Review: Batman/Superman: World's Finest Vol. 3: Elementary hardcover/paperback (DC Comics)

Batman/Superman: World’s Finest Vol. 3: Elementary is Mark Waid writing JLA again if it had a strange 1980s bent.

That’s my best attempt at contextualizing the “Elementary” story, and that only comes from weighting the third act heavily over the beginning and middle. Don’t get me wrong, Elementary is masterful — Waid and artist Dan Mora continue a superlative run that looks great and is bunches of fun — but I wondered at times who exactly Elementary was for.

The volume breaks the momentum between the last volume and the next, interrupting the only forward action World’s Finest has seen so far, and does not even nod to the pseudo-tragic events of the previous issues. My cynical explanation is that someone thought it might be useful to have a standalone-ish Superman/Metamorpho team-up book available before the new Superman movie comes around. Otherwise, as struck me when a familiar villain arrives toward the end of the book, this title increasingly reminds me of JLA — action-packed DC Universe team-up title, fun to read but without much effect on the larger DCU as a whole.

[Review contains spoilers]

I’m all for giving limbo characters a chance to shine, and I also recognize every character is someone’s favorite. But when Elementary turns from Metamorpho to the Metal Men, I immediately flashed to DC’s Legends of Tomorrow miniseries from 2016 — an anthology of so-so quality that included, specifically, stories of Metamorpho and of the Metal Men. For me that’s a dour connotation; as opposed to World’s Finest Vol. 2: Strange Visitor’s team-up with the classic Teen Titans, Metamorpho and the Metal Men don’t get my blood pumping.

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The book clicked for me later on, though, as more and more heroes arrive on the scene — Green Lantern Hal Jordan, Captain Marvel, Firestorm, and so on — and I wondered if Superman might have to disband the Justice League again to strip “NewMazo” of his powers. That’s a reference, of course, to JLA #27, where the League fought Amazo as such, and which I mistakenly thought was by Waid but was actually written by Mark Millar in the midst of Grant Morrison’s run. That gave me a little perspective — Elementary is like those guest issues of JLA by Millar or Waid, not particularly relevant but fun team stories nonetheless. I’m not sure that’s a good look for Waid’s own World’s Finest ongoing, but at least gave me a direction as to the point of it all.

Setting aside what Waid will be writing for DC in the not too distant future, I’d be interested to see him tackle the Justice League in World’s Finest. There’s a fantastic splash in “Elementary”’s fourth chapter where Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Flash, and Firestorm arrive on the scene like something out of early 1980s Justice League (or, perhaps, SuperFriends: The Legendary Super Powers Show), and it struck me that World’s Finest doesn’t tend to mention the League — it’s a call for “reinforcements,” not a call for the League. Maybe that’s a meta-reflection of the League’s absence in the current DCU when these issues were published, but a Satellite-era story in the Waid/Mora style might be fun — the last “Big Seven” League, on the cusp of Crisis, until JLA decades later.

Mora deserves all the accolades he’s received for this series, but I couldn’t help but wonder if some of “Elementary”’s third chapter didn’t lean toward “figure-bait,” if that’s a thing. We’ve previously seen a Funko Pop! of the Batman/Superman fusion creation from World’s Finest Vol. 1; here, in one chapter, we get Ultramorpho, Batman in Metal Men armor, and Superman in Metamorpho armor, before the NewMazo reveal. Cool designs all, but I have to think at least some are coming soon to a store near you.

“Elementary” turns on a couple points that I thought were particularly specious for a Waid-written tale. Though Superman and Batman initially suspect Metamorpho Rex Mason of the murder of Simon Stagg, Jimmy Olsen seems to find enough evidence to accuse, and have the police arrest, Bruce Wayne. Waid’s focus is on the Silver Age-y conundrum that Clark Kent clearly knows Bruce didn’t do it but can’t defend him for reasons of secret identity — but Waid elides what reason Jimmy has to think billionaire playboy Wayne could have killed Stagg with poison and exited a locked room. Further, Metamorpho is livid that Wayne tried to frame him for the murder, which is a contradiction — no one accused Metamorpho except Superman and Batman, suggesting Rex knows Bruce is Batman, but if Rex knows Bruce is Batman, surely he also knows Batman neither killed Stagg nor framed him.

Likely the highlight of all of Elementary is the first-issue date between Supergirl and Robin, also teased back in World’s Finest Vol. 1. Waid does well tying in all the funny elements of that weird conversation — the monkey, the fountain, the avalanche, etc.

That Dick Grayson was awkward to this extent at that age I can accept, though some of it still felt far-fetched; Waid conjures another Silver Age conundrum when Robin realizes he can’t use his secret identity’s credit card to pay for dinner, a surprising gaffe for the world’s greatest detective’s partner, and equally that Robin wouldn’t have known how Supergirl’s family and friends perished. There’s some fun in Batman giving Robin fatherly dating advice, though I still wonder if Waid means to suggest Supergirl chafing under Superman’s tutelage, as in Strange Visitor; his praise of her “maturity,” and Supergirl’s lack of reaction, make Superman seem sanctimonious.

Still, Batman/Superman: World’s Finest Vol. 3: Elementary is altogether enjoyable. I see again some JLA in this, but also this volume more than the last is more like latter volumes of Jeph Loeb’s Superman/Batman and the titles that followed — “just so” team-ups of the World’s Finest heroes and their families, perhaps specifically meant to be standalone for readers who just want that team-up and nothing more.

[Includes original and variant covers]

Rating 2.25