Another One Turns To Dust
The Martian Manhunter's storyline concludes.in a less epic manner than Aquaman's but still in a far more satisfying one than the Hawks' as J'onn J'onzz deals with his new nemesis and chooses his home.
DC has really screwed up the pacing of Martian Manhunter's storyline in this series. Five issues went by before this one without really touching on J'onn, and when we last did, it was that really poorly done dream sequence issue. So really, issue twelve was the last time we really had a satisfying chapter. This storyline has probably suffered the most from Brightest Day narrowing its focus to only one or two characters at a time, and it hurt so much mostly because the Martian Manhunter has had one of the better stories of this series. Thankfully, this issue does manage to regain some of the momentum lost.
J'onn probably has one of the most personal stories in Brightest Day as he is confronted with another surviving Green Martian. It is less about preventing something like an invasion than it is fighting against having all his hopes and dreams perverted. This makes it the strongest character story of Brightest Day, and it could have been the best had it not been left out of the spotlight so much in the second half of the series.
My one big disappointment with how this story concludes is the fate of D'kay D'razz. It seems like such a wasteful thing to do with the character, because unlike the pointlessness and lameness of Queen Shrike, D'kay actually makes for a very compelling villain. The premise of D'kay as a twisted Eve to J'onn's Adam is pretty brilliant, and her character design is definitely unique and interesting. Not to mention that Martian Manhunter is in some dire need of good villains, as the Human Flame proved in Final Crisis. So what happens with D'kay in this issue is just a bad decision on DC's part.
This brings me to something that is bothering me about the Entity. Yes, there is even more than bothers me about the Entity. What we have generally seen of all these embodiments is that they are very single-minded, giving almost no consideration to anything other than one they embody. Nekron wants everything to just die. Parallax torments everyone he can. The Butcher is all about the payback. The Entity of life... kills, and that is what bothers me. I am not referring to what seemingly happens when the resurrected complete their missions, which I will get to next. I mean that more than one of these missions the Entity assigned involves ending someone's life. For example, Max Lord was sent out to kill Magog. It just seems antithetical for the Entity to be willing to kill. It is like the Butcher being willing to forgive or Ophidian doing charity work.
The heroes now are aware that the Entity seems to be attacking the people it resurrected upon the completion of their missions. Jade, who completed her mission so fast you could have blinked and missed it, is standing among all these heroes as they figure it out and it is ignored how the Entity never came after her. Max Lord and Reverse Flash have also been left alone so far. I have to wonder if there is any real reason for this besides DC not wanting to reveal what the Entity would do until the scene with the Hawks. If that's the case, they should have planned the story better.
Brightest Day has some inconsistencies and flaws that are catching up to it, but this conclusion to the Martian Manhunter's story is still one of the stronger issues of the series. The fate of D'kay is disappointing for the reasons I have said. Still, the emotional weight of the confrontation plays out really well, and this is a very good showing for J'onn J'onzz.
