Comic Review: Event Leviathan #2

Event Leviathan #2

DC Comics

Writer: Brian Michael Bendis

Artist: Alex Maleev

Bendis and Maleev continue to craft a DC-wide mystery thriller with Event Leviathan. Leviathan has taken out the DEO, Spyral, and ARGUS. Batman and his team of detectives are investigating the mystery and trying to figure out the identity of the mysterious Leviathan.

Event Leviathan has the potential to be a compelling mystery thriller, and with the killer creative time of Bendis and Maleev, you’d think it would be. Unfortunately, this book just isn’t working for me. Maleev is a fantastic artist as always. I was excited to see him and Bendis collaborate again, but so far the results have been disappointing. The first issue was uneventful and full of exposition, and this issue isn’t much better.  It’s definitely a step up, but once again not much happens. The detectives have their number one suspect, and honestly, it’s kind of predictable. I’m keeping this spoiler-free, but I think this character is a boring choice for a prime suspect, and there are more interesting directions to take this.

Question and Plastic Man‘s scenes didn’t work for me either, which is frustrating because they’re great characters. Question’s dialogue feels off, he’s never really been one for flippant humour. He has a dry wit, but he’s not usually much of a joker. While Bendis gets Plastic Man’s humour right, it feels misplaced. He’s a goofball, but he’s smart too, and he comes across as too much of an idiot here. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, and his intellect will come into play later, but his scene didn’t gel for me.

Maleev is an artist that can make anything compelling, but the story lets his art down. There’s not a lot of variety in the action, besides a brief fight scene and the final few pages. It’s also marred by a couple of confusing layout choices. Take the above image, it’s stuck between being a double-page spread and just being two pages. The top three panels should be shorter, or the one below should be longer. As it is, it’s an awkward layout that took me out of the story. 

It’s not without merit though. Maleev is one of the industry’s top talents, and his art shines. He uses some great body language and use of mood lighting to add an extra dimension to the dialogue. Maleev is on pencils, inks, and colours; and this makes his singular vision shine through in how well they complement each other. The final page is a great image, and while I’m not sure about the direction, the next issue promises to be more compelling.

A mystery thriller plays to this creative team’s strengths, and I wish I was enjoying the book more than I am. Bendis knows how to tell a compelling story, and his work at DC has impressed me so far. Event Leviathan #2 is not a bad comic, and there are some interesting elements at play. It has a great cast of characters and a compelling hook, but so far it hasn’t lived up to its potential. Hopefully, that will change with future issues.