War of the Multiverses

 
Dark Nights: Death Metal
War of the Multiverses

DC Comics
2021

 

 

War of the Multiverses is another companion volume to the main Dark Nights:Death Metal story. There are two issues in here, the first a collection of very short comics about how various heroes spent their last night before the final battle, the second another collection of shorts showing various heroes fighting their evil multiversal counterparts while giant metal Wonder Woman dukes it out with giant evil Batman Who Laughs.

 
I mean no disrespect when I say that some comicbook writing has a very fanfic sensebility to it. You like Silver Age Superman? Here's a comic about his girlfriend Lois Lane, and the mischief she gets up to in between his issues. Here's another comic about his best friend Jimmy Olsen, and the mischief he gets up to. Here's a whole comic of retrocontinuity flasbacks to Superman's childhood adventures as SuperBOY in Kansas. Here's a comic about the time Superboy went 1000 years in the future, in between issues of the other comic. Etc.

 
To say nothing of the content of these stories, I associate fanfic with the urge to 'fill in the setting' by telling new stories that take place in between the major plot events and showing what minor characters were supposedly up to while they were off-camera. (In terms of content, there might be particular kinds of stories that often get slotted into those positions, but let's leave that aside for now.)

 
If this extra material had been interwoven with the main story, maybe it would have made the whole thing seem grander and more epic. Although honestly, there might simply be too much material here for that technique to work, even in an omnibus edition.

 
But collected separately like this, and read afterward, these vignettes feel like fanfic elaborations. Which is not to say I didn't enjoy any of them! They varied a lot in quality. I liked all the various Teen Titans having a low-key party before the big fight, and weirdly, the Penguin fighting his even eviler twins was one of the best battle stories.