The All New Atom: The Hunt For Ray Palmer #1

Ryan Choi teams up with Donna Troy, Kyle Rayner, Jason Todd and Bob the Monitor to find Ray Palmer. 

I haven't had the pleasure of reading a lot of Gail Simone's material. I know she is highly praised by fans and I generally hear nothing but great things about her work and I'm sure she's written some pretty great comics. This however is anything but good. This is simply atrocious. I don't see how any self-respecting comic reader could actually enjoy the absurdness that this comic is made up of. The last story arc of this series I sort of enjoyed. I've had my issues with the series but I decided to stick it out and see if it got better. I was thinking things would pick up in a good way within this story arc since it's about finding Ray Palmer. Unfortunately that wasn't the case. The story just barely ties intuit the events that are occurring in the Countdown To Final Crisis but it takes too many wrong turns in the process. 

I still can't get over the talking floating head that lives with Ryan Choi. It has to be one of the dumbest ideas I've seen in comics. The Godzilla-looking monsters later on were equally absurd. I don't want to see two giant monsters tonguing each other (yes you read that right). I just can't take this comic seriously. It really is unfortunate.

The best thing that can be said about this comic is the artwork. Main series artist Mike Norton has been delivering consistently great art. It's just unfortunate Gail's writing isn't as strong as the art is. You can have the greatest artwork in the world but if the story sucks then it sort of defeats the purpose. I'd hardly recommend getting this simply for the art. Yeah the arts pretty nice but nothing that spectacular. 

If you want to read a more exciting and thrilling adventure involving the search of Ray Palmer I'd recommend reading the Countdown To Final Crisis. The so called "search" for Ray Palmer barely happens in this story. Instead Gail resumes her usual whacky, over-the-top nonsense scenarios in this series that fail to invoke any sort of excitement or interest in readers.