Comic Vine Review

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The New 52: Futures End #0

4

The future isn’t quite so bright in the DC Universe. In fact, they’re pretty abysmal. This is what kicks off next week’s weekly series.

The Good

Many times with Free Comic Book Day issues, we sometimes get glorified previews or reprints of old stories. That isn’t the case here. This is a new story and a prelude to the upcoming FUTURES END weekly series. Just as the Trinity War FCBD issue did, this sets the stage.

The story starts out thirty-five years from now. Brother Eye has pretty much obliterated and overtaken the world. There are still a few heroes (and villains forced to turn hero) left working as a resistance. But we know how this is going to go. This is a dark and depressing future. We see some familiar faces in the resistance and it’s a great selection of characters that you wouldn’t immediately expect. It’s a nice little touch to allow some of the other players to take the spotlight. Part of the reason for this is some of the bigger guns have been removed from the board in a pretty gruesome way.

We also get some pretty cool art. Seeing how the characters have aged or changed is what we want to see in this dystopian future stories. When the action kicks in, it’s brutal. There’s no holding back and the issue definitely earns its Teen rating. I’m actually a little surprised it didn’t get a T+ rating.

The Bad

While these stories are fun to see, it does feel like something we’ve seen many times. There is some excitement to be had. It’s simply a matter of just diving in and enjoying the story without thinking how a) the future will never reach this point and b) we know everything will be tidied up nice and neatly in the end.

We have a few different artists. It works for the most part. There were a couple moments you could feel the difference which caused some distraction.

The Verdict

There’s no denying this will be one of the Free Comic Book Day issues that stands out. As a lead in to next week’s FUTURES END #1, DC’s new weekly series, there is a lot to see here. Future stories often get pretty dark and dreary and we definitely see a lot of that here. Besides just horrific scenarios and heroes getting killed or worse, we do see some of the key players that are supposed to play a role later on in the series. It’s a fascinating idea for a story, even if we’ve seen it play out time and time again. The key will be in the execution. Based on the creators of this free issue, we can expect plenty of excitement.