A bad recipe for this world – review of the comic book “Kingdom Come”

Kingdom Come is one of the titles of legends on the Polish comic book market. In recent years, Egmont has spoiled readers with dozens (hundreds?) Of DC titles – from classics to new. Yet Mark Waid and Alex Ross’ flagship comic books had to wait for years to be reissued. 16 years have passed since its first release. This is not the first time this has happened with DC positions. A similar story once happened with Batman: Hush , which was capable of skyrocketing aftermarket prices before its relaunch, and which ultimately turned out to be a very mediocre story. Is a similar situation regarding Kingdom Come?

Eternal duration

The peculiarity of mainstream superhero stories is that they have an eternal status quo . All events only seem to have an apparent impact on the universe, no matter how frantic the announcements may be, because everything will return to the same starting point in the end. Such a Superman made his debut in 1938, and in the current comic books of the main publishing line he is still the same middle age. Mark Waid and Alex Ross decided to diversify this scheme and in 1996 they created Elseworlds (DC series about alternative realities), in which the action was moved years ahead. The Kingdom Come Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman and other superheroes have been retired for a decade or have been operating in a much smaller field (or both – Clark Kent has become a farmer). This does not mean that the Earth has suddenly become unguarded. A new generation has taken the place of the old heroes, but both the values ​​and the way they operate are very different from the old guard. For freshmen, no rules matter, while they intervene, civilians suffer. The measure disguises itself when Captain Atom dies as a result of a skirmish of the youngsters, resulting in a huge explosion claiming millions of lives. The old icons have to put on their leotards again to show the juniors what true heroism is all about.

Ok, SuperBoomer

The Kingdom Come storyline is based on the opposition between old age and youth, experience and freedom. And clearly Waid and Ross are in favor of the former. On the basis of “once were the times, now there is no time” there is no place for a nuanced approach – everything new is bad. In addition, the old guard is presented as the better side, although the methods used to restore the old order are murderous. The best way to reach the younger generation? Beat them down and put them in a super prison. Okay, Boomer. I don’t know if it comes from a different perspective than 25 years ago, or if Waid was conveying his conservative views in this way from the very beginning. Nevertheless, presenting in a positive light Superman creating an authoritarian regime has a negative feeling in me today. Admittedly, at some point there is a reflection between both sides, but the climax of this thread is banal. A pity, because some ideas for old heroes are great, such as Bruce Wayne sending robots to patrol Gotham, or The Flash – always phasing, always on the move – presenting only as a shaky streak. However, I completely missed the introduction of the human factor. In its previous title, Marvels, Ross applied a similar patent, weaving powerless reporter Phil Sheldon into the most important events in the world of the House of Ideas. Pastor Norman Maccay is expected to play a similar role here, but ultimately it comes down mainly to lecturing on the exposition.

The defeat of the harvest

The history itself is relatively short – originally contained in just four notebooks on over two hundred pages. Egmont, however, had prepared a bulky volume for his readers. The impressive dimensions are the result of numerous additions, among which sketches of almost all superheroes and villains appearing in the comic book lead the way. And here comes a problem: apart from the presentation of the main players, there is a suit of third-party characters: among them, descendants of the current heroes, as well as completely new cloakmakers. Each silhouette has a description, which makes it a kind of databook. Only you won’t find all these stories in the comic itself. Waid and – even more I guess – Ross prepared the whole rich world and then … didn’t put anything out of it in the main story. Probably now, in the era of ubiquitous events and other tie-ins , Kingdom Comeit would be created completely differently, as a whole cycle with dozens of smaller series telling about each character. I’m not convinced this would be better, but it would certainly help to care more about anyone in the new cast. And yes, writing a review some time after reading the comic, I can’t name any of the new characters. Such a Magog (I had to look for his name), who is responsible for the death of Atom and the escalation of the conflict, appears on only a few pages. The comic would be better if the whole thing was written into more notebooks.

Superrealism

Alex Ross is an artist as distinctive as it arouses controversy in assessment. Many people find his photorealistic style steals hearts, others criticize him – there are even comparisons to socialist realism. Originally, I belonged to the first camp, although now I am leaning towards the second. And while Ross is still great when he takes on static covers (oh, those deep chiaroscuro, like from Renaissance paintings), in the case of the interior it is not so good. The frames are often overloaded with characters, which, combined with a large number of details, leads to chaos. One should also be prepared for even enormous layers of epicness and pathos, pouring out from every side. On the one hand, such a setting seems ideal for this type of story, but in the long run it can tire the reader out while reading it.

Amen

Kingdom Come takes itself very seriously. And such an approach focusing on the purely heroic, even divine side of famous characters is an interesting and even today quite fresh perspective. Especially now, when most of the knitwear stories are laughing and winking at the reader. In Kingdom Come, but is full of powerfully built heroes in dramatic poses, who are fighting for a better tomorrow. Approaching such a legendary comic, however, I had higher expectations and Waid and Ross did not manage to meet them. Summa summarumapart from an interesting initial idea, they do not offer innovative solutions or in-depth criticism of the genre. Instead, a decent crossover was created, which stands out the most with an interesting, but sometimes heavy, visual layer.