The Rot Causes A New Bloom
I have one, and only one, real complaint about this issue, and it mostly gets resolved. At the end of the previous issue, Frankenstein laments his wife's departure from S.H.A.D.E., but resigns himself to continue, as it is all he has left. At the beginning of this issue he's seriously considering leaving S.H.A.D.E. for the same reasons his wife did. But then the character development that revolves around this pretty much fixes that hiccup.
Now that we've got that out of the way I can gush, because I loved this issue. This is exactly what I loved about the series from the start, but better. Amazingly enough, this issue works perfectly fine without having read Animal Man (Though if you haven't, shame on you!) because it doesn't dig too deep into the inner workings or the other characters. The Rot is a massive force, and Frankenstein is simply encountering it, and having his own experience with it.
Thus, it's a side story that offers no real developments for the ongoing Rot saga. It isn't necessary for Animal Man, and Animal Man isn't necessary for this. (But again, honestly, why would you WANT to exclude one?). So this is starting to sound like a useless filler issue right? WRONG! Ok ok, a big chunk of what I liked in this issue is Frankenstien being the same stoic badas he always is, and demonstrating more of it than any other issue imo. More awesome dialogue and general badassery, and some fun dialogue and everything. But there's also a LOT of character development, even some for Nina. Frankenstein's beginning to question his mission, his purpose, and his entire being. And The Rot's rejection of him really doesn't help. But Nina is there to serve as an interesting counterpart to drive him back to where he does his best work.
But is that the best thing for him? Father Time is starting to show a much darker side, definitely not evil, but certainly detached from general human empathy and compassion. Father Time certainly does benefit mankind, but he's so focused on science that he rarely bothers to consider tact. This really clashes with Frankenstein's unwavering devotion to justice in its purest form. Nina is right in the middle. She's a true scientist, not even a fighter, but she's far more in touch with her feelings than either other honestly. The three of them form an interesting trinity.
But what completely made this issue was the new inker. The past few issues made me realize the importance of having the right inker, as Alberto Ponticelli inked his own pencils for the first few issues, then Walden Wong recently; and the quality of the art was drastically changed. It was still obviously Ponticelli, but the clean thin lines made his art look horrendous. But now for the forseeable future, we've got Wayne Faucher on inks, and he's actually BETTER than Ponticelli's own inking. This is probably the best looking issue, despite occasional oddness in Father Time and Nina's faces.
In Conclusion: 5/5
THIS is the kind of thing I've been expecting from this series. Extreme stoic badassery from Frankenstein, nice character development, some heartwarming moments, great pacing, great story, weird stuff, and crazy artwork. I can overlook some oddities in the faces of Nina and Father Time, I'm getting used to it. But the presence of the new inker has made so much of a difference; but not only that, this issue is far better paced than the last few. It might seem sad to know Lemire is leaving, but the new writer Matt Kindt is apparently good friends with Lemire, and actually helped him out a bit with the story planning for Frankenstein. So he'll be using the same plans and notes, and likely giving us more of what we've come to expect from this series. So I'm looking forward to see what Matt Kindt can do, maybe Lemire was struggling the past few issues due to all his writing, maybe he didn't have enough time. Maybe Kindt will be an improvement because we'll get the series by someone without the other responsibilities Lemire has. I think Lemire will hopefully improve Justice League Dark, and Kindt will improve this, and the New 52 will have had some of their more interesting titles polished to a greater shine.