Countdown - Arena #3 Review

COUNTDOWN: ARENA #3 (OF 4)
Written by Keith Champagne
Art by Scott McDaniel and Andy Owens

I'm not sure what to make of Arena anymore. The entire thing has wreaked of a poorly written fanfic with the occasional quality moment. Furthermore, every issue seems packed full of cheap deaths just for the sake of killing someone and the entire thing just cheapens and detracts from the Multiverse with every death or destruction of a planet.

Continuing with that theme, this week's offering is another issue packed full of death and random hero fighting. First up was the Starmen group which featured a Stargirl and talking ape Starman waxing philosophical about the Planet of the Apes just before a deranged alien looking Starman kills the ape. Just as he's about to kill the girl, she drives her staff into his head, killing him and making her the winner.

After that is a Flash battle and, surprisingly, no one died! Amazing. This ends up being the most generic fight, which is sad considering it features three Flash's. Two vibration punches later and the winner is declared.

The final battle is the cover bout and main event of this issue, the battle of the Wonder Women. The battle saw Amazonia Wonder Woman killing the Justice Riders version with a sucker punch to the back of the neck. Now, she might not actually be dead, but the art shows her with her head on sideways, so it looked pretty definitive to me. The two remaining Wonder's turn their attention to each other and Amazonia comes out the victor over the Cold War-era Wonder Woman.

Aside from the fights, there was the backdrop of the newly vampiric Liberty Files Batman rallying the troops for one last desparate attack against Monarch. He's deduced that Monarch is a Captain Atom and that it is conceivable that the other Atom's would know how to stop him. He gives the device the Blue Beetle was making last issue to one of the Captain Atoms and sends him off around the Multiverse with it to gather other versions of himself with the hope they can stop Monarch. The issue ended with several Captain Atom variations all gathered together for next week's finale.

Verdict - Check It. I really don't know if I like this book or hate it. It's fun to see hero fights. It's just something fans always wonder about, but it all feels so cheap and inconsequential and I have no idea what Monarch is hoping to accomplish. He discarded Forerunner, who proved stronger than just about everyone, including entire Justice Leagues, on most Earths, so why gather weaker people in the first place? The art is still atrocious, too.

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