By Scott Lobdell, Ken Lashley & Pete Pantazis
The Psi-War arc has come and gone and Superman is ready for a new story arc. While Supes doesn’t have the greatest villains dossier like Batman, he does still have a decent gallery of evil-doers who can pose problems for him and Metropolis, and the Parasite is in town, but is he here to make the Man of Steel’s life more complicated, or could he possibly be here to help?
The Parasite is a pretty intriguing villain and he is one that can actually give Superman a hard time. Scott Lobdell does a solid job in this first issue of keeping his reason for visiting Metropolis on the down low. It’s nice to see that Scott is also building up the Clark and Diana relationship, but of course in one way or another, Lois is involved as well. There are hints of a love triangle but Lobdell isn’t making things overly dramatic; it’s subtle for now. This issue gives Lobdell an opportunity to inject some fun into this book, and he does just that in this first part of the arc.
Ken Lashley takes over on art duties for this issue and he does a decent job. His style is similar to Kenneth Rocafort and that is not a coincidence. Lashley does a good job for the most part, but in some panels Wonder Woman resembles Winona Judd, which is never good. Lashley mostly seems to struggle with eyes on people, but overall his art is solid. He has great panels of Parasite’s victims which are nice to look at, and Parasite himself looks pretty boss too. The fight with Superman is quick but well drawn. This is a decent first step for Lashly.
The beginning of this arc has been enjoyable. Lobdell is playing with a lot of fun elements that can hopefully work out and turn into a really good story. Lashley’s art is a good compliment to the story and should improve as he gets more comfortable drawing the characters. This has a chance to be one of the better Superman stories in the New 52.
