Why Can't Paul Dini Fully Commit to an Ongoing!? (Redux)
The Good: Adam Hughes once again delivers a nice gorgeous cover, although it has NOTHING to do with the story.
Jamal Igle is once again on artwork, and he does a pretty good job. He's replaced halfway through with Travis Moore, but even his art isn't too bad, and not such a drastic shift that it pulls you out of the story.
This was another fun and amusing one-shot story. The villain was fairly simple, a tiny bit gimmicky, but it worked to make her a proper threat for Zee.
Adam Beechen capture's Zatanna's personality just as well as Paul Dini does.
The way Zatanna wins in the end is very clever. Not as good as the issue with Backslash, but still, it works.
The way Zachary kind of 'wins' in the end and makes the entire issue seem planned by him was a great touch.
Yuki Onna. I like that reference there.
The Bad: The whole battle was a little more gimmicky than usual, and it feels like it's trying not to be, but it's impossible to hide. At least Backslash knew he was being completely gimmicky, and full advantage was taken of that fact.
I feel like Zachary's character development of the earlier issues is completely gone here. Zatanna was berating him for being a lazy performer, especially when she's around, but back in issues #4-6, I saw a young man struggling with all his might to impress his shining star of a cousin. In here I saw a lazy jerk who takes advantage of his cousin's talents and perfectionism. I'm fine with him being a crazy party boy, but something just seems wrong with him this issue.
This wasn't what was solicited. I was hoping for Brother Night and Paul Dini's epic conclusion, which is now 2 more issues instead of 3.
In Conclusion: 3/5
Normally Adam Beechen writes a damn fine Zatanna fill-in issue, but this time I just didn't feel it was up to par with even his other issues, much less the epic glory that was Paul Dini's previous issue. It's still a perfectly fine entertaining and amusing read, but Zachary's character is rewound. And it's hard to make up for the fact that I was really looking forward to a delicious Paul Dini/Brother night sandwich, but I got a filler instead, and it was made of some inferior ingredients.