No butts – Infinite Crisis #2

The Survivors

To sum up issue 1 the DC universe is falling into chaos, the Trinity (Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman) are fighting over recent actions, including Wonder Woman killing Maxwell Lord live on television.  Watching from their crystal world the Earth-2 Superman and Superboy-Prime (last seen from Crisis on Infinite Earths) are dismayed at how the heroes are handling their universe, so punching the crystal wall Superman frees himself to the universe at large. In addition, OMACs are running amok, and the Freedom Fighter was killed by a League of Supervillains put together by Luthor.

Issue two starts with Buddy, Animal Man, going to join some of the Teen Titans, Adam Scott and Jade, Firestorm, and Supergirl in a strange dimension, called New Cronus, to go help with something weird at the center of the universe.

Then Power Girl!

Picking up from JSA Classified Clayface is dragging Power Girl to whatever Luthor has planned, backing him up is a few other villains, including Giganta. Kara quickly recovers and starts fighting back against the villains, get a page of badass moments as she takes down each of the four villains. Right after defeating them, she meets Earth-2’s Superman, in a gorgeous full-page spread. Much of this issue, and this Crisis, revolves around Pee Gee and her place at the center of the rebirth of the multiverse.

As if you couldn’t tell from the last few entries the writers really wanted the multiverse back, and after cheating a little they basically decided to just bring the whole thing back, revolving things around one of the few to survive the Crisis relatively intact.

We have a few pages putting things in motion, Clark at the Planet going off to check on the recovery of the Freedom Fighters’ bodies, complete with ominous red skies, Luthor plotting taking down heroes, and deciding to go after Black Adam. Another Luthor, in his classic armor, trying to figure out what’s going on.

Meanwhile, Superman is taking Pee Gee to the crystal home, meeting Alexander Luthor who basically gives us a quick rundown of what happened in the last Crisis and the Multiverse, with some images calling back to classic comic covers and panels. Once we’re up to speed Kara is taken to see Earth-2’s Lois who is currently dying.

We then get a few more subplots, Booster Gold arriving on the moon from the future, and Joker torturing the Royal Flush gang, a little miffed that he’s not been asked to join Luthor’s group. As they say Joker’s too wild to join any team!

Touching Lois, for reasons, triggers all of Pee Gee’s memories of her time on Earth-2, something the best efforts of Superman, Superboy, and Alexander couldn’t manage. Finally, Pee Gee has found her family again, and nothing bad will ever happen to her again…

We’re still not done as Batman is ignoring the help of Alfred and he’s obsessed with trying to figure out what’s going on and dealing with OMAC, who he accidentally created  (this is during his paranoid loner stage). OMAC tell him, and we see in another lovely splash page, Wonder Woman and the rest of the Amazons fighting them.

Finally, we see the wall where Earth-2 Superman, and the others, watch the world and he explains to Pee Gee that he’s planning to try and bring their Earth back! And for bonus points, the last issue is of Kara’s one true love (okay friend) Helena Wayne!

We’re still in the early game here, with all the pieces being put together, but it is competent and helpfully Power Girl is front and center, being a core component to the story being told so far. I can’t say how well this follows through all the issues, we’ll all find out together, but it is all pretty solidly putting the pieces in place!