OK, it too me a while to piece together the events of this issue with the events from the "Earth 2: Society" sneak peak that DC released a while ago. The problem is that they don't really match that well.
First, we have the events of this issue. While approaching New Earth 2, Terry Sloan discovered that one of the metahuman refugees was trying to destroy the rescue ships, and he was forced to crash land all of them before the saboteur could destroy them. (It seems to me that the only two candidates for the saboteur are Mr. Terrific or Jimmy Olsen, though I'm not sure why either of them would try to destroy humanity.) Sloan decides that it's not worth trying to explain his actions to the general public, since no one would believe him anyway. (This part sort of makes sense, but it comes across as a way too convenient ploy meant simply to re-establish Sloan as the villain.) He and Commander Sato establish themselves as dictators from Overwatch-One, the rescue ship that they were controlling and that they decide to keep in orbit around Earth. (I'm less clear on how exactly they become dictators from such a remote position or why anyone would follow them given Sloan's actions What power does Sloan wind up having over them?) In the aftermath of the crashes, Sloan invades the TSS Endurance (the progenitor of New Gotham) to secure Batman's Source Vault before the others (i.e., Helena) can secure it. A year later, Sloan has inexplicably returned to the proto-tunnels of the TSS Endurance to combine the Source Vault with his Genesis Machine to recreate the world in the original Earth 2's image. (Unfortunately, we're not privy to why Sloan decided to act at this point. He's originally worried about the alien species inhabiting New Earth 2, but you'd figure that humanity has found a way to deal with them after a year.)
However, these events conflict with the events that we saw in the preview. There, it's Helena and Red Arrow, working with Jimmy Olsen (calling himself Dr. Impossible) that are activating the Genesis Machine, with the rest of the Justice Society (Batman, Flash, Green Lantern, and Power Girl) trying to stop them. Moreover, Helena refers to the gift from her father as the Genesis Machine itself, not the Source Vault. I'm not sure the significance of that. It seems notable, except for the fact that Sloan controls both items already in issue #2, so it functionally doesn't matter. It seems incompatible for Helena and Sloan both to activate the Genesis Machine, so I have to wonder if Wilson was forced to change stories? I just don't see how it'll work otherwise.
At any rate, even without the sneak peak, I'm seriously confused about the story that Wilson is telling. He uses flashbacks and flash-forwards to tell the story, but I feel like we don't really know enough the new status quo to stay grounded. Moreover, they were essentially the same story, with the Wonders trying to stop Sloan from doing something. It just all wound up feeling repetitive. It's particularly egregious because I've got a ton of questions that I'd love to see answered. I'm hoping that we don't again spend a lot of time on some overarching crisis (like Darkseid in the last series) and eventually get to know the characters a little better.
** (two of five stars)
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