Carmine Infantino dies.

To the world of comics it can be said that a legend passed; to the world of the Elongated Man and Flash it must be said that the legend, Carmine Infantino, passed away at age 87.

He created the Elongated Man, Sue Dibny, Flash, the Rogues, Grodd, Batgirl, Animal Man, King Faraday, Pow Wow Smith, Detective Chimp, Black Canary and Captain Comet, and contribute to Adam Strange and the first Flash, and revamped Batman during the 60s. As you can appreciate, one can't possibly think of silver age without getting mental images of his art. Not only he was prolific, but his style truly capture the style of his era. As an architect, seeing his interpretations of modern an googie architecture is quite an experience. And the same goes for fashion enthusiasts. I didn't live through the 60s, but no artist gets the vibe of the shows and movies of era like Carmine.

R.I.P.

Since the experts teach best, here's some Infantino 101 from the master Ty Templeton: http://tytempletonart.wordpress.com/2013/04/05/carmine-infantino-and-roger-ebert/

RALPH DIBNY: THE WORLD-FAMOUS ELONGATED MAN #1 & 2

So, this are the first two installments of my fake Elongated Man solicitations. 

The details of the series' setting are in the previous post. All you need to know is that it's 1962, the Dibnys are done with their nomad days and they have decided to settle in NYC, right at the building from the pic. 

The plots are not detailed, but there are enough elements there to guess who did it. The culprit and his fate will be explained in future fake solicitations. Enjoy.


RALPH DIBNY: THE WORLD-FAMOUS ELONGATED MAN #1

The Dibnys in front of their new home (no, not the Guggenheim, the other).
Art by yours truly.

Issue #1 on sale MAY 12 • Issue #2 on sale MAY 26 • 40 pg (#1), 32 pg (#2), FC, $2.99 US
Written by KEITH GIFFEN and J. M. DEMATTEIS art by JOSE LUIS GARCIA LOPEZ. 
"The World Famous Elongated man Vs. the NYC garbage collection system"

Cold open: Ralph has solved a mystery in Paris involving L'Escargot, his old enemy from the "Europe '92" mini. When he finishes explaining how he cracked the case, the villain retaliates by pushing his car down a cliff, destroying all of Sue's clothes and their stuff. So, Ralph is like: "That's it, the Dibnys are getting a home!". (If it was a show, this is where the opening theme would start).

The Dibnys are back in Manhattan, and this time is for good. As they settle in a luxurious apartment at Manhattan's Upper East Side, Sue goes on a crusade against Professor Head** , a. k. a. Egghead, the former supervillain who terrorized Gotham with a doomsday machine, and their obnoxious neighbor from across the hall, who plays loud music and seems to be stealing her newspaper. Meanwhile, Ralph starts investigating with The Super-Heroes League of New York* ways to reduce the general crime of the metropolitan area, which quickly leads him to deduce that there's a single person controls it. However, his research is interrupted when the League is asked to work on a series of high-tech robberies. It looks like somebody is making an improved version of Egghead's Doomsday Machine...  

This issue features 2 Garfield-like comic strips of Frazier, Central Park's Own Terrier, by FRANK CHO.

RALPH DIBNY: THE WORLD-FAMOUS ELONGATED MAN #2

Frazier, Central Park's own terrier. Click to enlarge. 
Art by yours truly, Rafa Rivas.
(And yeah, I totally stole the plot from a Jim Davis).

On sale MAY 26, 32 pg (#2), FC, $2.99 US
Written by KEITH GIFFEN and J. M. DEMATTEIS art by JOSE LUIS GARCIA LOPEZ. 

This issue opens with 2 Garfield-like comic strips of Frazier, Central Park's Own Terrier, by FRANK CHO. That dog's pranks on hobos have no shame, ha, ha.

"The World Famous Elongated man Vs. the NYC garbage collection system, Part II"

Professor Head is quickly clears himself from the high tech thefts, and provides technical information. So the questions are still who, how and why. Ralph suspect's the Central Park hobos did the high tech robberies, so he spies on them, which leaves him to the shocking discovery of the real culprit. 

Meanwhile, Professor Head might not be a super-criminal anymore, but he's still a lousy neighbor from across the hall, and Sue's war with him escalates when she finds out that he's also their nightly loud upstairs neighbor.

NOTES:
*The Super-Heroes League of New York: Also known as the Super Buddies, an association of New York-based superheroes who offer free services to the community. The list is really long, but the common suspects include Power Girl, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Fire, Ice, Rocket Red (exchange member) and Guy Gardner. It is managed by the sleazy Maxwell Lord, along with L-Ron and Oberon. 

**Professor Edgar Head: Their obnoxious neighbor from across the hall, who plays loud music and seems to be stealing Sue's newspaper. (It's right there in the plot, didn't you see it?).

Superheroes and their mythos

I have often wondered what makes a new comic book character (or a returning one that had faded) stick around. So far, my conclusion is that a breakthrough run will make him relevant; however, a rich mythos is key to make him stay past the first writer. Think about it, what do Batman, Superman, Spider-man, the X-men, have in common that characters like Aquaman and specially the Martian Manhunter lack? They all have a great rogues gallery, well known supporting cast, popular technology and locations.

Ok, it's fan-made, but you get the idea. (Art by Jeff Pina).

The problem with B-listers is that writers always try to create new elements for their mythos without embracing and revamping classic ones. They often move forward those characters, which is correct, without taking a look to the basics. When somebody mentions Batman, concepts like the Joker, Robin, Alfred, The Bat-cave, the Penguin, Catwoman, Commissioner Gordon, the Bat-signal and Gotham City come up immediately; when somebody mentions the Martian Manhunter... Exactly. This is why it would be good to revisit Professor Hugo, Mr. V or the Idol-Head of Diabolu in addition to creating new guys like Ma'alefa'ak. Aquaman would be an example of somebody in the middle, he has a fairly developed supporting cast and setting, but when it comes to his rogues gallery, most people draw a blank after two of them.

Now, Ralph is an animal of another species. Like Sherlock, all he needs is a sidekick (Watson, Sue) and interesting mysteries to solve. Most detectives share a similar formula. This is why writers were always able to recreate the vibe of his original series way after it ended. However, given that Ralph is a superhero, and I have nothing better to do I decided to merge the case-driven detective formula with the mythos-driven superhero formula to produce a series of fake solicitations. Here is the mythos I conceived for him:

SETTING

The Dibnys hard traveling years are over, so, they decided to settle in New York City, at the Dearbon Building, property of Sue's parents and located on 5th Ave. in front of Cantral Park and the Guggenheim. However, old habits die had, so half their adventures will take place all over the world. Frequent destinies include Waymore, NE birthplace of Ralph, and Yucatan, birthplace of the Elongated Man.

In this case, the fake stories are set in the fake Earth-J, named after Julie Schwartz, where its still the 60s and most of the DC heroes are just debuting.

SUPPORTING CAST

Ralph and Sue basically know everybody who is anybody in the DC Universe on a secret identity basis. Ralph is very specially tight with the Flash and Batman; however, only a handful of characters get to appear in almost every adventure of his fake series.

Sue Dearbon - Ralph's wife and sidekick. She's very plucky and talented. She is an authority on fashion, mystery writing and computer hacking.

Frazier - See the villains section.

J. J. Dearbon - Sue's dad and landlord. He came from Ireland with nothing on his pockets and now he's one of the richest men in the world. He has a loud, big bear type of jolly personality. However, he can be quite greedy ans is always exploring new ways to make money all around the world.

Caroline Dearbon (neé Astor) - Sue's clueless mother. Despite being very perceptive, she's quite clueless and she's normally sitting around in a perpetually good mood making unintentionally hurtful but honest comments.

Chief Clancy O'Hara - Cousin of Gotham City's Miles O'Hara, the clueless, stubborn and short tempered police chief of NYC, he calls the Elongated Man when crimes become unsolvable.

THE COMMON SUSPECTS

I figured common suspects would ruin the mystery, but even Sherlock has a Moriarty, right? Ralph has stated that he avoids supervillains on purpose for his own safety reasons, but how about a crowd of lovable thugs like Batman used to have in the 60s?

There's just one true villain here, and that's the big mystery of the first season, the rest are just con men and petty people.

???? - The "Moriarty" I was talking about. Just like Ralph solves mysteries for the thrill of the challenge, his enemy should manipulate all crime in the Eastern Seaboard just for fun. In the first big arc a number of villains will be introduced and Ralph will have to find out his identity.

Frazier - Ralph and Sue's old pet dog comes back with a twist. He's the Thin Man's Asta gone narcissistically wrong. In this fake continuity he's a Westie, since I don't think a Jack Russell can pull evil or has the required personality. If he was a regular villain, he would be too much for any superhero, but being just a dog, his silly instincts hold him back.

Egghead - Think of characters like Frasier Crane, Hackman's Luthor, Megamind, the Brain (from Pinky and the Brain) and, of course, the real deal, as portrayed by the great Vincent Price. He used to be a supervillain in Gotham, but now he's reformed and lives at the Dearbon Building along with the Dibnys, so his role is mostly that of an obnoxious neighbor and radio talk-show personality.

Miss Bacon - Egghead's infatuated secretary. She types for the posterity almost anything his eggocentric boss says. Their relationship is quite unprofessional, if you know what I mean, and she enjoys hinting people about that.

Mistress Sinestra - A local TV personality with secret witch powers. Basically a cross between Magica De Spell, Elvira and Fran Fine. She's obsessed with fortunes, spells and curses, so she's a constant pain for the Dearbons.

The Elongated Evildoer - Martin Beene. One of the few notable original enemies of Ralph. Obsessed with the Elongated Man for no good reason, he discovered a way to elongate things that he has touched. However, since that's a silly power, this time he comes back with regular stretching superpowers. He knows more than Ralph about stretching, but he's quite incompetent as a criminal, which frustrated him even more.

The Clinton Boys - 3 of them used to be "the Untouchables", who battled Ralph, Superman, Robin and Hawk and Dove, but they reintegrated with their family in Hell's Kitchen to become the largest gang of thieves / carpet cleaners (don't ask) in the NY metropolitan area.

M. M. Pennypacker - More of a frienemy of J. J. Dearbon, Sue's dad. He's his evil counterpart from Australia; the Flintheart Glomgold to his Scrooge McDuck. The main source of his wealth is news media, which is how he manages to stay clean depite being a crook.

Average Joe - Joseph Jones, and average looking man. He commits clean, practical crimes leaving no traces,   the perfect challenge for Ralph.

Rajah - A magician / hypnotist from the old Elongated Man stories. Magicians make great challenges for detectives, so this one is a natural.

L'Escargot - France loves the Elongated Man, and believe it or not, this guy is one of Frances biggest super criminals (true story, look it up).

Kukulk'caan - An ancient alien who once enslaved the Mayans. He created the gingo fruit that gave Ralph his super powers and his ship keeps attracting aliens to Yucatan.

Maximo Molina - Yet another megalomaniac trying to conquer the world, this one acts like an eccentric hacendado from Yucatan. Basically the local Prince John.

Edgar Moriarty - This creepy guy is the head of Scotland Yard. However, his family name makes him an obvious prime suspect.

The Grünewappen family - They are secretly the wealthiest family on Earth, but their status is threatened by the rise of a new criminal mastermind of Europe.

RECURRING CHARACTERS

The Super-Hero League of New York - Also known as the Super Buddies, an association of New York-based superheroes who offer free services to the community. Ralph and Sue work here in order to use its resources. The list of members is really long, but the common suspects include Power Girl, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Fire, Ice, Rocket Red (exchange member) and Guy Gardner. It is managed by the sleazy Maxwell Lord, along with L-Ron and Oberon.


Billy Warner - Ralph's #1 fan from the old stories. He lives in Astoria, Queens and wants to become a master detective like his idol. His body also reacts to gingo extract with elasticity, only he promised Ralph not to use his powers until he becomes a pro.

The Flash - Ralph's bro. He often calls when a mystery gets too complicated at Central City or visits just to hang around.

Batman - The other Worlds greatest detective. They often have to team-up when mysteries get too complicated.


The Croatoan Society - A league of Detectives who gather annually to solve paranormal mysteries. The original members were Ralph, Detective Chimp, Edogawa Sangaku, Dr. 13 and Tim Tranch. Sherlock Holmes, the Question, Filo Molina and the Dog joined eventually.

P. I. Butch "Dog" Douglas - NYC's former top detective. He's not that talented as a detective, but he makes up for it with dog-based super powers.

Speedy Gonzalez - Yucatan's champion, and the first speedster and superhero Ralph met. His powers also comes from a fruit, in this case Yucatecan chilli pepper.

Don Eduardo - Ralph's host in Yucatan. He's old and very knowledgeable on everything about Yucatan, so he serves as the resident guide. He's a great host, but is set in his conventional ways, so he finds Ralph's shenanigans obnoxious.

Filo Molina - A friend of don Eduardo and Yucatan's top detective. He's a retired trauma doctor who solves crimes on his free time.

Amos Hurd, the Millionaire Cowboy - A friend of Ralph from his old adventures. Pretty much the J. J. Dearbon of Texas.

The Justice League of America - The elite super-hero team of America, so, obviously, Ralph belongs to it. Its roster includes Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Robin, Green Lantern, Flash, the Martian, the Green Arrow, Atom, Hawkman and Black Canary. Zatanna joins along with Ralph, and eventually it will also include Hawkwoman, John Stewart, Firestrorm, Cyborg, Samurai, Apache Chief, Black Lightning, Supergirl, Enchantress and Platinum.

More Elongated art!

This image by Mark Stutzman deserves its own post I have to know the history behind it. I guess the trinity had to go for the Best next thing after Batman in whatever that adventure was (apparently a commission for a Fusion Toys puzzle series). Oddly enough, Ralph was a lot closer with Batman and only teamed-up once with Wonder Woman.

Hawkman and the Atom #46, art by Ryan Sook.

I believe this one was done by Willis Bulliner. And I guess that's Ralph saluting TPTB for his fabulous role in the New 52.

WHO’S WHO: The Definitive Podcast of the DC Universe, Volume VII

In the land of the E, the Elongated Man is king.

Firestorm Fan's  Shag just wrote a review of the VII volume of Who's Who. This is relevant, well, firstly because Shag is a friend of this blog, and secondly, because that issue covers D to E of the DCU phone book, which means the Elongated Man gets his bio there.

The fun thing is that the rest of the D-E characters are not famous enough to top Ralph on the cover, but still make a very nice crowd. I'm particularly fond of the Enchantress and Dolphin (talk about fan service, the water must be really cold!). I tend to prefer silver age independent heroes over the rest.

Ralph's entry is okay. It's always nice to see Carmine's art, and his characterization is spot on; however, he could have put a little more thought into it. It feels like "I'm old, life is short, waving with a weird spaghetti arm. Whatever. What's next?".

There might not be big shots like B Batman, S Superman or L Lex Luthor (I guess D Darkseid appeared in the previous issue) but the chat in the comment section of the post is very animated anyway.

The Enigma of the Elongated Man and the rest of the missing characters!

#1 & #21 of Buxton's list. Chunk, btw, is yeat another missing Flash character.

Den of Geek's Marc Buxton has written a fine list of the missing characters in the new DCU, which puts the Elongated Man's situation in perspective. Check it out at http://www.denofgeek.us/books-comics/45461/25-characters-still-missing-from-the-dc-new-52

The Curious Case of the Nate Bellegarde Challenge!

Nate Bellegarde is -- well, I have to confess, I didn't know who Nate Bellegarde is up until yesterday, when I ran into his Elongated Man request. A little googling showed me that he's a really talented artist with a mix of superhero style with and indie vibe (or at least that's my take). He's a pro since he was 16, which means he is also a natural with uncanny talent.

The best thing about him is that for $5.00 USD, he'll take requests at his... "Sketchblog". No. Wait... That's "Bletchskog" (nice trick!). I'm already negotiating a challenge for him (and so should you).

His Ralph is one of the best I've ever seen, he really looks like a rubber man and his insightful expression is spot-on.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

OH RALPH, I KNOW YOU'RE A 4, BUT YOU'RE A 10 IN MY HEART! by Erica Henderson

Oh, c'mon what kind of woman can resist that William Powell charm?

Hypertext fiction or How to Understand Final Crisis, Morrison and Borges!

Nope. Nothing to do with the Elongated Man. (Although it would have been slightly better in my boo).

To Morrison's dismay, understanding some of his works to the same degree of some by other geniuses like Alan Moore, Moore Gaiman or Darwyn Cooke, can be a lot work. For my two cents, all these comic book writes can be about as brilliant, the only difference is that Morrison is the ikea version of the rest.

Morrison's stories often require putting together a lot of pieces, resorcing to numerous rereads, internet consulting, getting kicked out of an online forum or club reading. Some fans go as far as organizing extensive an even ludicrous rereading lists of his past works every time he's about to publish new material.

Why is Morrison doing that to us? What is his purpose? Is he an evil psycho-sadistic? Is he a sloppy storyteller? Does he think he looks smarter by making ikea-stories? ... Yes and no. He does want ust to work on his stories like puzzles, he might want us to nderrate him and might be teasing us to look like a genius. I'll prove all of that by linking his work to Borges and his hipertext.

On Hypertext

Ok, hyperwhat? To understand Morrison's story strctures, the first thing we need to understand is the concept of hypertext. In normal narratives or texts, everything is linear. The reader is meant to read from start to finish with no major effort than eye movement to follow words and flipping pages. Sometimes, when an index is available, we can navegate through it and avoid a bit of the linear reading, going straight to the body of text that we want or need. As computers were introduced, text started to feature links to other texts, images and multimedia, making networks of information known as hypertext. With hypertext, the reader doesn't have to read in a linear way, he can navigate in any order as he jumps from node to node of media through the links. The two basic elements of hypertext are links and nodes.

A number of authors have used this technology to create hypertext fition and hypertext comics or "hypercomics":

 Originally Posted by Daniel Merlin Goodbrey 

‘A hypercomic can be thought of as a webcomic with a multi-cursal narrative structure. In a hypercomic the choices made by the reader may influence the sequence of events, the outcome of events or the point of view through which events are seen… it’s that element of reader choice and interaction that makes a hypercomic a hypercomic.’

Here's an example. And then some more. Got the picture, right.

Well, that's where it gets tricky. Hypertext doesn't have to use digital media. It can be done in regular media. For instance, an artist could paint this one on your wall. Boom. You have low a lowtech hypercomic right there. It could even be a painting or a drawing in your favorite gas station toilet. Hypertext could also be done in a book. Just by indicating that chapters 3 and 4 happen at the same time, the reader has a forking point at the end of chapter 2. Things could get more complicated if chapter six followed both 3 and 5, but you only needed 4 to understand 5. Or the writer could rearrange a series of consecutive events so that you have to figure out the order as some sort of puzzle. Another way would be giving incomplete, but complementary descriptions of the same subject in different scenes so that the reader goes back and forth, making a mental map to reconstruct things. 

Well, writers already did that. They started on early XX century with James Joyce's Ulysses (1922) and peaked with Argentinean Jorge Luis Borges's The Garden of the Forking Paths. 

On Borges and Morrison 

So far, I’ve just read 5 of Borges works, and I find the themes and what he does with his stories, strikingly similar to the ones of Morrison, who admits his influence and makes clear nods within his stories. The Scissormen in Doom Patrol are just one step ahead of what the secret society of writers did in Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius. The Book of the Library of Limbo are nods to The Library of Babel and Ts’ui Pên book-labyrinth. 

“The Garden of the Forking Paths” is a printed hypertext short story about a hypertext book (yeah, and way before postmodernism and deconstruction were thing). Final Crisis is a printed hypertext comic about a time-space collapse in which the time-space (or the panel sequence that represents time) collapses. Like, TGOTFP, Final Crisis also features, “the book of the Library of Limbo” a fictional hypertext book (“infinite number of pages, all occupying the same space”). Both books are about time, space and represent the universe itself. The difference being that the one from TGOTFP features the Universe as conceived by the author of the book, while the Book of the Library of Limbo is some sort of perfect natural thing (I don’t think so, but The Book of Destiny, perhaps?). The Library of Limbo might as well be a reference to Borges’ Library of Babel.
Ts’ui Pên, the fictional author of TGOTFP, parallels Morrison himself in that they are brilliant men dedicating their times to make labyrinths in a medium that is underrated in their respective contexts; trying to elevate it through the complexity of their work. 

I could explain how TGOTFP, I mean, the short story written by Borges, is printed hypertext fiction… But I think it’s better to leave that for the experts. There’s plenty of literature about that. This one is pretty good. Now, Final Crisis is another case... 

On Hypertext in Final Crisis

There’s not enough information on how does it constitute an example of printed hypertext fiction. Firstly, it doesn’t take much, as I pointed out since the beginning, the simple fact that Morrison has us constantly flipping panels, pages, books or even series back is enough; not even TGOTFP is as forked as some of his works. Yes, this would mean that a lot of other books and comics books and comic book events might be considered hypertext in the degree that they have us flipping and flipping. I’d consider Lord of the Rings an example of the opposite, as long as it is, I rarely flipped (maybe if I forgot a name). In Conan Doyle’s stuff and mystery fiction it happens a bit more often (keep in mind that Borges influenced the generation of the golden age of mystery fiction through the Ellery Queen mag). Borges has us doing that from the first two paragraphs (which are often the most intense), Morrison usually does the opposite, starting very simple and making things very complex as they reach climax. Final Crisis is an example of this, #1 is simple, and street level, with each issue being progressively more complex, until we have the fragmented and cosmic #6. The page flipping starts on #3, and it goes crazy on #7. The first half of #7 have the reader (pp. 4 – 18) flipping within those pages and the rest between that and mostly Superman Beyond. In addition to the flipping, Final Crisis has hypertext structures (something that not even TGOTFP has) on two levels: its format as a series, and fragmented and shuffled storytelling in #7.

Firstly, it constitutes a “hyper series” of sorts (yeah, I’m pretty much making up that term, although somebody online has thought about it first). There’s the main linear structure, issues 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7, and the 3 indispensable structural tie-ins: Superman Beyond, Final Crisis: Submit, and Batman: Last Rites (Batman #682 – 3). There are other tie-ins, but they are not necessary to understand the story (in fact, if read as part of the “hyper series”, they would only wear thin the reader’s attention). By contrast, it’s impossible to understand the ending of FC #7 without Superman Beyond. Likewise, Batman: Last Rites, takes place after Batman is kidnapped in FC #2 and before he returs in FC #6, about which it explains a lot. It also conciliates the ending of FC #6 with the contradictory ending of FC #7. In one ending we see Batman’s corpse, in the next we see him alive, living in the past; Last Rites, is the key. It’s interesting, but by doing this Morrison draws yet another couple of parallels between him and Ts’ui Pên from TGOTFP: 

1. Both authors wrote a labyrinth book (FC and fictional-TGOTFP) about his version of the [DC] Universe. 
2. Along with many other apparent contradictions, in both books a character appears death in one chapter and alive in the other; Morrison also pulled this on Seven Soldiers.

Back to the “hyper series” ( ™ ) structure, each of the 3 tie-ins (a.k.a. “hypertext nodes”) branch out of the main structure at 3 forking points to converge in 3 different ones, each tie-in has progressively less flexibility. The readers’ first forking point would be Batman’s kidnapping in #2, and they have until mid #6 to read it. Then, the second forking point Superman Beyond, is a fraction of a second within the story that branches out of the middle of #3, but could be easily red at any point before #6. Submit it rather an interruption, since it happens after the first pages of #4 and ends before the rest of it. There is how it looks:

Then, we have the other big hypertext structure of #7. I initially thought it was the smallest since I only identified it by the odd panels in p. 16.


Panels present time going backwards and forward in a loop.

By the end of #6, the main villain, Darkseid, has been wounded and is about to confront Superman. His eventual death after the fight is collapsing time and space before and after it. And the story represents the collapse by dividing the sequence of events in 3 fragmenting and intercalating them in a linear narrative:

1. The fight final fight against Darkseid and then, against his “Justifiers” (hypnotized minions, who were half the World’s population by then).
2. The events after the final fight and before Lois Lane starts narrating.
3. Lois Lane’s narration, continued by the final moments with Supergirl and Wonder Woman.

All the 3 develop in parallel. The narration in the caption voices of all of them happens from the third, and what is told and showed alternates between the 3. The reader can choose to read in the order provided by the panel sequence and the narration of Lois Lane or go try to read the events in chronological order. Which creates forking points pretty often. 

This is how it would look in a regular, linear narrative (SPOILER ALERT!!):

 Originally Posted by DC Comics Database, "Final Crisis Vol 1 7" 

In Command-D, Superman holds Batman's corpse, as Darkseid mocks Superman for failing to defend Earth, and that as Darkseid has becoming everyone and everything, Superman is now the enemy of all that lives. Driven to a rage, the Man of Steel is about to tear the Dark God apart when he realizes that Darkseid is in Dan Turpin. His hesitation allows the Anti-Life infected slaves to surround Superman. Darkseid declares that the Final Crisis is over, and he has won, preparing to fire the Radion bullet which will kill Orion in the past. Speaking through Turpin and his Anti-Life slaves, Darkseid asks if Superman will join Batman in the Omega Sanction, or try and outrace it. Superman refuses to give into Darkseid and tells him its not over yet. Just then, Barry Allen and Wally West arrive, leading the Black Racer to the dying Darkseid. The Anti-Life slaves unleash Omega Beams on the two Flashes, who outrace them, run past Superman (who is naturally surprised by Barry's presence) and vibrate through Darkseid. Having just fired the Radion bullet, Darkseid panics at the sight of the Black Racer, who claims Darkseid's soul, removing him from Turpin's body.

At Checkmate Castle, the Atoms manage to establish a tunnel to another Earth in the Multiverse. However, the stress is far too much for Lord Eye to handle. Additionally, the Justifiers break into the Castle. The OMACs under Mr. Terrific's command are not enough to stop the Justifiers, and Mr. Miracle's motherboxx opens a boom tube to the planet that Checkmate had selected for escape. Unfortunately, their choice of world was poor, as the Checkmate survivors end up on Earth-51. Fortunately, Captain Marvel and the Ultima Thule showed up, and he informed them of Superman's plan to gather the Supermen. Renee joins Marvel on his quest, informing Overman of the death of his cousin.

Back on New Earth, Superman is almost amused by the irony of the situation: by firing the bullet to kill Orion, Darkseid insured John Stewart discovered the bullet, which would make its way into Batman's hands, and be used against him. For all intents and purposes, Darkseid committed suicide. the Female Furies, lead by Wonder Woman, arrive to avenge their master. Superman is horrified at the sight of his best friend enslaved by Darkseid, and Wonder Woman tells Superman that he is outnumbered, as Libra's army of mind-controlled superhumans arrive. However, the Secret Society are now under the control of Lex Luthor and Doctor Sivana. Frankenstein and Supergirl lead the remaining free heroes to the battle, and overwhelm the Furies. Frankenstein is able to free Wonder Woman from the Anti-Life Equation, and she binds Darkseid with the Lasso of Truth, freeing the rest of humanity from Darkseid's control.

Superman shatters Darkseid's essence. As reality breaks down around him and the Earth slowly dies, Superman begins construction of a copy of the Miracle Machine, while Supergirl and Wonder Woman begin shrinking down and cryogenically preserving the people of Earth. Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, and Supergirl send a rocket through time as a time capsule, containing mementos of their Earth in case the Miracle Machine doesn't work.

As anybody can see, if you know the characters, there's no need to go back and forth to reconstruct anything, it's all made clear non-linear narrative. By contrast, we can reed the original pages of FC #7 and appreciate its non-linear, forked narrative.

Flash, the magic bullet and the Black Racer.

Back to what dragged my attention to this last structure, in p. 16 of #7, in the 4th panel, we have a character catching another that is thrown to her from the 7th panel. Pretty much like the story of the man MacGuffin of the story, which presents yet another hypertext structure…

SPOILER ALERT!!

The story begins with the investigation Orion, of a God who was murdered with a bullet that didn’t seem to be in the crime scene. Green Lantern discovers that the bullet is actually under the floor, and that it has been there for ages. This leads Batman to speculate that the bullet was shot in the future and traveled backwards through time until it hit Orion and then the floor. The Flashes use their speed power to try to stop the bullet and death itself (personified by the Black Racer figure) from hitting Orion in the past but fail. Meanwhile, Batman has the old bullet. He’s captured by Darkseid, but escapes and shoots him. That’s where the bullet ends. It has its origin after that. Wounded and slowly dying, with the old bullet, Darkseid shoots Superman; however, the Flashes have been tracking the bullet, now to its source and not its destiny; so, the time vortex that they opened is what takes the bullet to the past. However, the Black Racer, who has been following them, goes straight to Darkseid, taking his soul away from his body. So, as pointed by Superman, Darkseid lead the bullet right back to himself. Whenever the bullet or the Black Racer appear in the story, the structure forks in 3 paths; the reader can a, just keep reading in regular order, b, go back to the last bullet scene, or c, go forth to the next bullet scene. He story progresses, but the bullet is going backwards in time, pretty much like the panel loop in #7, p. 16.

Conclusion

My verdict? It's awesome. Well, if for some reason I was his writing workshop teacher (I don’t know, maybe he got into a really lousy school), and keeping in mind that workshop teachers are supposed to be jerks, I’d give in an A and I’d tell him how to get an A+ in my book. Firstly, the hyperseries structure needs to be clearer and get a bit more character. Turning Batman #682 – 3 into “Final Crisis: Last Rites” or “Final Crisis: Batman Forever” is a must; Requiem and Resist should be redoe by him and integrated into the structure, a 4th Wonder Woman tie would be seal the deal. All that would make it clearer that it’s a hyperseries that consists of a main storyline in the title book and 6 more nodes. All of it should have the same the same format, slightly different from the other tie-ins. Some parts need captions, particularly #7 and Superman Beyond. The back of each issue needs annotations. A bit more Aquaman, Hawkman and Zatanna wouldn’t hurt. And for Grodd’s sake, he should have done something with the Elongated man.