I really enjoyed Superman: War of the Supermen, but can’t say it was impressive enough that I’d get back into reading the Superman series of comic books.  I’d have thought nothing of checking out what came next if it weren’t for Superman #700.  A massive “giant-sized anniversary issue” with three stories from various writers and artist teams.

The first story by James Robinson and Bernard Chang takes place a bit after the war and drops right into the action as Lois Lane plays the damsel in distress and the Parasite as the bad guy.  The second half of the story focuses on an intimate moment between Superman/Clark and Lois.  The story is decent and art top notch.  My issues with this story are:

• Does Lois have to be the damsel in distress?  Pretty cliche.
• It’s only a few days since her father blew his brains out in front of her, Lois is in pretty good shape.  Shouldn’t there be more of an impact there?

The second story is by Dan Jurgens and is a retro tale of Superman and Robin.  It seems very out of place and doesn’t add a whole lot to this anniversary issue.  Out of the three this one is the most forgettable.  It’s cute, but nothing impressive.

The third story by J. Michael Straczynski is the treat of this issue and sees Superman reflecting on his absence.  He takes in his abilities and whether he’s been focused on the right things after a woman confronts him about his lack of action in saving her husband.  It’s a “human” reflection of such a powerful character.

The issue is pretty decent but for such a monumental issue it doesn’t quite seem super enough.

Plot: Two of the stories move the series forward in different aspects with just the retro tale not fitting in.  The first story when it gets to the interaction between Lois and Clark is very good and last story is excellent.  Jurgens’s tale wasn’t needed and dragged the issue down.  The issue would of been much for solid if it got rid of the first stories action and just went into the interaction between the two and expanded the third tale.  Rating: 7.5

Art: The art is all over the place with the first and third tale being the two stand outs.  Nothing is amazing and makes me really look for who did it but there are a couple of panels that are impressive.  Rating: 7.5

Overall: For a big anniversary issue, the package doesn’t quite live up to it’s super name.  With some edits it’d of been top notch, but two of the three stories don’t quite stand out and the third is too short.  It’s a decent comic just nothing special.  Overall rating: 7.5

Recommendation: Read

Page count: 42 pages    Price: $4.99     Release: Wednesday 6/23/2010

DC provided Graphic Policy with an advance copy of this issue for FREE for review.