Book Review for Library Read-a-thon book #12: 52 vol #2

Book: 52 volume #2 (issues #14-26) by Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Greg Rucka and Mark Waid with illustrations by various artist (art breakdowns by Keith Giffen)

Source: Library

Rating: 3 1/2 stars

Review:

I thought the second volume was good but perhaps not as good as the first. The scenes with Lobo didn't really make any sense and felt like they were a filler. Starfire, Animal Man and Adam Strange's story would have been a lot more interesting without including Lobo. Another story I thought felt like it was a filler was Ralph Dibny's mystical journey.

But the story with Steel and niece Natasha continues to be really good. I get a feeling that Natasha is going to learn the hard way that dealing with Lex Luthor leads to nothing but trouble. And thanks to Luthor's project, there are more and more "heroes" popping up and they are causing more trouble than the villains.

Black Adam's agenda seemed to have changed and he doesn't seem to be trying to force his "peaceful" ways on the rest of the world but others are not buying his change of heart and it had the US reinstating the organization Checkmate to keep an eye on the situation.

Renee Montoya and The Question continue their search for Intergang this time in Kahndaq, however they ended up getting framed for a crime they didn't commit. However, they were able to get away and put a stop to one of Intergang's bombing plots.

Meanwhile, in Metropolis the hero Supernova continues to garner more attention which is the last thing Booster Gold wants to hear about especially since his popularity has dropped immensely due to being found out as being a fraud. There's also something going on with Skeets.

Wonder Girl doesn't seem to be working with that cult anymore but she's still sad about Superboy's death and somehow thinks Supernova maybe Conner.

There are even more things occurring in this volume but I don't think the stories were as cohesive as with the first volume. It felt like most of the stories were all over the place. But I did enjoy seeing the Teen Titans and a few other characters show up in this and Clark Kent continues to make a few appearances.

So, this wasn't as good as I was hoping it would be but I'm still looking forward to reading volume #3.