This is Marvel’s final attempt at a Damage Control series. The original creators are still on, but in addition we have Kyle Baker on issue #1.
This book has gone from a humorous take on a reasonable concept—i.e., people who clean up super-messes—to an issue of Crazy. And that’s not a good thing.
And it’s too bad because the concept is kind of cool. Damage Control is getting advance notice of clean-up requests—meaning that someone is tipping them off before the super-hero/villain fight happens. Neat idea. Also neat: In this iteration, the Damage Control corporation is getting inside information–learning of damage before it happens. And so the organization is investigated by the authorities and also by New Warriors.
But again, the execution make it almost unreadable. I mean look at this picture of Speedball, who is asked by the government to infiltrate D.C. to see how they’re getting their info…
I don’t think Ernie Colon and Kyle Baker are bad artists, but this is really distracting. I skimmed the issues but had a hard time being interested enough to log all the ins and outs of the story.
There’s a movie made about Damage Control in issue #3.
I know there’s been rumors of a D.C. TV show–wouldn’t it be cool if it had a cast like that? Note that Marvel creators appear as some of the cast, including Denys Cowan, Tom Brevoort, etc. Interesting to see Dan Slott in there. He was a new jack at the time.
And issue #4 makes fun of Infinity Gauntlet, bringing cosmic characters into the mix, when a DC employee gets cosmic power and decides to start cleaning up the damage done in the universe by the Thanos event.
It leads to a big cosmic battle with Glalactus, the Elders and just about every Marvel hero.
This is the most plot-heavy issue of the three Damage Control minis. It’s also the best-written and the most genuinely funny because it takes itself seriously enough to have some tension while poking fun at Marvel characters along the way. At that point, EVERYONE gets involved.
Even Richie Rich.
This was the first Damage Control story that left me wanting more.
Quite a wasted opportunity. This book had the potential to be completely novel and very interesting.
T