lifetime of being a Shadowhunter Jace was used to washing blood, ichor and other disgusting things off himself. Like he always did, he gave himself a minute to soak, watching his own blood turn the water red. Once the minute was passed he lathered shampoo into his hair and began to scrub himself clean.

The shower water was warm and relaxing. Jace tried to wash himself as quickly and efficiently as possible but he was hit by the adrenaline crash before he finished. He leaned against the shower wall as the headache he’d been nursing for weeks slammed back into him. He ached, his stomach was vaguely upset, and he just felt nasty. The sad thing was that aside from some aches and pains he didn’t feel that much worse than he had for the last few weeks. He was just so tired.

He finished showering with clumsy fingers and stumbled out of the shower. He dried off and reached for the clothes Sebastian had given him. There was a silky black pair of pajama pants and a black tee-shirt. The fact that they were twisted together did not bode well for their cleanliness, but Jace was too tired to care. The clothes didn’t really fit, but thankfully Sebastian was both taller and broader across the shoulders than Jace was, so the clothes were too big not too small. Jace tied the drawstring of the pants tightly to keep them up and tried not to wonder how much weight he’d lost in recent weeks.

He knew that he should brush his teeth and hair, but he was too exhausted for that. He stumbled out of the bathroom and collapsed face down onto the bed. He lay there for a few minutes before he finally worked his way under the blankets. The bed was very soft and Jace was very tired; he was asleep before he even realized it was happening.

For the first time in weeks, he did not dream.

~~~~

A hand poked Jace in the side, dragging him towards the surface of a deep ocean of sleep.

“Are you alive?” a voice asked.

Jace groaned and batted at the hand, not completely awake. “Go away,” he grunted. He did not want to wake up. He hadn’t slept well in weeks and he was so tired.

��Alright, fine,” the person who was bothering him said. “You can just keep lying there comatose if that’s what you want.”

That was what Jace wanted. As soon as the annoyance was gone he sunk back into the ocean.

~~~~

Eventually, Jace resurfaced in the waking world. Since the bedroom had no windows it was dark and there was no way to tell what time it was. After a moment, Jace reached out, turned the bedside lamp on and squinted at the clock sitting next to it. It was late morning, almost late enough to be considered lunchtime. He sunk back onto the pillows and stared up at the ceiling trying to gather himself. He hadn’t slept that well in too long.

It took him almost twenty minutes to finally feel awake enough to get up. He felt groggy and heavy like his body had forgotten how to deal with actually getting restful sleep. He sat up very, very slowly and ran a tired hand down his face feeling stubble rasping against his palm. He hoped Sebastian had a razor he could borrow.

Eventually he pushed aside the blankets and stood. He padded out of the bedroom on tired feet. He felt a little hungover which was weird, but he was so thankful to have actually been able to sleep that he didn’t care.

When he opened the bedroom door he heard all kinds of loud noises and music coming from the TV downstairs. Jace headed down the steps to see that Sebastian was sprawled on the couch watching what Jace thought was supposed to be an extremely violent movie.

“You know that’s not what actually happens if you stab someone there,” Jace said.

Sebastian craned his neck to look at Jace. “Oh, look he lives. Did you get enough sleep, Brother?” He voice was a little teasing, but in a familial way. “You’ve been dead to the world for over twenty-four hours.”

For the first time Jace realized it was a new day. He blinked. “Oh…” he said. “I didn’t realize…”

“Yes,” Sebastian said, still with a friendly air of teasing. “That’s obvious.”

Jace rounded the coach, sat down and curled up against the arm of the couch. Sebastian raised an eyebrow at him, but Jace was the one who spoke first, “How are you feeling?”

“I’ve always been fine,” Sebastian said rolling his eyes. “You’re the one who’s sporting the most obvious sleep hangover I’ve ever seen.”

“Is that a real thing?” Jace asked.

“Google it,” Sebastian said with a shrug then he got up. He was perfectly steady on his feet which made Jace a lot less worried about him. “The majority of the food in this place went bad while both Father and I were busy being dead, so now that you’re awake I’m going to go out and get us some lunch.”

“I can go with you,” Jace said trying to straighten up.

“You’re only nominally awake,” Sebastian said. “And only the clothes you have are my pajamas, which do not fit you in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“Believe me, I’ve noticed,” Jace said.

“Just stay here,” Sebastian said. “I’ll be back.”

After he left, Jace lay on the couch and vacantly watched Sebastian’s movie. It really wasn’t the kind of thing he would have chosen to watch on his own, but it was what Sebastian had chosen and Jace wanted to get to know the other boy a little better. The confusion he’d felt the night before was gone and he was completely comfortable with his alliance with Sebastian. Everything was okay, this was right.

Twenty minutes later Sebastian came back with a plastic bag of paper-wrapped packages. “Roman pizza,” he said grandly dropping the bag onto the coffee table in front of Jace. “Fresh from the source.”

“Rome?” Jace said. “But this apartment is in Idris.”

“You obviously haven’t been paying attention,” Sebastian threw himself back onto the couch. “This apartment was never in Idris, just the door was. I’ve since moved the entrance to Rome, Italy. Have you ever been there?”

“No,” Jace admitted. Some Shadowhunters traveled extensively, helping out wherever they went, but Jace had never had that opportunity. As a child he and Valentine had never left the Wayland Manor, something that made perfect sense now that he realized Valentine wasn’t actually Michael Wayland. The Lightwoods had the Institute to contend with and didn’t travel either. Jace had always secretly hoped that he, Alec and Izzy would be able to leave New York and see the world once they came of age, though it was seeming more and more like that would never happen. He’d been trying not to be disappointed, and now that he found he actually wasn’t. It would be good to see the world with Sebastian, just like it would be good to see the world with Alec and Izzy.

“Here,” Sebastian rummaged through the bag and tossed one paper wrapped package to Jace. Jace unwrapped it to reveal the type of Roman pizza which was baked in long strips and then cut and folded in half when the customer bought it. His stomach growled and he nearly sobbed in relief. The combination of stress, exhaustion and terror he’d been living with recently always stole his appetite, it had been awhile since he’d been hungry.

When he looked up Sebastian was watching at him with a raised eyebrow. “What?” Jace asked.

“You look like you’re going to cry,” Sebastian said, mostly teasing but also almost mocking.

“I’m fine,” Jace said and stuffed a bite of pizza into his mouth before he did anything else embarrassing.

Jace inhaled several packages of pizza with barely a thought. When he finally tuned back into reality Sebastian was eating absently, his attention mostly focused on the movie. He glanced at Jace and his lips twisted into a smile. “Had enough to eat?”

Jace felt himself turn red. He normally didn’t get embarrassed about eating, but he was well aware that he’d probably looked like he was eating for the first time in too long. Valentine had always been finicky about table manners, he had no way of knowing if Sebastian was too. “Yes,” he said quietly. “Thank you.”

Sebastian’s smile was a little like the kind people gave to a puppy who had just done something cute and endearing. “Well, if my dear sister isn’t going to take care of you properly, then I guess the job falls to me.”

Jace found himself nodding along. On some level, he knew that there was something wrong with his unthinking agreement with Sebastian’s casual belittling of Clary, but he didn’t really think about it. It was really frustrating that Clary could spend so much time angsting about whether or not Jace still loved her but that Simon who didn’t even like Jace had been the one to realize something was wrong and try to help. He hadn’t thought about it at the time, but it was really annoying now that he wasn’t panicking about what he might do if he spent too much time around her.

“I’m really thankful for all of this,” Jace said feeling like the words needed to be spoken. “You have no reason to forgive me for everything I did to you while our father was still alive, but you did, and I’m can’t express how thankful I am for that.”

A confused expression crossed Sebastian’s face, like he was thinking something he knew didn’t make sense and couldn’t figure out why he was thinking it, then his expression cleared. “You can thank me by helping me.”

“What do you need help with?” Jace asked. He felt a little like he already knew, but he wanted to hear Sebastian say it, rather than make assumptions of his own.

Sebastian leaned back and stared at the television. He was debating how best to explain his goals, Jace somehow understood this almost instinctively.

“Tell me,” Sebastian said after a while. “Have you ever heard the quote ‘Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo?’”

“Virgil,” Jace said. “‘If I cannot move Heaven, I will raise Hell.’”

Sebastian grinned, it was a sharp, wicked thing. “That, Brother, is exactly what we’re going to do.”

For some reason I love the "If I cannot move Heaven, I will raise Hell" quote so you know I had to get it in here.

You know it occurs to me that this is the first Jace story I've ever written that isn't angst...

[thegeekerynj]

An Occasional Attempt to Read, Discuss and Review the Wonders of Comics

By: John Rafferty, cranky old man, and Fan of All Things Comics

The ALL Death Metal Issue 

Dark Nights: Death Metal # 5 - 6 (DC Comics)

# 5: Writer: Scott “the Scourge’ Snyder   Pencils: Greg ‘Cold-Blooded’ Capullo  Inks: Jonathan ‘Gallows God’ Glapion

#6: Writer: Scott ‘Slasher’ Snyder   Pencils: Greg ‘ Crusher’ Capullo   Inks: Jonathan ‘Death Punch’ Glapion

1)  ‘Speaking of Batman, What’d you do to the Castle Guy?

Simple. I transferred his soul from that Gotham to the one in your hand.

Thanks to a modified BRAINIAC algorithm, he will remain trapped inside for centuries, even thousands of yea - - -

Or, you could step on him!

2) He’s sent his evil Earths! I can sense them coming! Get Prepared!

Bizarro SO NOT prepared!

Wait!,What?

I have a very sharp rock.

From here on out, we fight together, every LIVING Being on this - - -

AHEM.

Sorry. Every being - - Living, DEAD, Undead - - We Fight together!

Better’

3)  ‘I’ve heard a lot of Prayers on the battlefield. Sometimes they’re whispered. Sometimes they’re screamed at the sky. They usually come before the worst of it. I’ve heard Prayers for Victory, for Providence, Prayers for Forgiveness. Whatever’s in a soldier’s heart, whatever longing, you hear it then.

God, I wish I still had my hair.’

4) ‘You wanna say it kid?

All right everyone… #$%* CHARGE!

Language kiddo, Language.’

———————————————————————————————————

Greetings, Gentle Readers, and welcome one and all to the back half of this, the ride to Crazy Town called Death Metal!

Now, before we go too far into this, and believe me, there’s lots to touch on, let’s recap:

At some point following Hell Arisen, The Batman Who Laughs, and his infected Multiversal minions, recreated much of the Earth - Prime Universe in his image

Perpetua is off destroying other Universes, collecting Crisis Energy, so she can remake the Universes in HER vision

Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Harley Quinn, and Scott Free are being kept as ‘Wardens’,  payment for protecting their loved ones

Batman is controlling the Black Lantern (we know what that means)

Superman has been infected with Anti-life

There are many heroes running around the reconfigured fighting their battles to maintain their freedom, and perhaps, turn the war

There are villains doing so, too

Jarro is totally badass!

Jonah Hex is so much moreso!

When doing multiple issues, and having so many great snarky quotes, you can’t pick just one… and 4 still isn’t enough!

So, between the Metal, Year of the Villain, Hell Arisen, the Primary Death Metal story, the side issues, which in some cases were better than the primary story, and the 5 issue crossover into JLA (a true crossover, not a Crisis 1-Panel type of crossover), we have come almost two years to get to where we are…

Issue 5 and 6, two issues which carry most of the motion toward the endgame of Issue 7, really deliver. We get payoff from some of the earlier storylines. We get explanations, and confirmations for things that were hinted at early in the storyline. 

There’s paragons of virtue working alongside villains. There’s Black Lanterns working with Red and Green Lanterns, Supermen, good, evil and cyborg, coordinated for one goal.

And an Amazonian Princess leading the largest group of Czarnian Bastiches ever seen.

All against the Hordes of the Laughing Bat.

I’m going a little off script here for a minute, so please, don’t treat this as a reason to zoom ahead to the next stop…

I must admit, I am sorry to hear the readership has dropped off for this storyline. While I understand there are choices that need to be made, to say there are too many crossovers is ludicrous, especially if you stuck through the original Metal Saga, then the Year of the Villain , with every title having three or four crossover books, then right into Hell Arisen, with the Infected one-shots, and the crossovers for all those books, and the native title crossovers.

The way Snyder and Capullo, and ultimately DC handled this Event was the right call… Keep everything isolated to the Event Books. Let the series continue to play out, so the Readers were not forced to make the unfortunate ‘Do I really need to pick up THIS title, even though I never read the book’ decision.

I mean, outside of the 5 issue JLA run, which wound up being a block of issues which were 100% a JLA story, links to the Death Metal storyline, there were none of the ‘Crossover Banners’ we have grown so used to since Crisis, Infinite Crisis, Invasion, Secret Wars, Spider-Geddon, Millennium, Civil War, and I could go on ad nauseam… No, for once, they took the High Road, and basically made the reader aware ‘This Book Is Part Of This Story’ Period. 

By giving the Readers the choice, do I want the Extras, or do I just want the Main Storyline, there was a show of Actual Understanding for the consumer. There was no need to stick 2 panels in a book to connect it to the Event, let’s play it out separately.

I’ve been reading comics for a very long time. THIS WAS A FIRST.

My feeling is, many Readers saw the first two issues, then the One Shots, and immediately thought they needed everything to know what was going on in the story. Now, that isn’t to say the first two issues weren’t a little slow, but, like I’ve been saying all along, that was the hill, and Issue Three, well, that was the First Drop, and we kept picking up speed from there.

I think many got out a little too early.

I can only compare it to a fine wine, which, upon opening, might not have everything you want in that first sip. However, once there is a little bit of breathing, slightly more time has progressed from the first sip to the second, there is so much more nuance, and flavor and outright appeal, that the progression through to the last swallow makes each prior an event unto itself.

So it is with great literature, and excellent graphic novels.

But I have digressed long enough.

These issues carry us from the action of the JLA ‘Doom Metal’ segue, where the reformed amalgam of the League, League Dark, and Titans fight their way to the Omega Knight, and both save the Martian Manhunter from his Bat influenced doppelgänger, and defeat the Omega Knight, recover the Death Metal, the legendary ‘Tenth Metal’ (Nth Metal actually being the Ninth Metal), which can bestow the ability to harness, unmake or create worlds and universes. This is the building material of the gods, used to create the Mother Boxes utilized by the Fourth World.

We also find out what ‘thinking small’ is all about, as Wonder Woman finally figures out what Lex was alluding to with the story of his childhood, and as a direct result, we get a different rendition of the WW84 Armor.

As setups go, these issues laid out the roadmap to the end of the story, making the participants fight for every inch of ground they travelled, every single enemy they extinguish.

Scott Snyder has paved the way to a MASSIVE FINAL Issue, a No Holds Barred, No DQ, No Time Limit , RFK Stadium Pelt Santa with Ice Balls Brawl between Wonder Woman and her Forces of the Multiverse and The Darkest Night and His Corrupted Dark Universe Minions, Winners Take All!

As with the last 4 issues, Greg Capullo and Jonathan Glapion have left nothing to chance, portraying each panel with the care and dedication of master surgeons, giving the Reader visceral eye candy, which rips, rends and tears at the fabric of emotion, similar to the Warhead mixed in with pieces of lemon candy. In some cases, it is enough to bring tears, always for the right reason.

May the Gods, Snyder, Capullo and Glapion have mercy on our souls, as they bring the goods one more time! On to Issue 7!

Out of 5🌶        🌶🌶🌶🌶.5

(And, I am sorry for my time on the soapbox.)

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Death Metal: The Secret Origin

Writers: Scott Snyder & Geoff Johns    Artists: Jerry Ordway  (1 - 7, 35 - 38), Francis Manapul (8-12, 32 - 34), Ryan Benjamin & Richard Friend (14 -21), Paul Pelletier & Norm Rapmund (22 - 31)

‘Look! The Evil Worlds! They’re vanishing!

Whoever did it, they just gave us a fighting chance!

Whoever did it is dead.

But who? Who did it?

We’ll never know.

RRF.

RAARF.

AAAOOOO!

———————————————————————————————————

The Secret Origin…

Or, the one where we figure out Superboy Prime…

Yes, Gentle Readers, this is the story Thirty-Five Years in the making.The Story of Clark Kent of Earth Prime, a young man who, on a night unlike any other found he had the same super powers as his comic book hero and namesake, Superman.

In the Infinite Crisis storyline, Superboy Prime was written having gone insane, having been in this ‘perfect utopian pocket dimension’, too long with the memories that everyone he had loved, his parents, his sweetheart Laurie, were all dead, he while was alive in an idyllic world.

Who wouldn’t lash out… and KILL Superman and Lois Lane of Earth-2?

Scott Snyder and Geoff Johns bring a completion to this story, bringing it full circle, to examine the character, and his psyche, what he has been living with, dealing with, and ultimately showing him to be a sympathetic character, and the hero he has always dreamed of being.

Now, as we learned in the Trinity Crisis one shot, The Bat who Laughs travelled the timelines, pulling specific players from the points of their defeats, and gave them an opportunity to correct their defeats… and did so with Darkseid, the Anti-Monitor and of course Prime. 

The Bat’s plan? To derail the Trinity, and ultimately end the War before the major fighting got started.

What wasn’t counted on was the ability of Diana to convince Clark Kent that the Bat would find a way to make the reward insufferable, and that she would help him to become the hero he had always seen himself as, the one he wanted to be by fighting against the Dark Universe’s influences, and help bring about the rebirth of the Multiverse that was.

Which brings us to the Secret Origin.

This is where we learn what the Bat offers Superboy Prime, what he thinks will sway this young man to give in to the madness which took him once, the madness he has regretted, and ultimately suffered because of, ever since.

Where we learn the measure of those he has been teamed with, and whether they Hero or Villain, are deserving of the titles they carry, based on how he is viewed.

Ultimately, we learn a lesson some of us have already known, that in the measure of intelligence, the instincts of a dog are far more impressive than the most intelligent man’s thoughts. By miles.

At this point, I would like to say when this character was included as part of Death Metal, I saw some form of this story coming. The character received truly shabby treatment after Crisis, and in Infinite Crisis, rather than being treated as broken, was painted as a villain. 

Hell, Hank Hall got better treatment after Armageddon 2001!

Anyway, Scott Snyder and Geoff Johns have written what must be seen as the HAVE TO READ Story of this series, outside of the series itself. This is not only a great story, it is a clinic on how to build a character, These writers have taken this broken child, a Kal-El who has lost everything he loved, over and again, and shown how a man can be saved.

Through belief, faith, and the love of a dog.

So, you see, Mr. Williamson, this is how you write a Redemption Arc.

The art for this story is transformative (heh heh heh). For each section of the story, whether it is the Man, the Superboy as seen by Others, The Boy and A Dog, or the Fight Scenes, there is a specific artist for each portion of the arc, with specific strengths. As such, they will be addressed individually…

Jerry Ordway opens and closes the book. I could stop here, and anyone who is a longtime DC Reader would know why this needed no elaboration. He has been a DC staple since the 1980s, known for artwork that is detailed artistically accurate and beautiful. For anyone who does not know his work, he is technically accurate and imaginatively beautiful. For comparisons, think Neal Adams, Marshall Rogers, the Dodsons, or Capelli and Glapion… but, he’s doing it by himself, no inker to interpret his work. (Example - the comics spinner rack, with the 1984 accurate covers, and bending of same from being riffled through).

Then, of course, there is the final splash page of the book, an homage to Action Comics #1. This page would have brought a tear to this cranky old man’s eye, were I not already all cried out…

Ryan Benjamin and Richard Friend bring us through the character driven portions of the story, the interactions between Prime and the other members of the ‘Super Squad’, and the battle with the Bat’s team… The Superiors of the Ancient House of El - The Saint, the Shepherd, the Savior, and the Last Sun. 

These pages are beautifully rendered, detailed and distinct from all the other artists, but not distractingly so. This method of storytelling, with the truly distinct art styles gives an illusion of the ‘fractured’ nature of the character, how he is broken on some level, and as a result, is  somewhat disjointed. 

Add to this the ‘Temporal and Dimensional Dissonance’ displayed when Prime interacts with the characters, the explosive nature of the differences he sees when he physically assaults one of the Supermen, and the entirety of the storytelling process is on display from the mind of the character.  Without access to the script, there is no way to know how much of this is directly on the Art Team, however, as the interpretation is important, I’m happy to give the tie to the runner here.

It works on so many levels.

The battle between the Bat and Prime falls to the team of Paul Pelletier and Norm Rapmund. This work is sharp, explicit and explosive, showing the inter-connectivity between Prime and the Multiverse, a carryover from the Crisis events which become a major strength for Prime. Every touch, every punch evokes sights, visions of things that could be, could have been, may still be…

And now, the reason the old crank was all cried out…

Francis Manapul.

I held off talking about these pages due the something special I found in them.

For the most part, there were two characters on these pages. Yes, the first page and a half featured the entire Superman Squad, including the Villains, but my focus was drawn to, and laser focused on the Boy and the Dog.

You could say Manapul merely rendered the interpretation of the words Snyder and Johns wrote to describe each panel, but in the end, He. Drew. Each. Panel. Manapul owned each and every panel, whether it featured the Boy, the Dog, or Both. 

You could say Francis Manapul made each panel his bitch.

Now, any person who has owned a dog knows that the dog is actually the one who selects who their master will be, who they will love, and who they will stand beside, from the time they are both pups, until their end of times.

Manapul proves he understands this. He expresses this through graphite and ink, bringing more emption to the face of a dog than I’ve seen on many people. The feeling expressed in Krypto’s face tells as much of the story here as does Prime’s expressions. The expressiveness is captivating, and deserving of very tear shed.

In years to come, comics fans will (as Comics Fans do) bring up this story on a level with Old Yeller, The Biscuit Eater, Lassie, Rin Tin Tin, Alan Moore’s ‘Man of Tomorrow’ and the incomparable Harlan Ellison’s ‘A Boy and His Dog’, as examples of how to write animals with feeling.

They won’t be wrong, except, in my humble opinion, this story is head and shoulders above the others.

This is the story which changes the entire Death Metal Saga, and more importantly, that finally redeems one of the most maligned characters in the Post - Crisis DC Universe.

Out of 5🌶        🌶🌶🌶🌶🌶

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Dark Nights: Last Stories of the DC Universe

Writers: Joshua Williamson, James Tynion IV, Scott Snyder, Jeff Lemire, Mariko Tamaki, Gail Simone, Christopher Sebela, Cecil Castellucci, Mark Waid

Artists: Travis Moore, Rafael Albuquerque, Daniel Sampere, Meghan Hetrick, Christopher Mooneyham, Minka Andulfo, Francis Manapul

‘An Oath.

Excuse me?

I would’ve liked to have had an oath. Just something cool to say when suiting up. Was always a little jealous of the Lanterns, to be honest.

“Beware my noise! Black Canary’s Yell!”

Dork! Remind me not to let you write it!’

———————————————————————————————————

When all is said and done, it is necessary to go with a Green Arrow quote. There is no greater level of snark, and from a writing perspective, I just can’t use Robin Williams’ standard.

Gentle Readers, when it is time to go into the Final Battle, this is the group of characters, no heroes, one should want to see standing by, ready to take up arms for the people.

Now, with this particular book falling between issues 5 and 6 of the Death Metal series, these are the stories of the group of characters currently coming together around Donna Troy, Wonder Girl.

Teen Titans, Titans, JLA, and other groups as they have fallen together, all these characters have at one point or another crossed paths with Donna Troy, which makes her a perfect rally point for the writers. The fact she has been around, either as part of the Original Teen Titans, or with Wonder Woman since the Sixties, makes her one of the iconic characters in this storyline.

Williamson, Tynion and Snyder have no problem waltzing her around from group to group, checking on heroes, villains, combined groups. Tao make sure all is well, and to make sure a friendly face is seen before everything goes to Hell in ahand basket burning hand basket.

Which is when Wally West shows up.

This compilation of short stories gives some insight into the characters, their mindsets, and how they see all this playing out.

The Green Lantern story, is one of regrets repented, with Hal Jordan and Thaal Sinestro fighting on the same side, once again, in more ways than one. Jeff Lemire can write a simple story that tugs at the heartstrings, and brings real feelings. The artwork by Rafael Albuquerque is simple, and everything necessary for this story.

The Wonder Woman story, ‘The Question’, is the self examination of why we fight, what drives a person. The question, posed as a riddle by the Riddler, is simple, What do you call a person who’s greatest strength is their weakness, Someone who can never win, and never lose, A person who must fight for justice, but brings an end to justice?

The answer, both simple and complex. And the basis for the story.

Green Arrow and Black Canary take center stage in Dust From a Distant Storm. A story of oaths, and OATHS, and a question unspoken, but answered. Leave it to Gail Simone  and Meghan Hetrick to kick my ass in 8 pages. Feelings, laughs, Joker Megalodons, and the daughter of the Arrow and Canary from one of the 46 destroyed Earths. This was my second favorite story in the book, excluding the wrapper.

Cecil Castellucci is a name I have not heard before reading this story of the Bat-Family, We Fight For Love. That I hadn’t heard of him before meant I had no expectations, other than the potential to be disappointed. I was very happily surprised, and this story was a real gem. 

Now, part of the reason for this was the artwork of Mirka Andolfo, whose soft lines, and sharp detail (go ahead, figure that one out) made this a story more about the family that exists around Bruce Wayne, the young men and women who look to him as a father, and he to them, as his children. The beauty of the storytelling, the simplicity of some of the framing, the whole idea of the dead man bringing the family together to celebrate life, well, it struck a chord in me which has been hit all too often in this series.

And did I mention Damien, Magpie, Croc and Despero in a High Stakes Poker game… and Jason Todd trading some time to listen to Mara the swordsmith for a new sword? How about Dick trying to reconcile with Barbara before going into battle, in case there isn’t a later?

Oh, and a wedding.

My favorite story, well, that would be from one of my favorite writers, Mark Waid.

His story, Man of Tomorrow, is one we have been waiting for, or promised, or expected in some variation for, ahhhh, probably 30 years, since GENERATIONS. It’s a simple tale, one of desire to spend the last little while before all Hellscape breaks out with your loved ones, but also needing to answer the call of duty. How can a man accomplish both?

As it turns out, if the Man of Tomorrow has a piece of Time Hopper tech from the Thirtieth Century, he can answer the call to duty as many times as necessary in one minute… and he does. And why wouldn’t he, after all, he is Superman.

This, Gentle Readers, was the finest story of the collection, again excluding the wrapper story. Mark Waid pulled out all the stops, never took his foot off the gas, cut the brake lines, and powered through this story, not with action, but emotion. 

Now, Mr. Waid would have been nowhere without the pencils and inks of Francis Manual. I will NOT repeat myself here, as I had much to say about his work above. I can only say, Thank You Great Creators that there were no animals in this story. *snf*

Eight pages of people in need. Famine arrested, schools built, food delivered, the poor made whole, the damaged, saved.

Good-byes made to family and friends.

And, when the minute is up, the rest of the night is for his wife and son. 

I hate these people for making me feel.

And now, ‘Together’, where we see EVERY Titan from every iteration of the team… picking up right after Wally shows up.

This is the first time Donna has seen Wally since the Heroes in Crisis storyline, when his insanity brought about the Speed Force explosion that killed Roy Harper, their friend, and teammate.

Time, and history make strange bedfellows in this world, hugs and forgiveness become commonplace.

So does resurrected Black Lantern Titans.

Leaving this story, the Titans of Old, and New are whole, they’ve had their pep talk, and been told they are better than the JLA, because they have been facing the same things the JLA faced, but as children… which makes the Titans the team to be.

And, off we go, Gentle Readers, to the last steep hill on this pan dimensional roller coaster ride in an effort to reset the Multiverse. Wh will live, who will die, how much will be reset… only time, and Scott Snyder know for sure.

But, I can tell you this. I am looking forward to the last two issues of this series!

Out of 5🌶        🌶🌶🌶🌶🌶

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