Rating: 
Summary: This is a clever book
Review: We know this is a clever book because Krueger and company take great pains to let us know just how clever they are, relying more on novelty and writing "tricks" than ability. Although I don't expect a plot to be too direct in a work this size, I would like coherence. It is hard to guess where the story is headed because Krueger avoids telling you enough to follow the story, and the dialogue between Uatu and X-51 is poorly written, not just in the sense that the characterizations change midstream (the narrators often switch roles and speech patterns but not because the characters go through any growth -- rather, because they seem to need something to do besides narrate) but in the sense that they're grammatically poor. The alleged conflict between Uatu and X-51 is without suspense. It's not a good thing when a reader is aware that he or she is actually reading a book, and the flaws were so obvious, it made me very aware of that, wondering (repeatedly) why Krueger broke from what he'd already established (or tried to), thus cancelling my willing suspension of disbelief. That's saying something as anyone who reads comics is willing to suspend a lot. I also found I didn't care about any of the characters, even though I cared about some of them from previous comics. There was no development beyond one-dimensonal posings. This is definitely not a _Kingdom Come_ ripoff -- it's just not good enough. There were some interesting ideas, but it didn't need to be this long for such a meagre payoff -- editing is a good thing. Then again, so are such things as pacing, internal logic and characterization.
Rating:
Summary: Keep the Cover toss the rest
Review: When this series started on the shelves Alex Ross's covers called out to me. I laid down my money without peeking inside confident that I could safely judge this book by its cover. Who could have guessed what meaningless drivel was lurking inside. I bought the first four books at one time. I fought my way through the first one and then gave up. As near as I can tell Marvel attempted to remake Kingdom Come sans Mark Waid with a call in performance from Alex Ross.
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