Image © DC Entertainment.

I’ve long felt that no one could handle Jack Kirby’s Fourth World characters as well as Kirby himself, but this book is proving me wrong. Writer Tom King and artist Mitch Gerads have come up with a version of Mister Miracle that is firmly anchored in the Kirby original, yet fresh and surprising. And they even do it with mostly nine-panel grid page layouts and standard comics storytelling, though there’s always a subtle feeling of oddness…is this really what’s happening to these characters, or is it some kind of dream or hallucination? Scott Free and Barda find themselves on the front lines of war on New Genesis against the forces of Darkseid, facing enemy forces again and again, relentlessly, becoming ever more weary. After they finally get a chance to rest, they’re called before Orion, the new High Father of New Genesis, who behaves in a troubling way, demanding formal courtesy and obeisance. He then sends the pair after Darkseid’s sub-commander Granny Goodness, once the mistress of Scott and Barda in their childhood, and things get even stranger.

I don’t know where this is going, but I’m intrigued. Recommended.