DC Round-Up: ZATANNA #1 will cast a spell on you

THIS WEEK: Zatanna #1 sees superstar creator Jamal Campbell somehow leveling up. Meanwhile, Jenny Sparks delivers a philosophical conclusion, Nightwing gets fantastical, and The New Gods continues to be awesome!

Note: the review below contains spoilers. If you want a quick, spoiler-free buy/pass recommendation on the comics in question, check out the bottom of the article for our final verdict.

Zatanna #1

Writer/Artist: Jamal Campbell
Letterer: Ariana Maher

Jamal Campbell is one of the true superstar creators working with DC Comics right now. He’s got a resume in recent years as impressive as anyone working in superhero comics. He worked with Brian Michael Bendis to co-create new character Naomi…and then he took a break from that to team with multiple Hugo-winning fantasy author, N.K. Jemisin to co-create new Green Lantern, Jo Mullein, and the entire space world of critically-beloved Far Sector. And if that all weren’t enough, he then teamed with writer Joshua Williamson to launch a new Superman #1 that was widely loved, too.

With a resume like that, one imagines Campbell had a free pass to do whatever he wanted next for DC. Event comics, Batman, create yet another new character? None of it would have come as a surprise. Campbell, however, has chosen to do a miniseries featuring Zatanna…and he has chosen to write and draw it himself. That was, perhaps, a bit of a surprise, although my only reaction to the news was simply, cool.

And you know what? This book is cool. It’s not often that you get a marquee superhero comics creator going all in (heh) on a non-marquee character. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love Zatanna, from the design to the magic to the showmanship…all of it. But she’s not Batman or Wonder Woman. She’s not even Green Arrow or Aquaman, both of which have had improbable runs by then-A list creators that were well received in my lifetime. She has in the very recent past even been scuttled off as more of a Bat-Family side character than a lead hero in her own right. To be fair, we did get the excellent Black Label book, Zatanna: Bring Down the House, but Black Label has really established itself as a home for bench hero comics, much more so than the DC mainline.

All of that is to say that Campbell clearly had a vision for this book when he undertook it, and it comes off as lively and engaging and fresh in this first issue. The shiny versatility on the artist is on full display from the start, as we get a fairy tale flashback, a killer opening spread to remind us about Zatanna’s whole deal, and a transition right into our main story. This comic unsurprisingly looks great.

But what I liked most about it is it tells a single issue micro story that really earns the final page cliffhanger that is poised to drive this miniseries forward. It’s an impressive bit of writing, one that pays off without the reader seeing it coming. I thought it was very well done.

Overall, this first issue was fantastic, and if the audience is game, Zatanna might be the latest DC side hero to have a classic, breakout run to her name. It occurred to me that she’s also one of those characters who hasn’t quite had her defining run just yet. Well, this might be it.

Verdict: YUB

The Round-Up

• I don’t really know what I expected from Jenny Sparks #7, which is the finale to this mini-series by writer Tom King, artist Jeff Spokes, and letterer Clayton Cowles. I’ve enjoyed this book quite a bit. It’s about a superhero (Captain Atom) who is using god-like powers on a whim, holding a bar filled with people hostage. And while that sounds like a maximalist premise, the telling of the story (so far) has been understated in a way that I think has really upped the stakes and tension. This finale issue, however, sort of moves past that and goes full-on philosophical. We have, of course, been watching a psychological chess match throughout between our lead character, Jenny Sparks, and our villain, Captain Atom. It’s been a slow build, and now in the finale it’s on full display. My reaction is that I think it works and I think it works really well. I came away wanting to immediately read the story from the start and see how it plays in full. Maybe I will do that and write more about this comic some day…
• Boy, The New Gods is just such a stunner. This week we get New Gods #3, which sees the regular series team of writer Ram V., artist Evan Cagle, colorist Francesco Segala, and letterer Tom Napolitano joined by artist Riccardo Federeci for a gritty flashback sequence that the book’s credits label as “chronicler sequence.” In this way, Federeci joins a murderer’s row of interesting comics artists who have contributed some pages to this book, with Jorge Fornes doing so in the first issue and Jesse Lonergan in the second. Combine these guest artists — all of whom are as idiosyncractic as they are excellent — with the regular art from Cagle and Segala, and you’ve got a book that does not look anything like your usual superhero comics. And it struck my while reading this issue that that was very fitting. This is, after all, a comic about next level space gods. Go all out, make it striking, make it unreal — and that’s exactly what this team is doing. I love it.
• Finally, Nightwing is a book I’ve struggled to wrap my head around. I initially though (and probably wrote in this space) that writer Dan Watters (who is contemplative, creepy, and experimental in his work) and Dexter Soy (who is one of those artists who draws great-looking punches to the face) were mismatched. Watters has done his best work, in my opinion, with more idiosyncratic artists (like DaNi) who can, as they say, match his freak. So yeah, at first I experienced some confusion over how this book might even work. But it slowly won me over. This is a book that understands Nightwing can explore the weirder and more fantastical side of Gotham City in ways that Batman maybe can’t. He can kick animal monsters in the face, use the logo on his suit as a neon flashlight, and just generally be cooler than Batman. I think this book is working, and the creative team has really gelled, even if it took me a minute to come around to it.

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