Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #1: No School Like the Old School

Batman/Superman returns in its purest (read: most historically nostalgia-baiting) form, World’s Finest! And with no less than living legend and DC puritan Mark Waid at the helm, with current artistic superstars Dan Mora, Tamra Bonvillain, and Aditya Bidikar along for the ride – how could this be anything less than a smash-hit success?

Not to sound reductive, but it’s possibly easier to describe World’s Finest #1 by what it isn’t. It isn’t a soul-searching meta-commentary on the nature of superheroes or the unbreakable bond between its leads. Nor is it a reinvention of the wheel out to update an old formula for modern readers. Nor is it a retcon, a reboot, or a re-imagining. And – given the inherent gravitas of having Mark freaking Waid writing it (his first monthly DC work in over a decade) – it’s worth noting that it isn’t the author breaking new storytelling ground for himself and/or the industry and/or superheroes in general.

My god, man, what IS this comic, then, anyway?! you’re thinking.

It’s superheroes. Plain and simple.

It’s Superman and Batman doing what they do best; the Platonic ideal of two-thirds of DC’s trinity teaming up, making up for one another’s shortcomings, and generally beating up the bad guys. It’s about a level of trust between the standard-bearers of all superherodom that transcends the generations, or trendy off-model iterations of either character permeating pop culture. It’s about the best and the brightest, the founding fathers of all superheroes coming together to kick a little bad guy butt.

So, if that’s what you want, World’s Finest #1 is your ticket to ride. However, readers wanting a little more meat on the narrative bone – something a bit deeper or nuanced – are bound to come up feeling shorted by the reading experience. The fault isn’t Waid’s; he did exactly what he set out to do: tell a rip-roaring superhero story. And in that, he absolutely succeeded. But after years (decades, even) of being conditioned that there ought to be “more” to superhero stories, a meat-and-potatoes approach such as this is bound to fall a bit flat with a generation of readers conditioned by Morrison, Rucka, Azzarello, et al. But maybe, that’s exactly why the industry needs a comic like World’s Finest right now. Maybe, just maybe, it’s okay to remind folks that the basic DNA of superheroes is the basic DNA of superheroes for a reason: it just freaking WORKS. And sometimes that’s more than enough.

The narrative execution of World’s Finest, though, feels a bit off, which is a very weird thing to say about a Mark Waid-penned comic indeed. The story opens in media res, during a throwdown involving both Poison Ivy and Metallo (who gets a gloriously gory makeover courtesy artist Dan Mora) and a mystery villain. Metallo injects Superman with Red Kryptonite, triggering a seemingly-endless array of random transformations. Then there’s a flashback out of nowhere that does little to boost the present-day narrative, then we’re right back where we started and the Doom Patrol shows up. None of this shifts organically. I get the feeling Waid is wanting to go for a free-wheeling, anything-goes romp through the DCU wherein anybody could show up at any point in time – which is great, in theory, except when the execution feels haphazard like it does here. The scene shifts are jarring where they should be smooth; the flashback sequence feels rote and establishes nothing we don’t already know about the nature of Bruce and Clark’s friendship. The umbrella mystery of a shadowy villain pulling the strings is beyond played-out and even if it weren’t, there just isn’t enough to the mystery to make me care one way or another.

On the art side, Dan Mora should be a slam-dunk choice, at least on paper. He’s white-hot right now thanks to Boom’s Once & Future and his recent work on Detective Comics with Mariko Tamaki, so it only makes sense to continue to elevate him to a prominent comic like this one. But Mora’s art is typically very down-to-earth and human in its execution, meaning he doesn’t feel like he’s overly comfortable drawing big-screen bang-pow superheroics like these. Not for lack of trying: there are some wonderfully-composed shots throughout (shout-out to Tim Drake, the best Robin!), but on the whole, everything just feels less than the sum of its parts. Not even the always-awesome Tamra Bonvillain on colors or legend-in-the-making Aditya Bidikar on letters can fix what feels like an artistic concern that comes down to a great artist being mismatched to the wrong story.

In the final analysis, World’s Finest #1 isn’t going to alter the landscape of comics. It isn’t going to get industry tongues wagging, nor will it be remembered as a watershed moment for any of the creators’ careers. But that’s languishing on what it isn’t. Instead, try to focus on what it is: a fun superhero comic. That’s all. And sometimes that’s enough.