The comic for this review? DC's special: Day of Vengeance.
AKA when The Spectre decides to beat the Hell out of everything.
The story is mostly one of many other stories leading to the event known as Infinite Crisis in the DC Universe (which is a whole another can of epic whoopass that you would have to look up). This limited series focuses on the character known as the Spectre, one of the most powerful beings in DC (which of course, meant he isn't really used a whole lot in other stories or else he becomes a Deus Ex Machina everytime he appears) and thanks to another spirit such as him called Eclipso, he is to believe that all magic is evil. So being God's Spirit of Vengeance, he does what he does best:
HE PROCEEDS TO KILL ANYONE RELATING TO THE "M" WORD.
He killed Leonidas Potter?! That Green Wearing Bastard!
He's pretty much going Jason Voorhees on their asses and despite their best efforts, the various magic users of DC are pretty much screwed since he's well, the fricking Wrath of God. Already, he has taken out the best magic users of DC.
Phantom Stranger (aka the most mysterious character DC ever made who can't fricking die): Turned into a mouse
Doctor Fate (Agent of Order): Imprisoned in his own helmet...God Damn. Oo
Madame Xanadu (To be honest, I just heard of this character): Blinded and can no longer read her tarot cards because the Spectre's a dick.
And that's not all, Spectre is even mentioned to kill in a pretty damn good bodycount. He even kills a family of Vampires.
No, he spares the Cullens, cause the fans would go insane if he did kill them...
So naturally, this calls for action, as the comic gives us these guys!
Who ya gonna call? These guys! ...I guess we're boned.
So yes, we're not given the Justice League, Justice Society of America or any of the big list teams (frankly, I guess they decided to do other things than lending a hand), we get this group of D-listed heroes composed of:
Ragman: Think Batman if he was Jewish and looks like a hobo wearing rags containing the souls of dead people. Ironically, he works in Gotham city but I never heard of him until now. Then again, it's the place of the Goddamn Batman.
Nightmaster: Who proves wearing chainmail is still going to save your damn life and make you look badass. Carries a magical sword because, well swords are cool when their filled with magic goodness. And get this, he owns a bar and we know that bartenders are badasses.
Enchantress: Powerful Sorceress who admits that using too much of her magic abilities makes her go evil and on a power-drunk rampage...Yeah, that's all I can say for the character.
Nightshade: To be honest, I really don't know much about this character other than manipulating shadows due to the fact she does less things that gets me to understand the character other than a brief mention about her relationship with the Enchantress but that's it.
Blue Devil: Name really says it all. Oh and he carries a trident that can banish demons to Hell, which is awesome.
Detective Chimp aka Bobo: ...Yeah, it's a talking monkey whose a smartass and does detective work. He admits he sucks in battle...Yet I like the character.
So yes, a bunch of random superheroes go off on a suicide mission to combat the Spirit of Vengeance known as the Spectre, who has a pretty good track record in his career compare to our heroes, who I mention I just learn of just by reading this miniseries.
...My God, they are so going to die.
But what's this?! Captain Marvel appearing to fight the Spectre?! Maybe our heroes got a chance after-
Oh right, he's getting his ass kicked...
So naturally, the group decided to say screw it and fight Spectre's companion Eclipso, who isn't that much of a pain in the ass compare to Spectre and just plain pain in the ass for them. While this is going on, Bobo and Nightshade are looking for someone that is stronger than the Spectre but more on that later. Back to the fight, the gang is getting their asses kicked around by Eclipso and Captain Marvel isn't doing well in his battle against Spectre, which Enchantress devises a plan. Basically, she gathers the powers of nearly anyone who has magic and channels it into Marvel, who then proceeds to kick Spectre's ass, and it's rather insanely awesome.
This is for Hogwarts, Middle Earth, Sparta, and Disneyland!!!
It sums up as an epic middle finger to the Spectre by frankly everyone that hates the bastard...And that's a lot of people. Really, it's like a Gurren Lagann moment, where you know it's insane but it's god damn awesome. Naturally, a plan this amazing is a plan that's not going to work in the long run in a comic as Enchantress gets a Hell lot of power and this prompts her to go evil on our heroes and Marvel slowly losing his new amounts of strength, losing his chance to beat on Spectre's ass for good. This prompts Spectre and Eclipso to retreat and our heroes surviving the encounter. Oh and how did they handle Evil Enchantress? Blue Devil just goes up and punches her in the face...That was kind of simple.
Now confident of their mission against Spectre, our heroes of course can't go back to Plan A from above, because we know a plan that awesome will never be used again in a comic. So we go to Plan B, in which Bobo and Nightshade picked up a teenage girl named Black Alice and plans to use her to fight the Spectre. So...An angsty teenage girl fights the Wrath of God? Knowing how weird comics can be, this plan is going to work, no matter how insane it is but it still sounds iffy. Of course, they have a reason: Black Alice has the power to take peoples powers and use them for a limited time (of course, she can't take Batman's power of being rich...Because that power is a little too epic for even Black Alice). At this point, Captain Marvel leaves the group to aid the Wizard Shazam, whose pretty much an uber version of Gandalf the White....What the Hell am I saying? Gandalf is always number one in my book!
Damn right!
So Shazam figures that Spectre is gunning for him next and prepares the battle. Meanwhile, our gang decides to face the Spectre and Eclipso again and sure enough, they do (you all saw this coming). Plan B is taken to effect...And it actually works. Holy crap, for something called a Suicide mission, it sure works out in their end...Twice in fact! Of course, Black Alice can't turn the Spectre into green/white goop since the Spectre without his powers...Is pretty much just a unkillable pissed off ghost. So they paid a little more attention to Eclipso, who again proves to be an pain in the ass to our heroes until Bobo tells the group that sunlight is Eclipso's weakness....So they throw her punk ass into the orbit of the Sun! Genius!
Spectre finally has enough of this bull crap and as soon as he regain his powers, heads to face Shazam, and begins the epic battle between pissed off Spirit of Vengeance and Old Wizard second to Gandalf of badass old wizards!!
...Fine, Shazam's in #3. Ben Kenobi rules. Screw Midi-chlorians trying to make the Force sound like weaksauce.
Spectre and Shazam go about in an epic battle and when Spectre seems to have the upper hand, Shazam pretty much proves that old men collecting rare artifacts of doom are not people who dwell in basements like weirdos, as various artifacts in his base beats the Hell out of the Spectre. Of course, you can't exactly kill the guy known as Wrath of God and Spectre in the end is the victor, killing Shazam and releasing tons of great evil into the DC universe...Nice job Green Man. Our heroes then declare themselves a team and prepares to head off and face Spectre and contain the various evils he unleashed and our comic then ends, leading to more events I have not yet read at this point.
What I thought? It's pretty damn good to my surprise. You may get a bunch of C or D-listers as your main cast but they prove they can be awesome...Not Batman levels of insanity awesome but awesome nevertheless. I enjoyed the story and the art was pretty decent to outragously awesome (Marvel beating up Spectre like some red headed stepchild was pure gold). One of the things that bugs me was the fact that DC had more magical badasses but they're not in the story other than a cameo. Green Lantern Alan Scott is basically holding a ton of magic in his ring yet Spectre never gunned for him and Zatanna is a well known magic user and she also manages to avoid Spectre's wrath...So how did they avoid this crap? Otherwise, it's a damn good read and this crap is the stuff that got me to writing stuff like this.So in my opinion, I enjoyed the Hell out of it. Not everyone will like this sort of stuff but I'd say give it a try.
So this is a rather fair review of a comic I have read and I hope this entertains you all!
Now I'm off to bring Leonidas Potter (aka most badass Wizard) back to life...With Science!
Sources:
-DC Comics
-Star Wars
-LOTR
-Twlight
-Funny Photoshop of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
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