Graphic Novels - Infinite Crisis Part Two: The Survivors

Hello and hello! As I start this, it’s the 18th of February. At this time, I’m waiting for my shift to begin, and I’m wondering how this old CD of mine got messed up. I’m back, going through the mega crossover Infinite Crisis. Here is Issue #2. The same creative team is here, with a little help from George Perez and Jerry Ordway for a small history lesson. The covers are also cool, with both covers showing Power Girl, who has a big part in the event (And no, I’m not talking about her…..eyes.). Lee’s issue shows her standing with the four forgotten heroes, and Perez’s cover show her looking at images containing big stuff that happened in the DCU. Both covers are well done, but they're okay to me. I kinda like the Lee cover more, I don't know. Now on to the Story!

Issue 2

Issue 2 starts out at the house of Buddy Baker aka Animal Man. He is also going to join Donna Troy and the rest of the heroes in space. Before Animal Man teleports away, he says good bye to his wife and kids. After he teleports to New Cronus, he’s greeted by Cyborg and we get a big shot of New Cronus. Some of the heroes on this mission are Green Lantern Allan Scott, Jade, Shift, BumbleBee, The Hearld, Supergirl, Red Tornado, and Firestrom. Donna is trying to figure out why center of the universe is shifting to where the battle in space is happening. We get a funny conversation between Firestorm, Mick (his other half), and Supergirl. At this moment we get a thought box from the Superman of Earth-2 (I’ll just call him Supes-2) about how Supergirl and Power Girl are both the same.

We shift to a city (I’m guessing Metropolis, but I don’t know). Power Girl is fighting some villains from the Society, and Psycho Pirate is telling them to bring her in for Luthor as well. She puts up a good fight, but she gets in a tight jam. Suddenly (what the heck is that guy doing? A dress shirt and surfer shorts?), someone starts playing that music from the Max Fleischer Superman series as Supes-2 quickly makes work of the villains and introduces himself to Power Girl (Kara). If you don’t know by now, Power Girl is also from Earth-2. How? Find out soon.

Okay, what is that guy I circled doing? Looking up Giganta's skirt? Seems like he's desperate.

We then move to the Daily Planet in Metropolis. News has gotten out about the massacre of the Freedom Fighters as well as other things going on in the world. Human Bomb, Phantom Lady and Black Condor are all dead, while Damage is in the hospital and Uncle Sam is missing (probably recruiting soldiers). Lois is on the phone with Ma Kent when she notices Clark is gone. She finds him in the hall of headliners where he is looking at the headline of his death. He tells her that Bruce is right about what he said about him (…..I don’t know about that) and that he wants to talk, but he’s hearing that John Williams’ music and knows that it’s time for action. Clark changes into Superman and flies off to save everyone.

Up, Up, and Away!

In Gotham City, the Society is talking about their plans. They’re trying to find out what’s controlling the OMACs and the location of the Marvel Family. Apparently, they need some people for a mind wiping machine that Lex has created to erase the heroes’ minds. Luthor (hmm…) tells the Society to stop looking for a Marvel member and to bring him Black Adam. We then shift to the Arctic where Lex Luthor (?) in his battle armor is spying on the Society’s plans. He knows that he’s the real deal, but for some reason he’s having headaches. So yes, there are two Lex Luthors out there. If you read Villains United, then you would know that. Anyway, as he’s piecing together this problem, he sees Supes-2 and Power Girl flying in the sky.

In the sky of the Arctic, Supes-2 and Power Girl talk. She doesn’t remember him or Earth-2. Supes-2 tells her that he will give her the answers on her own origin as they go into a deep cave. There, they meet Superboy-Prime (I’ll call him Prime) and Alexander Luthor of Earth-3 (and you, Alex-3). We then get a reason on how Power Girl survived the merging of Earths long ago (Fell through a crack in reality….Okay, I’ll accept that) Supes-2 then gives Kara (as well as any first time readers) a big history lesson on the universe. All right! Make notes because this may take a while:

• And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters…….sorry. Wrong book. I do need to get back in my Bible though. It’s been a while. All right! Here’s the real condensed version of the history of the Multiverse:

Real Version:

• Long ago, a being from Oa (who was named Krona) wanted to witness the beginning of the universe. He ended up doing something at the beginning of the universe that caused this one universe to become a multiverse, many universes existing in the same place but vibrating at different frequencies (Flash Fact.) Some of them were similar, but others were different (Think Sliders, but with superheroes).



• On two of these earths, there was a Superman. They kind of had the same origin, but there were differences on their earths. One Earth (Earth 2) had the Justice Society of America as its hero team, while the other (Earth 1) had the Justice League of America. Eventually, these two earths met thanks to their respective Flashes, and they have helped each other fight evil every so often. There were other Earths around as well. Some of them are Earth-3 (Good Guys are bad guys and vice-versa), Earth-S (home of the Marvel Family), Earth-X (home of the Freedom Fighters), and Earth-Prime (DC’s real world where Superboy-Prime comes from).



• Because of the instability of the mulitverse, a being called the Anti-Monitor was created. He wanted to turn the multiverse into antimatter. And this is where the events from COIE took place. He destroyed all but five earths. Eventually, the Anti-Monitor was defeated and all of the remaining Earths became one new Earth. Alex-3 was able to bring Lois-2 back from the dead for Supes-2 and he was also able to create a place for him, Supes, Lois, and Prime to live and watch over this new Earth.



• Supes-2 says that the new earth started out with hope. Here, we see panels of things that happened Post-COIE. We have John Byrne’s reboot of Superman (Oh yeah!), Wonder woman’s reboot, Wally West as the new Flash, and the formation of the JLI.



• Suddenly, the four survivors begin to notice some about the Earth. It’s darker than their Earth and it feels corrupted. Here we see memorable stuff from the late 80’s and some of the 90’s. We have the death of Jason Todd, the breaking of Batman by Bane, the death of Superman, the birth of Parallax, and Wonder Woman fighting another Wonder Woman (don’t know what going on there).



• As they look on, things get worse. Here we see current stuff that has happened in the DCU. We see Sue Dibny’s funeral, Superboy being controlled by Luthor, the death of Ted Kord, and Wonder Woman killing Max Lord. At this time, the four survivors begin to notice that their place is coming apart. Supes-2 decides to break out and help the universe.

As the history lesson ends, we get a little some more conversation between the four people. Prime mentions that Kara is better of not knowing about her origin because it makes it easier that she never remembered. See, he remembers his Earth and his misses his family and friends (Aw. Sad.) . As Prime and Alex-3 leave to “see” what the villains are up to, Kara and Supes-2 go see Lois-2, who is now dying.

We shift to the moon. Someone teleports into the wrecked Watchtower. It’s Booster Gold, who has returned from the 25th century with his robot buddy Skeets. BG went back to the future during The OMAC Project (don't know why, but when your best friend is killed by another friend, that does stuff to ya.) . He’s now back with information that could prove useful to the heroes. Before he goes to contact his hero friends, he leaves the moon to find Blue Beetle’s Scarab.

We then shift to Gotham City, where Joker (as played by Mark Hamill, ha ha) has pretty much handed the Royal Flush Gang its butt. He asks the King (I don’t know his name) why he wasn’t inducted into the Society. The King replies “See, everyone knows---- Joker’s too wild” and proceeds to laugh in Joker’s face. Joker, being the cool, calm, nut job he is, uses a hand shocker to shock the crap out of King and leaves.

Back at the hidden place, Lois is glad to see Kara, who still doesn’t remember them or Earth-2. Suddenly, as Lois touches Kara’s hand, all of Kara’s memories of Earth-2 come back. It’s a heartwarming scene as Kara finally remembers them both.

Holy Carp! She remembers!!!!

We then shift to the Batcave, as Batman is sulking (as always) and waiting for the black box he got from the Watchtower to decode so he can see what happened. Alfred comes to clean up the wounds Bruce got from Mongul last issue. Bruce acts like an a-hole and loudly tells Alfred to leave. Alfred leaves, but not before telling Bruce off (Tell him Al!!).

You, Master Bruce, are a real douche.

Bruce is then left alone (Boo hoo). The computer screen then flickers off, and as Batman notices what happens, Brother Eye pops onto the screen. They talk and we found out that while most of the OMACs have been deactivated, they and Brother Eye are still a threat. We now find out where all of these machines are heading: Themyscria aka Paradise Island, the home of Wonder Woman. It turns out that Protocol TRUTH AND JUSTICE is defined as the elimination of all Amazons, which was apparently Max Lord’s dying wish. As Diana fights alongside her sisters, she doesn’t know what to do because there are innocent people inside the OMACs.

We then shift back to the Survivors’ hiding place. It turns out that Lois is dying of old age, but Supes-2 believes that the end of their “heaven” isn’t helping. He discusses the joyless condition of the DCU, and the way its heroes kill, wipe memories, and don't live up to his expectations about how heroes should act. He tells Kara that they have to save Lois-2 by getting her home to Earth -2. He also tells her that the heroes want to make the current, dark Earth forgotten, so that the old Earth (his Earth) can return.

Hmm...an Earth with old people. I'll take the dark Earth, thank you.

……………………………………………………………………………..

Well, that’s the end of issue 2. The artwork here is well done by all artists. Johns puts the focus on the four survivors and Power Girl, while giving everything else a small moment to shine. I’m glad that they decided to put the history lesson in because it’s needed to understand who these characters are and to also understand what happens later in the event. It’s also a good thing that they put this here because I did not know anything about Multiverses or who these characters really were at the time I got this. The scene involving Kara, Lois-2, and Supes-2 is a nice, emotional scene.

We get caught up on the whereabouts of the Trinity, get a new subplot involving Blue Beetle’s Scarab, a dark, funny moment from the Joker, and more plot involving the heroes heading to the new center of the universe. Probably the only thing I didn’t like about the issue is how Clark takes Bruce’s words from last issue. Superman is the only hero in the Trinity who hasn’t really done anything, and he gets these words from Batman. Still, he sulks about it. Fortunately, he does stuff it and gets to work. I guess they needed to give Superman something to go through and overcome, but it doesn’t really work for me here. Supes-2’s rambling about how the DCU sucks now is somewhat interesting. Know that he is supposed to be the original Superman (this guy), so him talking like this is like hearing some old man complain about how things were better in his day….oh wait. Anyway, the end of the issue is interesting. How will they bring back Earth-2? Will the current Earth be affected? Find out next time.

NEXT TIME: BATMAN, AMAZONS, AND A REVELATION THAT CHANGES EVERYTHING!!!