The Search for Ray Palmer - Crime Society #1 Review

COUNTDOWN PRESENTS THE SEARCH FOR RAY PALMER: CRIME SOCIETY #1
Written by Sean McKeever
Art by Jamal Igle & Rob Hunter

I wasn't sure what to expect from this issue. Based on the Wildstorm issue of the Search for Ray Palmer, I was expecting some throw away book with no actual story and basically another garbage book. On the other hand, McKeever is a much better writer than Beechan and did an excellent job with the Crime Society in last week's Countdown, which bolstered my enthusiasm for that book and raised my hopes for this one. Thankfully, McKeever did not disappoint and delivered a very solid read.

However, this book should have been subtitled, Jokester's Origin or something similar. There is very little Crime Society in this book and the brunt of the comic deals with telling how Jokester became the hero, which is a weird thing to say about a Joker-like character to be honest, he is today. The short story is, Jokester was a loser with a horrible act until he started focusing on Owlman, the "Batman" of the Crime Society, as the butt of his jokes. Once he started doing that, he became a huge star until Owlman had finally had enough and ended his career by disfiguring and hospitalizing Jokester.

With his career over, Jokester became a hero alongside the Riddler Family, which contained his daughter, Duela Dent, and his ex, Eve, who was revealed to have multiple personalities and one of the more dominant personalities ran out on Jokester after she became pregnant with Duela. Just when it looked good for Jokester, the Crime Society apparently murdered Eve and the Riddler and that is where we found Jokester in last week's Countdown issue when he met up with Bob and the Challengers.

It was a very entertaining read and I'm really enjoying the Jokester character. The book ended with Jokester jumping through the portal with the Challengers, but in the next panel, it is revealed Eve is still alive and I'm curious to see if this will ever be picked up on again or if it is just another tragic event for the Jokester. Seeing Duela again was a nice touch as well, even though it was in flash backs. I liked how she was talking about how she gets confused and can't tell the difference between her Earth and her trips to ours. My only question with this though is how this relates to the Search for Ray Palmer. It had absolutely nothing to do with that and Ray is not even mentioned in this issue. They should have just told this story in another tie-in, like a Countdown Presents: Jokester or something similar. In the end though, this is still a good book and definitely worth a read.

Verdict - Must Read

Related Posts