Action Comics #879 Review

Written by Greg Rucka

Penciled by Diego Olmos

Cover by Andrew Robinson

Codename: Assassin finally catches up with Nightwing(Chris Kent), Flamebird(Thara), Nadira and Az-Rel.  Assassin announces that he is pleased to be dealing with four Kryptonians instead of two and orders his army to attack the suspects.  Nadira and Az-Rel escape as Nightwing flies after them and Flamebird takes on the army of monsters alone.

Tharas protective helmet is shattered in the battle and Assassin is able to purge her mind.  He learns of Chris' origin and tells Thara that he will take pleasure in killing him in front of her.  Thara becomes enraged and turns into an actual flaming bird.  She quickly destroys the army of monsters and hurries to find Chris.

The battle with Nightwing and the sleeper Kryptoninans continues.  Az-Rel reveals the legend of Flamebird and Nightwing, stating that one will die in love of the other.  Chris refuses to hear the tales and continues to battle.

Thara arrives, no longer as a flaming bird, and joins the ensuing fight.  Flamebird and Nightwing give steady chase to Az-Rel and Nadira, only to have them escape again.

At Arlington National Cemetery, Lois stands above the grave of her father.  Substitute Superman, Mon-El, arrives and Lois asks a favor of him.  He scans the grave with his x-ray vision.  Everything appears to be identical to her fathers body.  Lois then inquires about the number of teeth in the corpses mouth, finding that it has too many to be her fathers.  She knows without doubt that her father is still alive.

Sam Lane is disgusted at the events that took place earlier.  No captures and still little information about the subjects in question.  Assassin reassures him that they could never have known about Thara's literal Flamebird transformation.  General Lane reminds everyone that his operation known as "7734" has yet to go public and realizes at that moment Mirabi is nowhere to be found.

Suddenly she appears and leads General Lane to shocking events.  She has captured Az-Rel and Nadira.

Story:

Meh.  What started out as a strong, interesting, action packed story has quickly turned into a snooze fest of confusion.  I had feelings that this would be the one strong comic of the entire World Without Superman series but it is falling hard.  It feels like things are just thrown together for the sake of shock and I can't see where this is all going to fit in.  Also, its quite clever that operation 7734 upside down and reverse spells HELL.

Art:

It works better this issue than in last because I am expecting it.  Nothing spectacular but its not the worst art ever.  Fits the story well enough.

Cover:

Still the strong point of this comic, Andrew Robinsons cover looks very nice once again.  Misleading in that it makes me interested on what's going on inside when I'm really not.