Countdown: Forty-Nine

I think my criticism against Countdown was a tad premature. I really enjoyed this issue. Whaddya say we run through the plot points real quick. Things open where they ended last time, with Killer Croc breaking free and attacking Jimmy Olsen, who pulls a Plastic Man and warps all out of place; The Monitors talk about eliminating universal anomalies; Pied Piper and Trickster convince Mirror Master to let them into the little Rogue supergroup; and Mary Marvel goes where she was explicitly told not to go, only to find an old friend who’s none too happy to see her.

I suppose the final few pages were worth the cover price alone. Mary Marvel can’t find Captain Marvel or Freddy Freeman, so she heads to Gotham and finds Black Adam hiding out in an old abandoned building, killing anybody and everybody who dares to enter. And he’s got some weird looking setup, that looks quite a lot like the inside of the Rock of Eternity. If you think about it, it took him about a whole month to figure out how to get his powers back. Captain Marvel must have not been too creative when thinking up a new magic word. Maybe it was “grocery store.” Everybody says that at least once a month.

Seriously, though, I am overjoyed that they included a character that I actually care about into this series, because I was getting quite bored with it already. I find myself getting excited thinking of all the possible things that could come of this surprise appearance. Maybe he’ll give Mary some of his powers, and the two of them will hang out and stuff. I’m also really looking forward to the upcoming Black Adam miniseries that details what happened to him between when we last saw him in 52 and now. Should be fun.

Oh, but they really need to drop this Rogue story, and fast. We already know what they do! It was in last week’s issue of Flash! Stop it, already. I’d rather see Black Adam tear some more rapists limb from bloody limb.