Final Crisis-Greg Cox

Final Crisis
Greg Cox
Ace, Jul 2010, $15.00
ISBN: 9780441018574

The war of the Gods is over after eons of lethal combat; Darkseid and his evil Apokolips horde are victorious. His next step now that he defeated the defenders is to employ the Anti-life destruction of free will in order to take charge of earth, the key to controlling the Multiverse. Once he succeeds on this, which is inevitable as only the embattled JLA remains to stop him, eternal darkness will be everywhere.

While tracking down six missing children, ex cop Dan "Terrible" Turpin meets dying New God Orion, who warns him that "he's in all of you!" Confused and upset, Turpin ends up at a Command bunker in devastated Bludhaven. As the Anti-Life turns millions into Darkseid minions, supervillain Libra murders a member of the Justice League, which enables him to claim leadership of the Society of Super-Villains. The Green Lanterns investigate the murder of Orion leading to a new hope with the rebirthing of a dead superhero, but Superman is trapped in a non future and Batman is a prisoner. It will take a miracle to save the universe, but none seem forthcoming.

With homage and awe to the late great Jack Kirby and his Fourth World mythos, Greg Cox provides a terrific rendition of the wonderful Final Crisis (comic books are well written too; thanks to my spouse a big comic book fan). With seemingly every DC characters making at least a cameo appearance in “It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World” and multiverse, Final Crisis is actually a simplistic tale of superheroes and others willing to go out (not in a blaze of glory as the victors write the history books) to fight overwhelming evil that has won eternity. Mr. Cox does a fabulous novelization of the classic miniseries as even down to the final flicker, goodness refuses to quit.

Harriet Klausner