Aquaman 15: Throne of Atlantis Part Two

Creative:

Art: Paul Pelletier & Art Thibert

Written: Geoff Johns

 Price: $2.99

Double Feature [part 1]

Because catching up sucks but can be creative, and double features are always nifty.  But only if they’re awesome.  You know how sometimes you go to the movies or to Fry’s, and you see the ever-tantalizing trap-term “Double Feature” in bold red followed by the title of your favorite movie, only to be chased [in significantly smaller font] by last year’s B-list film?  Not even good enough to be considered a passable combo, like Ocean’s 12/13 Bluray combo pack, because Ocean’s 13 isn’t terrible even if you’re sober.  Nobody wants to sit through This Means War just to see Zero Dark Thirty, amiright?

See.  That's legit work right there.

I like art.  This may or may not be obvious by now, and while I’m unfamiliar with Paul Pelletier’s pencilwork I enjoyed what he did during his introductory splash this issue.  His Batman was particularly scowl-y, and his aptitude for illustrating expressions is so amazing that you can understand most of the story without the speech, which is cool if you wanted to just flip through and look at the art (see Mera’s panels).  

My only quip would be the minor inconsistencies in Aquaman’s face renderings in some panels over others.  I would like how he looks young but experienced in one, and then suddenly aged or overly-jawed, like Ripjaws from Ben 10 (I bet he could still command that though).  Then there’s Art Thibert (X-Men, Ultimate X-Men, Trinity).  There’s a time in every young comic reader’s life -it doesn’t matter when/where you start out- where there’s always a handful of names you see everywhere and on everything.  Thibert’s one of those fellas for me, and thus far the man has yet to disappoint me.  Throw Rod Reis in there and what do you have?  Geoff Johns’ go-to team for part two of Throne of Atlantis.  That was obvious. 

All of the aforementioned tension (see JL 15 review) is being ramped up to an all-time high.  We have the introduction of a new character named Vulko, essentially an Atlantean defector on his quest to assist “King Arthur” with his sibling rivalry issue.  The Batman versus Aquaman front still isn’t going well, especially since Aquaman’s brother just drowned a good number of his people.  There’s this touching scene in the batplane where Aquaman, in an explosion of rage, exposes to Batman just exactly how much this conflict between the surface world and Atlantis is actually more internal than external.

Who said touching?  Silly me.

Then the batplane explodes, because in Aquaman’s war plans he knew Batman would pose a threat.  What does that lead to?  More assassination plots obviously, because riding a giant seahorse is synonymous with being a coup-plotting badass.  Orm has surfaced, threatening fisherman along the coast, and “The Big 3” give Aquaman one chance to bring his brother in peacefully as he pleads for amicable measures.  This pretext establishes a very key element in future Justice League stories: Batman, Wonder Woman and Superman as the dominating figureheads of the Justice League.  Even though Cyborg would refer to and be in constant communication with Batman on all things Justice League, a group consensus had never been reached about a leader or co-operative leadership.  Consider Johns’ moves: GL is nowhere to undermine Batman’s authority for sport; Superman steps up and is proactive in a League matter; and using the conflict of adopted world versus home world that would make Aquaman’s struggle relatable to Wonder Woman (everyone knows where she would stand if the Amazons decided to invade tomorrow based on how Johns has written JL), Johns has put Aquaman in the position of potentially failing as international peacekeeper.  This would ultimately result in the loss of power amongst his teammates and establish The Big 3 as our Trinity for our future event (get excited).  Following those presumptions, it would be up to the pre-52 Trinity to keep everything together once whatever happens happens.  Wait did I say potentially failing?

You’ve got a BIG pair of barnacles on you, Buster.

Pencil Rogue Says: An easy 4.5/5.  Waiting for the balloon to pop.