Customer Rating:  
Summary: Missed opportunity
Comment: On rare occasions, a comic story has the opportunity to transcend the normal parameters of its somewhat simpler and lighter format to explore deeper and more thoughtful terrain. When this does happen, a work of exceptional quality can be produced, thereby elevating the genre into more cerebral realms. What is required is vision and scope beyond what is usually employed with superhero fare, but when less is unfortunately striven for, a missed opportunity is the result. With the premise of a group of callous yet calculating and resolute villains being covertly teleported to an uninhabited planet for the apparent purpose of forming their own society, a possibility to explore substantial academic subjects such as sociology, anthropology, history, political science, and religion presents itself. Some of these topics are briefly touched upon, teasingly revealing how provocative their further examination could have been. Instead we mostly bear witness to a series of silly and redundant infighting, a scenario much too reminiscent of the concurrent and equally lackluster Countdown Arena. Along with the misplaced prominence on pointless bickering, additional problems arise whenever you bring a large cast of characters into the mix. The loss of individual personalities and their unique appeal and identity usually occurs, with much of their posing and blustering blending into one homogenized and cliched voice. Some interesting angles are delved into, most specifically the contrasting of Luthor's rational methodology versus the Joker's nihilistic mania for leadership of Hell planet. All this for the perverse privilege of seeing what survival stance espoused by which crooked candidate will be nominated, an interesting and certainly apropos analogy in this current election year. Of course on this primordial campaign trail, it may come down to survival of the fittest, not issues and answers. Concerning the larger picture, even the much anticipated revelation of the behind the scenes adversary and their shrouded motivation lacks credibility and is ultimately a letdown, as was the anticlimactic ending, regrettably resigning a story that should have been a major player in the current affairs of the DCU as merely a minor footnote. While this type of tale may be entertaining on an undemanding escapist level, so much more could have been attained, with the final outcome being a disappointing example of settling for less instead of striving for more.
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