OneMetal.com book REVIEW:
Wednesday Comics

Despite the dozens of publishers pushing extensive catalogs of superhero and indie titles onto the market today, it’s rare for a comic to break the mold. DC’s lavish Wednesday Comics is that book: a coffee table hardcover that packs fifteen twelve-page comics and two one-page specials onto massive, vibrantly colored sheets. It asks a hefty price, but the over-sized edition marks a perfect introduction to a diverse range of talent and superheroes, especially for inexperienced readers dipping their toes into comic book waters.

Wednesday Comics, which was originally released in a weekly rather than monthly format, shapes its stories like traditional American newspaper comic strips, with the various comics divided into weekly segments. Small groups of creators each handled individual strips over the series’ launch, allowing readers to indulge in a buffet of art and writing styles. Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso (along with colorist Patricia Mulvihill and letterer Clem Robins), for instance, maintained the Batman strip, a classic detective tale with a dash of noir romance. Wednesday Comics benefits most from the quality its unique approach demanded from those involved. Artists were forced to rethink their usual formula, bending their artwork to fit a Sunday comics layout. Meanwhile, writers were forced to keep each strip concise and action-packed, a satisfying design that typically calls for a cliffhanger at each finish.

For the most part, the creators excel, showcasing top-notch work that varies remarkably from strip to strip. Dave Gibbons, Lee Bermejo, Neil Gaiman, Paul Pope, and Adam Kubert are just a few impressive names attached to the project. The strips acting as self-contained stories, readers unfamiliar with the extensive histories of Superman or Green Lantern, for example, can breathe easy, a convenience normally found in ongoing comic strips.

While most of the book’s strips are gorgeous to behold and quite pleasurable to read, a few slip on quality. Wonder Woman, though mesmerizing from a visual standpoint, overloads each page and reduces the strip to a confusing jumble, its tiny panels crammed with flighty speech bubbles. The mediocre Metal Man strip stumbles in its lackluster finale, Sgt. Rock and Easy Co. feels too watered down, and Hawkman’s script pays awful tribute to its characters by making them two-dimensional and grossly unappealing.

Wednesday Comics achieves plenty of dazzling feats, easily outshining any smudges darkening the book’s worth. Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth and Strange Adventures both soar with creative achievement, their sci-fi/fantasy worlds bursting with detail. Likewise, the Superman strip, so grand in its painted spectacle, is utterly gripping. Unlike Ben Caldwell’s messy Wonder Woman strip, Karl Kerschi and Brenden Fletcher’s The Flash notably embraces the series’ idea, implementing famous comic strip trademarks onto a later page. Others are just fun: Metamorpho, the Element Man resurrects the nostalgia of old school comics, the Teen Titans and Deadman stamps a flair of modern animation onto their pages, Plastic Man contains the life of a mid-twentieth century American cartoon thanks to Stephen DeStefano’s pastel drawings, and Supergirl traipses after her furry friends as they cause trouble throughout Metropolis.

Bottom Line

Some of the comic industry's best talents lend their hand in a truly stunning and memorable compilation that will delight both new and old readers alike.