It was recently asked of me. "Hey, why are you making recaps of 6 year old borderline irrelevant comics?" I decided to reflect for a moment (a week really) and it is because I know many people who are afraid to get into comics and are intimidated by the long histories and many starting points. So I decided to just pick a point in the DC timeline and move forward from there. There might be a point where I drop some of the comic lines because they just aren't very good or are uninteresting to me, until then, please enjoy my continuing coverage of DC Rebirth. Today I am covering issues #4-6 from Trinity Volume 1: Better Together. If you would like to read part 1 before starting this one click here.
Better Together, Part Four: Nothing is Real: We begin with Wonder Woman telling us that none of this is real. Batman, Superman and her are literally rowing up on Themyscira. (Only weird because two of them can fly.) She has deduced that the reality they are in is altered by their emotions. What she can't figure out is why and for what purpose. In this Wonder Woman continuity, she left home never to return. Batman and her both figure she willed them to Themyscira and he reminds her it isn't real. Before they can talk about it more Superman has to dodge an arrow. Suddenly they are surrounded by Amazons.
They begin speaking in a dialect even Batman doesn't know and before Wonder Woman can explain who she is one of the Amazons attacks her. Before the fight can go too far a young princess Diana intervenes.
Back at the Kent farm, Lois hits Poison Ivy with a truck. (I laughed at her saying, "Get away from my son!" Because I added you bitch in my mind and good times were had.) Ivy for her part did toss Jon so that he was not hit by the truck, much to Lois's relief. Ivy is not happy though and punches Lois in the face.
In Themyscira Queen Hippolyta offers our heroes a chance to prove who they are and that they are worth consideration. The games are something Diana had to do when she was young to prove she was ready to become emissary to the outside world. They do well of course. The queen is cool with Wonder Woman staying but the two men are not welcome and are banished to the dark quarters. Young Diana is upset and Wonder Woman turns down the offer to stay, opting to go with the guys.
As their boat, to places unknown leaves, young Diana jumps on board wishing to help them. She pulls out her own lasso of truth and asks why she feels so connected to Wonder Woman. In that moment they are all able to see that this place was designed to get to know that. To take them to moments when they were most vulnerable and see how they felt and reacted. While they float along and are still convinced nothing is real, a giant serpent attacks their small raft. Superman's heat vision doesn't work and they are swallowed whole.
Inside the snake there are many many little snakes. Batman, feeling a little gloomy, starts to tell Wonder Woman something about herself, but she is distracted by the fact that young Diana is missing. Lucky for them they find a sword and Wonder Woman uses it to cut them out of the giant snake. Batman tries again what he thinks he knows about her, but they are interrupted by Mongul and his daughter! (This is supposed to be a big reveal I think but I had to look the guy up. I think he is mostly a Superman villain, maybe Green Lantern too.)
Better Together Part Five: Deliver Your Children: This issue begins with Poison Ivy laying in the field thinking about the cycle of life, but how Mother Earth endures. It is her job to protect the Green (the elemental force which connects all plant life). We learn she is in a dream place and she thought she was the only non-plant there, until she wasn't. A small child with a giant ax shows up. (Poison Ivy recently lost some children that she grew so she instantly connects with this kid. See Poison Ivy: Cycle of Life and Death.) Then Mongul showed up and ruined it all.
In the present we see that Ivy was telling this story to Lois, who doesn't care and wants her to let her husband and his friends go. Ivy doesn't know that she has captured Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman. She just knows that something on the farm is giving off a lot of solar energy and she needs it to get her 'daughter' back.
Back in the plant dream world, Batman tells us that Mongul was buried in Black Mercy (another thing I had to look up, it is a space plant that creates dreams). All the heroes are about to fight Mongul and he takes them all down really fast. The daughter stops him from killing them because they need them alive. Our three heroes bounce back pretty quick and point out that making them relive their pasts only made them stronger. Mongul tells them that he didn't do any of that; it was his daughter’s doing.
He then grows really big and tells them that they are not dreaming, but are in his dream. He tells us that he was really bored in the Black Mercy (he had killed Superman in his dreams like a million times) until White Mercy was born. Like Ivy he fell for the kid and taught her all the things about war and death. His dream world was breached by Ivy and they saw a chance for escape. Mogul gave Ivy the flowers that brought the heroes to his dream and now they were going to help him and his daughter get out. Obviously the heroes are not on board, but White Mercy tells them that she is already in their hearts. Now their bodies are empty vessels ready for the taking.
Ivy is feeling guilty, she didn't want to hurt anyone, she just wanted a way to bring her daughter out of the dream. To make her real. Lois points out that this is crazy and messed up, as she frees Jon from the plants that were keeping him asleep. As Jon wakes up, Ivy tells us that her daughter needed something from this world that was bright enough to show her the way. Clark's, Bruce's, and Diana's eyes all open and from Clark's mouth White Mercy tells Ivy hello.
Better Together Finale: At the Mercy: Our final issue in the volume begins with White Mercy narrating about how easy it was to take down Earth's greatest heroes without striking a single blow. Even with all of their flaws, she still envies them, because they are real and she used them to send Mongul to the real world, but she cannot join, because she is not real.
At the Kent farm (look I know I am calling it the Kent farm and technically they are going by the name Smith at the moment, but whatever, calling it the Kent farm is way less confusing) Clark, aka, Mongul now is attacking Ivy. She is annoyed and Lois and Jon are confused. Mongul calls Ivy a fool and she is pretty upset, but Mongul doesn't care as he berates her. Lois tells Jon to do the thing he is supposed to do (that is to use his powers to get them all the heck out of there).
In the plant dream world, Wonder Woman tried reasoning with White Mercy. Superman falls and is looking to be in rough shape. Batman tries to be scary to get White Mercy to help, but she is pretty unaffected. She points out that Superman will die as a result of Mongul taking his body. White Mercy offers to help. Batman is skeptical, but Wonder Woman is willing to listen. White Mercy wants to help because in learning all about their pasts, she learned joy, loyalty, and strength and got to feel all of it. Wonder Woman seems convinced but Batman asks why she helped Mongul then. She points out that they could not have defeated him in his own dream world, but she can if Batman will trust her.
Poor Jon is trying to fight his possessed father while Lois tries to reason with Clark. Mongul as Super Clark is about to smash them all when Bruce, who is now possessed by White Mercy saves them. Ivy is very happy that her daughter did make it out.
In the dream world, Wonder Woman is carrying Superman and Batman basically chanting to herself to, "follow your heart and not what you see." The world tries to stop her by dropping Steve Trevor in her path, but she is able to ignore him. She finds the garden that Ivy and White Mercy were happy in.
Super Mongul is going in to kill everyone again when White Mercy tells him no. He wonders how she got out. Ivy (who assumes that Clark has powers because he is possessed by Mongul...come on, she saw Jon use heat vision and jump three people out a barn *shrug*) asks if White Mercy will give Bruce powers too. She is like, um nope, but knowing Bruce, he is prepared. Bruce/White Mercy lift up a necklace made of kryptonite (cold Bruce, but handy) and it takes Mongul Clark out hard. While he is down Lois and Jon rip the plant off the front of his body. In the dream word Superman disappears.
White Mercy and Ivy have a nice moment but White Mercy cannot stay and so as to not cause her mother pain, she erases her memory (I should have seen that coming) as she rips the plant of Bruce. Real Bruce wakes up and Wonder Woman, because she is a bad ass, can see the truth and rips her own plant off. Poor Pamela is confused as to where she is and asks how to get back to Gotham.
Later, Lois Lane is narrating again as our three heroes sit at a table in the barn. They are looking out the giant hole Jon made. Lois seems confident this could be the crack in Clark's wall to let in the light (the light of friendship I guess?).
On the last page of this volume we see Lois, Clark, and Jon walking by a field of corn as Lois is sure that friendship is the first step to family and to them not feeling so alone in this world. In the last panel we see a small green form peeking out of the corn. The End...for now.
Thoughts: I liked this volume. I know that is not shocking to anyone who has read my previous thoughts on any of these heroes. I guess I liked it more than some others I have covered because it gave us little pieces of each hero's past to just reflect on with them. Each has had loss and pain and alone each has struggled, but true to the name of the comic, they really are all better together.
I am also a big fan of Poison Ivy in general. I did read her stand alone comic; Poison Ivy: Cycle of Life and Death and would recommend it to anyone who is a fan of hers. I figure this was a way of getting her out of a funk and I am here for it. I get the feeling that the world where she and Harley hang out is barely in the canon with the rest of Rebirth, but I digress. Over all this was a fun story and I look forward to reading more with these three.
Francis Manapul the writer and sometimes artist of this volume also did most of the regular covers. The exception being issues three and four who were done by my main man Clay Mann. There were many artists who did variant covers and if you love covers as much I do I would recommend you check them all out. I was hard pressed to pick a favorite cover for this volume but for me Manapul's cover for issue 5 really pulls me in and I just love it.
The best line of this volume goes to Diana. Everyone was really worried about that boar she brought, but she was more worried about dietary restrictions.
Last Week: Action Comics Volume 2: Welcome to the Planet, Part 1
Action Comics Volume 2: Welcome to the Planet, Part 2
Next Week: Green Lanterns Volume 2: Phantom Lantern, Part 1
Green Lanterns Volume 2: Phantom Lantern, Part 2
Note: All images belong to DC™
Better Together, Part Four: Nothing is Real: We begin with Wonder Woman telling us that none of this is real. Batman, Superman and her are literally rowing up on Themyscira. (Only weird because two of them can fly.) She has deduced that the reality they are in is altered by their emotions. What she can't figure out is why and for what purpose. In this Wonder Woman continuity, she left home never to return. Batman and her both figure she willed them to Themyscira and he reminds her it isn't real. Before they can talk about it more Superman has to dodge an arrow. Suddenly they are surrounded by Amazons.
They begin speaking in a dialect even Batman doesn't know and before Wonder Woman can explain who she is one of the Amazons attacks her. Before the fight can go too far a young princess Diana intervenes.
Back at the Kent farm, Lois hits Poison Ivy with a truck. (I laughed at her saying, "Get away from my son!" Because I added you bitch in my mind and good times were had.) Ivy for her part did toss Jon so that he was not hit by the truck, much to Lois's relief. Ivy is not happy though and punches Lois in the face.
In Themyscira Queen Hippolyta offers our heroes a chance to prove who they are and that they are worth consideration. The games are something Diana had to do when she was young to prove she was ready to become emissary to the outside world. They do well of course. The queen is cool with Wonder Woman staying but the two men are not welcome and are banished to the dark quarters. Young Diana is upset and Wonder Woman turns down the offer to stay, opting to go with the guys.
As their boat, to places unknown leaves, young Diana jumps on board wishing to help them. She pulls out her own lasso of truth and asks why she feels so connected to Wonder Woman. In that moment they are all able to see that this place was designed to get to know that. To take them to moments when they were most vulnerable and see how they felt and reacted. While they float along and are still convinced nothing is real, a giant serpent attacks their small raft. Superman's heat vision doesn't work and they are swallowed whole.
Inside the snake there are many many little snakes. Batman, feeling a little gloomy, starts to tell Wonder Woman something about herself, but she is distracted by the fact that young Diana is missing. Lucky for them they find a sword and Wonder Woman uses it to cut them out of the giant snake. Batman tries again what he thinks he knows about her, but they are interrupted by Mongul and his daughter! (This is supposed to be a big reveal I think but I had to look the guy up. I think he is mostly a Superman villain, maybe Green Lantern too.)
Better Together Part Five: Deliver Your Children: This issue begins with Poison Ivy laying in the field thinking about the cycle of life, but how Mother Earth endures. It is her job to protect the Green (the elemental force which connects all plant life). We learn she is in a dream place and she thought she was the only non-plant there, until she wasn't. A small child with a giant ax shows up. (Poison Ivy recently lost some children that she grew so she instantly connects with this kid. See Poison Ivy: Cycle of Life and Death.) Then Mongul showed up and ruined it all.
In the present we see that Ivy was telling this story to Lois, who doesn't care and wants her to let her husband and his friends go. Ivy doesn't know that she has captured Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman. She just knows that something on the farm is giving off a lot of solar energy and she needs it to get her 'daughter' back.
Back in the plant dream world, Batman tells us that Mongul was buried in Black Mercy (another thing I had to look up, it is a space plant that creates dreams). All the heroes are about to fight Mongul and he takes them all down really fast. The daughter stops him from killing them because they need them alive. Our three heroes bounce back pretty quick and point out that making them relive their pasts only made them stronger. Mongul tells them that he didn't do any of that; it was his daughter’s doing.
He then grows really big and tells them that they are not dreaming, but are in his dream. He tells us that he was really bored in the Black Mercy (he had killed Superman in his dreams like a million times) until White Mercy was born. Like Ivy he fell for the kid and taught her all the things about war and death. His dream world was breached by Ivy and they saw a chance for escape. Mogul gave Ivy the flowers that brought the heroes to his dream and now they were going to help him and his daughter get out. Obviously the heroes are not on board, but White Mercy tells them that she is already in their hearts. Now their bodies are empty vessels ready for the taking.
Ivy is feeling guilty, she didn't want to hurt anyone, she just wanted a way to bring her daughter out of the dream. To make her real. Lois points out that this is crazy and messed up, as she frees Jon from the plants that were keeping him asleep. As Jon wakes up, Ivy tells us that her daughter needed something from this world that was bright enough to show her the way. Clark's, Bruce's, and Diana's eyes all open and from Clark's mouth White Mercy tells Ivy hello.
Better Together Finale: At the Mercy: Our final issue in the volume begins with White Mercy narrating about how easy it was to take down Earth's greatest heroes without striking a single blow. Even with all of their flaws, she still envies them, because they are real and she used them to send Mongul to the real world, but she cannot join, because she is not real.
At the Kent farm (look I know I am calling it the Kent farm and technically they are going by the name Smith at the moment, but whatever, calling it the Kent farm is way less confusing) Clark, aka, Mongul now is attacking Ivy. She is annoyed and Lois and Jon are confused. Mongul calls Ivy a fool and she is pretty upset, but Mongul doesn't care as he berates her. Lois tells Jon to do the thing he is supposed to do (that is to use his powers to get them all the heck out of there).
In the plant dream world, Wonder Woman tried reasoning with White Mercy. Superman falls and is looking to be in rough shape. Batman tries to be scary to get White Mercy to help, but she is pretty unaffected. She points out that Superman will die as a result of Mongul taking his body. White Mercy offers to help. Batman is skeptical, but Wonder Woman is willing to listen. White Mercy wants to help because in learning all about their pasts, she learned joy, loyalty, and strength and got to feel all of it. Wonder Woman seems convinced but Batman asks why she helped Mongul then. She points out that they could not have defeated him in his own dream world, but she can if Batman will trust her.
Poor Jon is trying to fight his possessed father while Lois tries to reason with Clark. Mongul as Super Clark is about to smash them all when Bruce, who is now possessed by White Mercy saves them. Ivy is very happy that her daughter did make it out.
In the dream world, Wonder Woman is carrying Superman and Batman basically chanting to herself to, "follow your heart and not what you see." The world tries to stop her by dropping Steve Trevor in her path, but she is able to ignore him. She finds the garden that Ivy and White Mercy were happy in.
Super Mongul is going in to kill everyone again when White Mercy tells him no. He wonders how she got out. Ivy (who assumes that Clark has powers because he is possessed by Mongul...come on, she saw Jon use heat vision and jump three people out a barn *shrug*) asks if White Mercy will give Bruce powers too. She is like, um nope, but knowing Bruce, he is prepared. Bruce/White Mercy lift up a necklace made of kryptonite (cold Bruce, but handy) and it takes Mongul Clark out hard. While he is down Lois and Jon rip the plant off the front of his body. In the dream word Superman disappears.
White Mercy and Ivy have a nice moment but White Mercy cannot stay and so as to not cause her mother pain, she erases her memory (I should have seen that coming) as she rips the plant of Bruce. Real Bruce wakes up and Wonder Woman, because she is a bad ass, can see the truth and rips her own plant off. Poor Pamela is confused as to where she is and asks how to get back to Gotham.
Later, Lois Lane is narrating again as our three heroes sit at a table in the barn. They are looking out the giant hole Jon made. Lois seems confident this could be the crack in Clark's wall to let in the light (the light of friendship I guess?).
On the last page of this volume we see Lois, Clark, and Jon walking by a field of corn as Lois is sure that friendship is the first step to family and to them not feeling so alone in this world. In the last panel we see a small green form peeking out of the corn. The End...for now.
Thoughts: I liked this volume. I know that is not shocking to anyone who has read my previous thoughts on any of these heroes. I guess I liked it more than some others I have covered because it gave us little pieces of each hero's past to just reflect on with them. Each has had loss and pain and alone each has struggled, but true to the name of the comic, they really are all better together.
I am also a big fan of Poison Ivy in general. I did read her stand alone comic; Poison Ivy: Cycle of Life and Death and would recommend it to anyone who is a fan of hers. I figure this was a way of getting her out of a funk and I am here for it. I get the feeling that the world where she and Harley hang out is barely in the canon with the rest of Rebirth, but I digress. Over all this was a fun story and I look forward to reading more with these three.
Francis Manapul the writer and sometimes artist of this volume also did most of the regular covers. The exception being issues three and four who were done by my main man Clay Mann. There were many artists who did variant covers and if you love covers as much I do I would recommend you check them all out. I was hard pressed to pick a favorite cover for this volume but for me Manapul's cover for issue 5 really pulls me in and I just love it.
The best line of this volume goes to Diana. Everyone was really worried about that boar she brought, but she was more worried about dietary restrictions.
Last Week: Action Comics Volume 2: Welcome to the Planet, Part 1
Action Comics Volume 2: Welcome to the Planet, Part 2
Next Week: Green Lanterns Volume 2: Phantom Lantern, Part 1
Green Lanterns Volume 2: Phantom Lantern, Part 2
Note: All images belong to DC™
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