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Sep 11, 2011 DC New 52 By Jeremy Nisen

What a pleasant surprise. DC Comics’ publisher Dan Didio’s turns at writing have been a mixed bag. His run on Superboy way back when was pretty good, but his recent efforts with The Outsiders were, simply put, not good.

Accordingly, if you’d asked me last week which relaunched comic book being worked on by a DC co-publisher I was looking more forward to, I’d definitely have answered Jim Lee’s Justice League #1 (reviewed here). But the fact is, I gave them the same rating…and I think I liked O.M.A.C. just a little better. Of course, Keith Giffen’s art has a lot to do with that.

O.M.A.C. is an acronym standing for “One Man Army Corp,” and was originally a creation of Jack “The King” Kirby. His is a very iconic look, with a huge mohawk and blue skin. There have been a few interpretations of O.M.A.C. even recently, but this one is more or less back to basics—a big, blue ass kicker capable of extraordinary violence who’s receiving his commands from an unseen, robotic master.

The story of Kevin Kho, who appears to be the new unwilling host for the O.M.A.C. identity, is pretty compelling—O.M.A.C. tears through a lab at Cadmus Industries (well known home to much super science gone amok in the DC universe). In doing so, O.M.A.C. scuffles with Kirby creations and Kirby-like creations, and Giffen’s art is definitely paying homage to the king in mimicking much of Kirby’s style. Indeed, the art in this book is ultra-kinetic and lends to fairly dense action-centric storytelling. And there’s goofy stuff like a ray gun coming out of a woman’s mouth to blast O.M.A.C. at one point.

This is what I’d call good old fashioned comics. I don’t know how well the book fits with what I perceive to be the point of DC’s “New 52” initiative/line-wide reboot. To my mind, this is comics for comics fans; Kirby-style creatures and faces and poses are lovely but I’ll admit they are an acquired taste. Still, for me, this is a fun book that surprised on the upside. (www.dccomics.com)

Author rating: 7/10