Rating: Summary: Amazing Art, Amazing Story-1 minor flaw Review: Kingdom Come, the greatest graphic novel this side of the Watchmen, is a nearly perfect story with amazing art by Alex Ross. It is to the JSA what 'Avengers Forever' is to the Avengers, the 'Dark Knight Returns' is to Batman and 'The Inhumans' is to...well, the Inhumans. The story takes place in JSA territory (Earth TWO for those who care). The basic premise is a new generation of superheroes-reckless, egotistical, immoral, has gained public support and and forced the older, 'moral' heroes into early retirement, apathy or underground. A horrendous accident caused by the new breed of sociopathic heroes spurs Superman and Wonder Woman to reform the JSA to forcefully bring the new heroes back in line. With Batman and his allies striking a devil's bargain with Luthor and other super villians to return power back to the 'regular' humans, a fearful government ready to unleash the nukes to solve their problems, things rush to a climactic final battle and possible armegedon for all involved. I loved alot about this book. I loved the kick.../take no prisoners spin on Wonder Woman. I loved the love-hate realtionship between WW and Superman. I loved the tension in wondering if Superman could or would take on Magog. I loved the snippets of the Book of Revelation that kickstarts the story. What keeps it from being perfect for me, however, is the ssingular focus on the main players, i.e. the "good guys" (with one exception...sh-sh-shazam!). Not one of the villians is looked at in any depth. Nor are any of the minor characters given much of a voice- especially the young bucks that are causing alot of the fuss. What about a glance into things from their eyes? Still, it is a great story.The art is perfect, equal to Jae Lee's Inhumans, but a little extra depth and fleshing out a few more characters would have put it up there with the ranks of the Watchmen, the Inhumans, and the Dark Knight Returns, instead of just below.
Rating: Summary: This graphic novel has beautiful Alex Ross artwork! Review: This graphic novel has beautiful DC comics artwork by Alex Ross. I will only recommend this book if you like Alex Ross's Artwork! I will NOT recommend this book for its other contributers! Alex Ross does fine art pieces of Superman, Captain Marvel, Batman, Lex Luthor, Wonder Woman and many other DC superheros and villians. If you look closely at his colorful paintings, You will find some Marvel superheros as well. Great graphic novel to look at! Eye candy!
Rating: Summary: Captain Marvel versus Superman and Other Old Farts Review: Kingdom Come owes much to such previous work as Alan Moore's The Watchmen and puts these past inspirations to good use in one of the best (and best produced) examples of deconstructing heroes, a trend that became all the rage. Mark Waid takes the DC heroes into the future and using Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman on one side and a wonderfully inspired and frightening Captain Marvel (plus a slew of current heroes' children thrown in on both sides) on the other side, he shows both the idealistic and the simple fascistic elements that go into creating a super hero. The story is marvelously drawn by Alex Ross with paintings that render beautifully some very horrific scenes. Unlike many such ventures, the story is not cold but told with a great deal of heart. A wonderful glimpse into a future of the DC heroes.
Rating: Summary: AWESOME!!!!!!!!!! Review: oh my god! this book.....it touched me! i've been an avid reader for the last 15 years or so.....and it brought tears to my eyes. the artwork....the storyline...probably the best that i have seen in such a long time. its definitly worth buying for anyone who loves DC COMICS. Mark Waid and the rest did an awesome job of keeping the story together. and the artwork was absolutely stunning. never seen stuff like this before. final advice BUY IT!
Rating: Summary: Actually, 3-3/4 Stars... Review: But, for some reason, they don't let you do that. Reviews of this collection appear in large part to be very favorable, or very un-favorable. I'm in the middle. The hight parts are the excellent art, dark tone, good dialog, and maturity. These traits alone set this collection in the upper-eschelon of graphic story. However, Kingdom Come is still no Watchmen, no Dark Knight Returns. There is far too little backstory, especially with regard to the metahumans. They are the antagonist, yet the reader is furnished with almost no info on their mindset, or their history. Beyond that, the story is painfully difficult to follow at times, and will demand a second reading. Now that's not always a bad thing, especially in books that are packed with detail. Kingdom Come, however, is not as much packed with detail as it is just hard to follow. All complaints aside, this is a very good collection. But it could have been great...
Rating: Summary: Intriguing and Ironic Ending! Review: Even though this was a difficult book to read, I am glad I made it all the way through. This book has a choppy, scattered flow that makes it hard to follow. The author gives the reader unnecessary background information that acts as a filler between the drama. A cast of dozens play out the terrific battle scenes and I had to constantly re-check the who's who playlist. I recommend visiting the DCComics website for more background information on these characters. Some positive things I liked were the incredible illustrations by Alex Ross. The detail is extraordinary! By the end, the book builds to a powerful climax that has a sobering effect. Intriguing and ironic final scene. Which alone makes this one to pick up. I look forward to reading the graphic novel next.
Rating: Summary: Looks nice Review: I was a bit disappointed by this. I thought that, although it looks superb and is no doubt a festival of continuity for long-standing comic fans, it over-egged the pudding to such a degree that the little things - a gripping story, characters that you can care about - are pushed into the background. It's like a series of stunning oil paintings one after the other with a tenuous story that seems a bit like 'Batman : The Dark Knight Returns'. It seems to have uniformly five-star reviews here, but I haven't read it again since I bought it, and that was some time ago.
Rating: Summary: I was blown away when I first read this... Review: Kingdom Come is the best graphic novel to come out since the Dark Knight series. The story revolves around the idea that with our changing society, our heroes are changing too. The heroes of yesteryear, such as Superman, Batman, and Wonderwoman are replaced by new heroes who do not adhere the beliefs of the past. The new heroes do not care about the protection of the innocent and the upholding of justice but are fueled by the glories and feelings of omnipotence that come with having special powers. As a result, the new heroes spend their time fighting one another recklessly, unconcerned with the havoc they create in society. They are akin to new gods, fighting and bickering among themselves, ambivalent to anything that is around them. It is within this theme, we find the old heroes, coming back to reclaim their position in society, trying to reinstill the notion of what a hero is supposed to be. Kingdom Come, within its framework, is able to express through a comic graphic novel, how much our society has changed from the past. And instead of simply accepting our present as being acceptable, it manages to show the many faults that our society is beginning to exhibit. In many ways, the new heroes in the graphic novel exhibit the many characteristics that our society today appear to glorify. I think that there is a lot to be learned from reading this graphic novel and if you've never read one of these formats (because you feel that it is juvenile or non-literary) you will be unequivocally surprised at how wonderful this book is. On a concluding note, the illustrations in this graphic novel is fully painted by one of the best artists in the field of comic books. You will be impressed.
Rating: Summary: A must have! Review: If you haven't bought this book or at least heard of it then you are missing on a story that is a modern classic already, along with "sandman", "Kingdom Come" is one of the books that have risen to an impressive acclaim by everyone, I love this one myself, you should really buy this you shall not regret it. the artwork is fully painted by the greatly talented Alex Ross, and the story is excelent, in a not so far future superman has decided to live away from the rest of mankind for he feels like his pressence is no longer needed, similar things have happened to all the heroes of the world, leaving the globe to the new generation of superpowered beings. soon this story turns into a battle between the new vs the old vs the normal humans and a lot of special details are put into the story. a really great book for everyone who likes good art and comics.
Rating: Summary: Deus ex machina in watercolors Review: It would seem that the paucity of depth in the field of superhero "comics" is evidenced by the rapturous hossanahs delivered to the decidedly middle-brow work of Mssrs. Waid and Ross. For anyone who has read and enjoyed the work of Dave McKean, Neil Gaiman, Bill Sienkewicz, Frank Miller, even Alan Moore, be warned: this work does not compare in any way whatsoever. While the pictures are prettily drawn in a Norman Rockwell kind of way, the composition and page-making is childish and primitve and contributes nothing to the storytelling, nor anything to further exploration of the medium, whether that be art or illustration. And as for the presumed poetic and moving story, the book reads like nothing so much as a badly scripted film that has had a half dozen hollywood heavyweights called in to "polish" it. Unless, that is, you consider such devices as an invented external narrator who has nothing to do with the plot good story telling. It seems that whenever the composers ran out of steam (every two pages or so) the solution was to introduce a new character, which could be daintily rendered in supermarket colors and made to spout endless and anonymous b-movie expostulations. (See for instance, any of Wonder Woman's dialogue, which made her seem a cross between Lynda Carter and Jean Claude Van damme.) For anyone interested in genuinely sophisticated work in this medium, go back to Miller's "Dark Knight" or "Elektra," and leave this book to those kids who like their comics fully sweetened, artificially flavoured and all full of a whole lot of nothing.
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