REVIEW: Did DC’s ‘Justice League: Rebirth #1′ miss the hype?

After the highly anticipated announcement of DC’s new line, revivals of old plotlines and change in character costumes, readers are also waiting on how will these changes will affect Justice League. Being the standard bearer of DCU, Justice League is expected to step up and bring their A game forward. The great question is, did the team of Hitch place the renowned team of superheroes in the pedestal? Let’s see.

JUSTICE LEAGUE: REBIRTH #1 by Bryan Hitch, Daniel Henriques and Scott Hanna featured two elements: 1) a confused Clark Kent wherein he was torn between his duties as a member of Justice League and being a husband and father to his family and 2.) the team adjusting to the fact that Superman was presumably dead — or missing. However, this two plots did not give too much climactic effect to what you expect from the hyped announcements. There was less action felt in the presented plot line. Also, the idea of the Reaper was likely a very familiar scenario (Starro, anyone?) There was a less villainous feeling if this was an introduction of something bigger in the next couple of issues.

Despite the bland introduction of the story, this issue highlighted a very essential part of Justice League — the member’s interaction. As they work as a team, the panels demonstrated the individuality of each member, to their reaction to the current crisis they were experiencing and how incomplete they were as a team without Superman. I love how this issue balanced out the individual and team conflicts about the changes that the team was going through. The involvement of the two Green Lanterns, Jessica Cruz and Simon Baz also gave spice on the issue despite the lackluster story. As rookies to the team and also the hype that they had on their own series, this two brought up somehow the reader’s interest to follow up the next couple of issues. Despite missing Hal Jordan in this issue, seeing the two was not a bad idea at all.

In terms of art, Hitch had so much responsibilities in his sleeves as a writer. However, some of the drawings in the panels seemed like a little bit of messy. It felt like rushed and some panels have too many action going on. However, that specific panels that illustrates Clark’s confusion to his responsibilities somehow gave off an atmosphere of frustration as it should be. There were clear facial expressions and the simplicity of the background in those panels completed the emotions.

Overall, Justice League: Rebirth #1 for DC’s new set of line-ups came short in some parts. However, Hitch gave us a whole meaning to what Justice League was,  But, with the addition of new characters and on how they were presented to this issue, we might see more features in the upcoming issues. There are so much more in store for us, if this issue is an introduction. Thus, it’s not bad to add this comic book series to the pull-list to see the progress of the stories. There might be surprises that is waiting for the readers that we might not expect.