New Comics! (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Earth 2 #4:  I have a vague recollection of a military squad trying to do something in Papua New Guinea in the first issue of this series.  Unfortunately, I don't have the issue on hand (the problem of having two different apartments in two different cities), but I'm guessing that the Atom was part of the aforementioned squad.  I think that I've mentioned that I'm not all that familiar with the Golden Age characters on whom the "Earth 2" characters are based, and a little Wikipedia research reveals that the original Atom was a "diminutive college student" and a "'tough-guy' character."  This Atom isn't all that much different, though he appears to be a soldier rather than a student here.  Five years after the events of the first issue, we see him ready to leap from a plane to take on Grundy.  When a fellow soldier asks him whether he's nervous about unveiling himself to the world, the Atom brushes off the question by expressing full confidence in his abilities.  (He refers to himself in the third person in the process, a nice touch on Robinson's part.  You have to wonder if Pratt feels as confident as he sounds here.  By referring to himself as the Atom, he might be showing us that he has confidence in the Atom, though possibly not himself.  I wonder where Robinson is going to take that.)

Before we see what happens next, Robinson returns to the characters that we already know and does some great work.  I loved when Hawkgirl accused Jay of possibly causing the devastation around them and Jay, after initially claiming that it couldn't be him, acknowledges that he actually has no idea whether or not he's responsible.  That sort of honesty is a rare thing in a world of superheroes who are generally blindly confident in themselves (take, for example, the Atom) and Robinson uses the moment to remind us that Jay is just a college kid who got his powers about five minutes ago.  He seems to be setting up Jay as the moral compass of the group, the one most awestruck by his powers and, therefore, the one most aware of the responsibilities that come with them.  Moreover, Jay and Hawkgirl's banter deepens in this issue, developing along the lines of an older-sister/kid-brother relationship.  It could be over done, but Robinson makes it fun, using it to add some levity in an otherwise pretty damn serious story.  ("Will you shut up, I'm not dead yet!  Now just do as I told you!"  "God you're bossy.")  With this banter, Robinson shows Hawkgirl as a young woman trying to do (and perfectly capable of doing) the right thing, but suffering from very little in the way of support.

Enter the Green Lantern.  You can see Alan instantly take control over the group, giving Kendra the support that she needs to excel.  However, Robinson makes sure that we remember that Alan is still reeling from the train crash and Sam's death and that he's still struggling to learn how to use his powers since he, too, gained them about five minutes ago.  His failure to create a construct couldn't have come at a worse moment, as he was facing Grundy at the time.  Thankfully, the Atom arrived in the nick of time to take out Grundy, and it's here that Robinson really turns up the mystery.  Hawkgirl recognizes the Atom and seems to have been part of the same military program as he is.  Why did she escape?  Was she not a soldier but dragooned into participating in the program?  Why is the World Army collecting superheroes but not using them?  Robinson leaves us wanting more at the end of this issue.  Will Alan and Jay fight Pratt?  Will Grundy re-appear?

This title continues to be the most original of the New 52.  The last two issues haven't reached the same heights as the first two, but Robinson is moving through a lot of plot material and character development, so I don't expect the same level of emotion and wit every issue.  I have hope that, when the dust settles and the basic parameters of the title are established, Robinson will have more time to focus on scripting interactions like we see here between Jay and Kendra, making us feel the connections between the characters more than we have in the last two issues.  I'm also hoping that we start to get a better sense of how the world is coping with the aftermath of the Apokolips war.  We saw hints of it in the first two issues, and I'm hoping that we return to it soon.  All in all, though, this title continues to up the ante for the rest of the New 52 line.

Superboy #12:  I like Tom DeFalco.  Tom DeFalco wrote some of the best issues of "Amazing Spider-Man."  But, something happened to him along the way to "Superboy," because, man, some of the moments in this issue were groan-inducing.  Whereas James Robinson has Alan Scott serving as the inspiring hero of Earth 2, DeFalco reduces Bunker to nothing more than gay stereotypes:  nervous fretter, celebrity obsessive, shopping queen.  But, in addition, he wants us to believe that Kon is going to understand what it's like to be a "real person" by spending time with the DCnU's verison of Paris Hilton and her friends, the multimillionaire playboy and the NBA player.  Even Kon himself is wealthy, thanks to robbing a bank.  "I toss a handful of hundreds on the table[.]"  Really?

Beyond the simplistic characterizations and  questionable plots, Kon's narration is also painful.  "Thanks to her particular eau d'menace, my T.K. has no trouble finding Miss Tall, Dark and Spooky!"  Really?  "Eau d'menace?"  "Miss Tall, Dark, and Spooky?"  Then we have the detective friend reappear declaring, "It's time for Detective Jocelyn Lur to become your teacher -- or your executioner."  REALLY?

In theory, I'm pretty sure that DeFalco meant for this issue to be a new chapter in "Superboy," representing Kon going into the world and starting to find a group of friends and, probably, a group of adversaries.  But, DeFalco does nothing to make me care about anyone in this issue, instead making me just hope that the bad narration and awful monologuing would end.  I think I'm done.