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codyisreading's review
3.0
3.5/5
One volume left. A significant portion of this book is devoted to Mitchell Hundred meeting with Brian K. Vaughn and artist Tony Harris to potentially hire them to write his autobiography. I've never been a fan of fiction where the author inserts themselves into the narrative (I'm looking at you, Stephen King). At best it's a diversion from the main story and at its worse it can be seen as awfully vain. I think what's frustrating me most is that the main story of Kremlin and January's betrayal was introduced and immediately put on the back burner in favor of less interesting, one-off bits.
It's almost as if BKV introduced the betrayal storyline and immediately realized there wasn't enough intrigue to fill out multiple issues. The saving grace of this volume is that there are (yet again) more story beats introduced to--what feels like--set up the climax of the series. But as in past issues, it's only hinted at and doesn't feel like the legwork was done to warrant an expansion into alternate timelines, automatons, and mystery boxes. When these details are all dumped in the span of a few pages, the material isn't given time to breathe.
One volume left. A significant portion of this book is devoted to Mitchell Hundred meeting with Brian K. Vaughn and artist Tony Harris to potentially hire them to write his autobiography. I've never been a fan of fiction where the author inserts themselves into the narrative (I'm looking at you, Stephen King). At best it's a diversion from the main story and at its worse it can be seen as awfully vain. I think what's frustrating me most is that the main story of Kremlin and January's betrayal was introduced and immediately put on the back burner in favor of less interesting, one-off bits.
It's almost as if BKV introduced the betrayal storyline and immediately realized there wasn't enough intrigue to fill out multiple issues. The saving grace of this volume is that there are (yet again) more story beats introduced to--what feels like--set up the climax of the series. But as in past issues, it's only hinted at and doesn't feel like the legwork was done to warrant an expansion into alternate timelines, automatons, and mystery boxes. When these details are all dumped in the span of a few pages, the material isn't given time to breathe.
lunchlander's review
2.0
I'm losing interest in the home stretch. The book seems unfocused and a bit self-indulgent. Issue #40, the issue where BKV/Tony Harris pitch for the Mitchell Hundred comic, is probably the worst in this regard. I actually miss when it was more about local politics and less about superhero/sci-fi elements.
shane_tiernan's review
4.0
This was awesome as usual, but I'm definitely ready for some answers at this point. Usually you would expect that the hero finds out the "problem" and then spends a large part of the book "fixing" it. But I'm expecting this to all happen at once, with the "problem" being "find out what's going on.".
charlibirb's review
4.0
Besides the meta opening, this is much more what I wanted this series to be about. Less actual political issues, more SciFi! It's definitely the strongest portion of the series.
joshgauthier's review
4.0
Nearing the finale, this volume works better as a whole. The meta beginning was a little strange, but the rest moves powerfully through the central storyline. There are some aspects of the story that might offend or unsettle people (as is often the case with Vaughan), but the tension is definitely raised in this entry.
gizmoto16's review
4.0
I didn't understand who the two new characters were at the start of this book...but once I figured it out, I LOVED it. It was a fun little interlude.
rouver's review
3.0
Things are starting to heat up w/ Vaughan trying to wrap up his story with only one book left after this one.
molokov's review
3.0
Apart from the very meta first issue, this definitely had a bit of improvement, giving us some reveals (finally!) about what gave Hundred his powers. Still, on the whole, I only consider it average.