The Atom #21 (Remender's first issue)

[Jack Zodiac]

So what'd everyone else think of the first new issue with Rick and Pat Olliffe?

I wasn't sure what to make of it, especially after a run like Gail's. With her, there was non-stop comedy and action, so the story almost never felt like it was dragging; but this issue awkwardly picks up in the middle of one of Gail's plot points (the magic and science around Ivy Town distorting reality and causing all the weird, fucked up shit that'd been goin' on since the first issue) being dissected via an experiment Ryan is performing on himself by shrinking down and entering a sample of his own blood.

There's humor and a little action, but most of the issue felt like decompression, and the narration just didn't sound right for Ryan's voice. The jokes were much less punctual than Gail's, and were intermittently strewn about the dialogue instead. And the action was sparse and not very intense. I just wasn't very impressed by the issue (outside of Pat's art, which wasn't so much impressive as it was just very fitting, especially for the scenery of Ryan entering his own blood). I'll stick with it another issue, though, and see where it goes. I just wanted to see what everyone else thought of it.

I will say this, though. Rick gives some awesome Head. ;)

[Stressfactor]

I, too, had a problem with Ryan's voice. Gail's Ryan seemed quite a bit more positive -- someone who was likely to dive into something with a "WOOO-HOOO!" Someone who was excited and blown away and OPEN about life.

Remender's Ryan is a bit more pessimistic, he seems darker and less excited about things, more.... intense. He also did seem a bit rude to Panda -- which felt really, really wrong from Ryan.

I agree about the Head though -- he's got that nailed.

I hold to a 'rule of three' in comic books -- an artist/writer combo has three issues to convince me to stay on. If they can't do it in three I'm gone.

[Gail Simone]

I haven't read the whole issue yet but I'm looking forward to it!

[TCJohnson]

I only read the previews....but in the previews it said that all the chaos was caused by Ray Palmer. I thought it was Chronos.

[Stressfactor]

Yeah, Remender is backtracking on that a little bit. The long and the short of it is that Ryan knows Chronos is a bad guy and COULD have been lying about that so Ryan is doing tests to try to find out if Ray was at fault or not.

Difference is, where Dean Mayland was claiming Ray's belt warped the laws of physics, Ryan is now surmising that the belt may be causing small inter-dimensional rifts that have allowed science and magic to merge.

[Pink Bat Maxine]

I'm not a fan of writers who come on board and immediately backtrack on the previous writer. Gail had the nice 'Chronos was behind it all, not Ray' reveal at the end of her run, then in the first issue, we get a reversal on that. Whatever.

Also, the tone was way off, Ryan was not recognizable as Ryan, and it looks like there may be Jia fanservice that'll disregard who she is as established in some pretty brilliant issues.

I'll give this writer a second chance in the future and on other projects. But I ain't gonna be reading his Atom.

[Pink Bat Maxine]

**personal rant on**

....Also, it may seem like nitpicking, but I HATED seeing Ryan disregarding his professional responsibilities like he did in this issue? Really? He couldn't call in and say he needed medical leave? He just seems..... very professionally responsible. It didn't scan right, to me, that he's leaving the dean.... and his STUDENTS.... hanging like that.

Dammit, we get few enough professional educator superheroes that have their own book! Helena and Black Lightning would get the lesson plan in in the midst of a Crisis, so what the heck's up wit' dat, Ryan?


**personal rant off**

[Jack Zodiac]

Yeah, at least when Gail had him missing class, he was in the middle of some surprising and unavoidable stuff, but missing his work (especially after Gail solidifying what an amazing and caring teacher he is) for a deliberate project like he was just didn't strike me as a good idea for the character. I get that maybe he's going to build up a conflict with his personal and professional life like that, but that's not, for one thing, very original, or very true to the character.

And yeah, shoehorning some more Jia in there like that, unless there's some decent story coming out of that in the future, was pretty unnecessary. I like the idea of him and Giganta having a relationship more, myself. It's hilarious on too many levels to discard. :p

[jerrymcl89]

I unfortunately also did not love this. I'll give it a few more issues, but if they didn't put names on the front of these books, I'd still have known the writer changed.

[Thnikkaman]

From what I've read here, I'm glad I dropped this book with #20.