Hey Match-heads, Shag here! Today our good friend Tim Wallace continues his monthly coverage of DC’s weekly event, The New 52: Futures End! Sorry this update is a few weeks late; entirely my fault. Life seems to get in the way of good blogging intentions. If you missed the previous installments, click here! Warning, Tim’s entries contain SPOILERS for the related issues of The New 52: Futures End. Consider yourself warned! Just so no one is confused, this particular entry starts off BEFORE Tim’s post covering big changes for Firestorm.
Be sure to follow Tim’s regular work over on his exceptional site, Kord Industries: A Blue Beetle Blog! Get all your Ted Kord, Jaime Reyes, and Dan Garrett goodness there! Get even more Tim-time over at the Legion of Super-Bloggers! You can also stalk Tim on Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus. And now, let’s turn it over to Tim…
Some of this may already be familiar to you (like the events of issue #29 which were so groundbreaking we brought them to you back in November!), while other parts are being revealed for the first time…think of it as the intricacies of time travel…after all we are dealing with a story that has taken place both five and thirty-five years from now! Wibbly wobbly timey…you get the picture.
The New 52: Futures End #28
Five years from now on Cadmus Island, Lois Lane parachutes onto the beach, having taken the leap of faith that Cal/Tim Drake had recommended. The coordinates from her mystery box led her here, but when she encounters an OMAC and gets chased through the jungle she begins to question why. It isn’t any clearer when she finds the Cadmus base, and more OMACs. And it goes from bad to bizarre when she literally trips over herself…or rather the E2 Red Tornado she saw in her vision several issues back!
In Las Vegas, Sergeant Rock and Faraday discuss priorities. What’s more important? Taking down Brother Eye or the unstable Fifty Sue? And like Lenny & Squiggy…at the mere mention of her name, she appears! She’s pretty upset about Deathstroke abandoning her and siding with Brother Eye, so upset she wants him dead! Much to their dismay, she tells Faraday and Rock that she wants to lead a team to take down Brother Eye…and skin Deathstroke alive.
While in New York, Plastique watches as the battle of Batman versus Batman Beyond continues in the fire of what used to be “The Wounded Duck”. It’s several pages of back and forth action, until Terry finally manages to give Bruce the slip.
In another part of town Cal locates Ronnie. He’s concerned about Madison going missing. Ronnie suggests he ask Jason, the leader of their study group, then says if she’s in trouble he’s coming too. Jason’s not with her though. He’s at Yamazake’s home trying to explain about Firestorm…but instead discovers a video of Yamazake’s wife’s death playing on a loop. The doc isn’t home. He’s at his lab with Madison. To make her pay for the sins of her father he plans to force her to be a guinea pig, testing his teleporter.
The New 52: Futures End #29
For all the details, including Ronnie’s sacrifice and the birth of the new Firestorm, see my previous post covering this issue.
The New 52: Futures End #30
On Cadmus Island, Lois has a little talk with herself, the badly damaged E2 Red Tornado. If they’re going to get off this island they need to find a friendly face. Enter Oliver Queen and his Outsiders! Landing at the beach, Ollie and company prepare to bring down Brother Eye, launching an EMP arrow in the hopes of shutting down all electronic systems. Unfortunately the arrow is caught mid-air by the Brother Eye possessed E2 Hawkgirl, and right on her tail feathers is an army of E2 heroes and OMACs. As Ollie leads a small group into the jungle, in search of the Cadmus base, Red Arrow reminds the team not to kill the E2 heroes, their actions are not their own. He does encourage them to kill as many OMACs as they can, though! That works for a bit…until the OMACs pull a “Voltron” and combine into a single giant creature.
Meanwhile Grifter stops Deathstroke from killing Ollie with a shot from a sniper rifle, which gives E2 Lana time to “thonk” Slade on the head with a rock. They run to join Ollie, but Deathstroke is back up and hot on their heels…until Fury shows up and tears his head off.
Barda and Mister Miracle are reunited as the world’s greatest escape artist leads the team back into Cadmus to shut down Brother Eye. They weren’t counting on Brother Eye hosing his consciousness in the altered body of Power Girl though. Even still, Ollie manages to shut down the main system, using the distraction of the Barda/Power Girl fight to his advantage.
E2 Red Tornado tells Lois she knows she won’t make it off the island, and encourages Lois to go and tell the world the truth about the E2 heroes and Cadmus. And finally as an explosion rocks the island, the surviving heroes make their way back to the Arrowboat. But as the last few panels reveal Brother Eye on cell phone and Red Tornado’s eyes flashing back on, we’re left to wonder…are things really over?
The New 52: Futures End #31
In Seattle, at the Queen Foundation headquarters, Lois Lane is holding a press conference. Flanked by heroes from our Earth and Earth 2 she tells the world about Cadmus’ activities, imprisoning, experimenting and controlling the E2 refugees. She’s posted video online to support her claims and calls for Cadmus to be brought to justice for war crimes!
Missing from all this is Oliver Queen himself. He’s still playing “dead”, enjoying retirement on Green Arrow Island with a visit from Animal Man and family. In Siberia, Constantine, his lady friend Midge and Kal-El gather at the site of the Tunguska blast. After her encounter with Brainiac, Midge has lost her marbles, on the plus side though she’s also now something of a Brainiac compass and points them in the right direction. With several thunderous booms, Brainiac appears…inhabiting the body of a large bear. Kal-El orders Constantine to leave while he deals with the villain. Brainiac speaks of a pact, with Superman’s father, and how by coming here “your coming place is spared” (Krypton?).
Another huge explosion and Kal-El is thrown clear of the bear. He scoops up Midge and Constantine and asks what he must do to stop it. Constantine replies “Go home.” (again I ask, Krypton?) On the remains of Cadmus Island, Faraday tries sifting through the rubble, seemingly searching for something (or someone). He finds his way to a secured area, labeled DNA storage, only to find the other side of the door leads to a sheer cliff. The lab was blown into the sea when the island blew up.
Finally in Pittsburgh, the new Firestorm takes a somber journey to Ronnie Raymond’s funeral. It also appears this new union of Jason and Madison may be off to a bumpy start…they can’t figure out how to separate. They bicker a bit, each frustrated by their current situation, but watching from a distance and hearing Jason’s dad speak at Ronnie’s funeral bring them around a bit. As does seeing Cal/Tim at the funeral…but Madison’s not quite ready to let him see her like this, besides she says “even before this happened, we had…issues.”
Ok, definitely more happened in these 4 issues than the last ones…but I can’t help but feel the battle of Cadmus Island went by too fast. It seemed too easy…especially considering how many issues we have left in this series. I guess there are more twists and turns ahead!
Shag here again! That’s it for this month! Thanks again to Tim for this fantastic coverage! Next month Tim will return with further coverage of, The New 52: Futures End! Let us know what you think of this weekly series in the comments.
Support Firestorm (and Tim Wallace over at Kord Industries)! Fan the flame!
The Fire and Water Podcast Presents… 
