Next up for the month is actually a double feature! I have
two villains for this post and they are pretty well-known: Brainiac and
Metallo. Since Metallo is less complex, I’ll talk about him first. Metallo was
first introduced in Action Comics #252 as John Corben, a criminal. After a
fatal accident, Professor Vale was able
to save Corben's brain and put it into a robotic body with a heart of Kryptonite.
After John died, his brother ended up taking the role until the reboot in 1986.
Then, John Byrne brought the original idea back and gave it a more Terminator edge in Superman #1. At this point, Metallo was deactivated and under Lex Luthor’s
possession.
Then, there’s Brainiac. Where do I even start? Ever since his first appearance in Action Comics #242, he's been revamped and retconned in just about everything. Let’s just go with the Coluan
background here. There’s no need to mention the fact that he’s been a
Kryptonian A.I. too. In this iteration, He was a scientist from Colu who was
executed via teleportation. His consciousness ended up on Earth and found
Milton Fine, a circus performer who had psychic powers. He took control of Fine
and fought Superman a number of times until he ended up becoming catatonic. He
also ended up being under the care of
Lex Luthor.
Today’s story is “The Brainiac Trilogy” from Action Comics
#647-649. At this point, Action Comics was back to being a main Superman book. Beforehand,
it was weekly and being shared by multiple heroes. We haven’t gotten to the
point where the Superman books were tying right into each other yet. Roger
Stern was the writer. The artwork was done by George Perez, Kerry Gammill, and
Brett Breeding. So, sit back and see how Brainiac got his groove back!
Action Comics #647-649
Writer: Roger Stern
Artwork: George Perez, Kerry Gammill, and Brett Breeding
Colors: Bill Oakley
Letters: Glenn Whitmore
Editors: Jon Peterson (associate) and Mike Carlin
SUMMARY
We start out with Clark having a nightmare about Brainiac.
When he awakens, he realizes that Brainiac (who was thought to be dead) is
still out there. He also knows that Lex Luthor may have something to do with
his whereabouts. We then catch up with Brainiac who is under the supervision of
Lex Luthor’s scientists. He’s being held in a secret lab hidden in the Rocky
Mountains. He’s gotten more powerful but he’s playing along with his catatonic
state. When Happersen, one of Lex’s scientists, looks in on him, Brainiac puts
his plan into action. He takes control of Happersen and he tries to take his
revenge on Lex.
We find Lex at an automatic factory that’s manufacturing
supplies. Suddenly, the machines start to attack Lex and his guides. Things
look bleak until Superman (who was trying to find Lex) comes in and puts a stop
to it all. Superman and Lex have words about the situation. Later, Lex contacts
the lab and tells them to neutralize Brainiac. What he doesn’t know is that
Brainiac has control of all the scientists there through chips connected to
their brains. He’s also awakened Metallo from his slumber.
After Brainiac has Metallo scanned, he sends him and
duplicates to Metropolis to carry out some plans. The fake Metallos cause a
ruckus in Metropolis and that gets Superman on their case. Meanwhile, Metallo
(disguised in business attire) carries out another part of Brainiac’s plan.
Fine’s body is breaking down, so Brainiac needs a geneticist to help make a
better one. Metallo finds the scientist, Dr. Augustine, and Brainiac is able to
take control of him. Since he works for Cadmus, he gets the supplies needed.
They do get found out, though. Augustine escapes while Metallo takes on
Guardian and the guards. He has the upper hand when Superman shows up and
trounces him.
Ha ha!
Realizing he needs to see what’s going on for himself, Lex
heads to the Rocky Mountains and is captured by Brainiac. Thanks to some
information gathered from Metallo, Superman finds out about the lab and heads
there. He heads there ready for a fight but finds out that Brainiac has a new
body that’s based on his Coluan body, cybernetic implants, and Fine’s powers.
Brainiac tries to defeat Superman mentally, but all he’s able to do is knock
him out. When Superman comes to, he finds the scientists knocked out as well.
Superman tries to find Brainiac who takes his leave in a
spaceship he created. As it rockets out into space, he tells Superman that
Metallo hid powerful bombs all over Metropolis and that they’re set to go off.
Superman goes after the bombs and that leaves Brainiac to escape into space.
After Superman deals with the bombs, Brainiac leaves a parting message that he
will return one day.
I am Oz! The Great and Powerful! Gaze upon my purple muttonchops!
OPINION
This was a pretty good story-arc. It was written really
well. It propelled this version of Brainiac back into the space-traveling
threat he was back the Pre-Crisis days. Beforehand, he was basically a
weird-looking white guy in a pink jumpsuit. That doesn’t seem cool, so it’s nice
to see this Brainiac get his groove back. It was also nice to see Superman get beaten
like this. That was a sweet ending in #649. While Metallo was just a lackey, he
was a cool one. Even without his Kryptonite heart, he provided a nice threat
until Superman showed. By the way, Supes’ finishing move was hilarious.
The artwork is awesome. There’s really no other word to use.
You got Perez and Gammill who are both good artists. Breeding keeps it all
consistent with some good inking. The action looks sweet. The nightmare
sequence in #647 looked nice. Brainiac’s new look is pretty good even though we
see little of it. The ship also looked pretty sweet. There’s really nothing bad
to say about the art overall. Well, there is Brainiac’s previous look which was
pretty tacky, but that’s all.
NEXT TIME: INTERGANG? MXY? TOYMAN? WHO KNOWS!
No comments:
Post a Comment