Alejandro's Reviews > Kingdom Come

One of the DC’s crown jewels!


This TPB edition collects “Kingdom Come” #1-4, plus an epilogue (exclusive of the collected TPB edition), an introduction by Elliot S. Maggin (who did the prose novelization), and a Sketch gallery (including a guide of the characters portraited on each individual cover of the original comic book issues).


Creative Team:

Writers: Mark Waid & Alex Ross

Illustrator: Alex Ross

Letterer: Todd Klein


ROAD TO KINGDOM COME

This epic tale showing the last days of the DC Super-heroes risen from two separate ideas.

First, an unpublished proposal by Alan Moore titled “Twilight of the Super-Heroes” (when naing something with the word “twilight” didn’t left you with a bitter taste of shinin’ vampires) where precisely was about a grim future where the main powerhouses of DC have formed clans and they were in war with each other (you can watch in the direct-to-video animated film Justice League: Crisis in Two Earths some of this developed there, and which that said animated movie was originally a “bridge” between the animated TV series Justice League and its following seasons renamed Justice League Unlimited).

Second, Alex Ross had done Marvels for Marvel Comics and he wanted to make a similar project for DC Comics, but where Marvels is a portrait of the first days of Marvel Universe, here, it’s a study of how the last days of DC Universe may look. (Later, Alex Ross would define the parameters for Earth X, a project to show the last days of Marvel Universe).


WHEN BEING GOOD GOT OUTDATED

Superman was the first super-hero and he “wrote” the book for all the super-heroes (not matter the publishing house) that follow him, creating a new literary genre on its own right.

While Batman has been adapted (quite successfully) for each era (grim, campy, dark, friendly, dark again, etc),…

…it seems that the core elements of what makes Superman tick where so tight attached to his 1938’s roots that, while his super-power levels had been changed from time to time, his very never-ending image of truth, justice and freedom, inspiring hope to all mankind, it was something that without a doubt, if you take out that, he isn’t Superman anymore…

…but the future, OUR future as society will have space for something so good hearted as Superman?

Alex Ross and Mark Waid show us the grim scenario (quite ready-witted) where new generations of super-heroes take in their own hands what they see as justice without remorse of the loss of lives.

Magog, the new prototype of super-hero, makes what Superman couldn’t do, and what’s worse, there isn’t any reprimand or consequence for Magog’s actions by the law of men, which a broken-hearted Superman (more broken-hearted that you can imagine) left society in a self-imposed retirement leaving behind any trace of humanity and embracing his original Kryptonian heritage.

If hope left us…

…is there any reason to live in the future?


BLOOD AND THUNDER

Ten years later, without hope among humankind, a new generation of super-heroes without morals, without any code, without rules, without responsability for their actions, without any role model to follow, is becoming so threatening that The Spectre is ready to impart judgement over Earth, since…

…Kingdom Come, the armageddon is upon us!

However, The Spectre was Jim Corrigan so many time ago that he “forgets” how to be human, so he choses a guide…

Enter: Norman McCay

Norman is a preacher, a man of God, which it seems like the best option to guide the incoming judgment for the “gods” among men with powers and abilitities far beyond of mortals.

Wonder Woman forces Superman to return to a world that desperately needs hope again, soon enough a new Justice League risen, recruting as many power houses as possible.

However, not everybody, especially those without special powers will take kindly the intervention of this new Justice League, where two men will be particularly worried about this new development in an already volatile world situation…

…Bruce Wayne (aka Batman) and Lex Luthor.

Each of those two human beings, each representing the ultimate potential for a human being without super-powers can be, forming their own armies to take on their own angles against the new Justice League.

It's men versus gods.

However, Lex Luthor possess the wild card in this apocalypsing crisis…

…Captain Marvel, the Earth’s Mightiest Mortal!

This is a war…

…and in a war, ALWAYS there are deaths…

…lots of them.

Kingdom Come is upon us…

…let’s pray…

…for everybody!