BLACKHAWK is one of those great books I grew up with as a kid. I was lucky enough to be able to read them during their mid-Sixties run and then again when they were resurrected in the mid-Seventies. I even got lucky enough to get my hands on some of the truly CLASSIC stories from the 1940's and 1950's, not to mention Howard Chaykin's reboot in the 1980's.
So, when DC announced a new BLACKHAWKS series as part of the NEW 52, I was pretty excited.
Man-talk about a major bummer. Someone PLEASE tell me this is truly an alternate reality version or a bad dream. Let's start with the cover. Who the hell are these guys? SERIOUSLY!!! Where's the cool looking outfits? This looks like a bad B-Movie poster. Where's the Lady Blackhawk I crushed on as a kid and even found a warm spot in my heart with her appearances in BIRDS OF PREY? And who let this guy who stole Magneto's hair end up front and center.
Okay-on to the plot. This shouldn't take long...I hope!
They are on a covert mission to Kazakhstan. The team is made up of Lady Blackhawk, The Irishman(oh-that's original!), Kundichi, Attila and Wildman. Okay-can't totally rag on this. I mean the classic team did have an International flair with names like Andre, Olaf, Stanislaus and a cook named Chop-Chop. Anyway, the mission is far from covert with Kundichi dropping terrorists out of planes and plenty of fireworks on the ground. Also on the ground: someone with a Smart Phone getting images.
Delegate Schmidt pays a visit to the mountain top stronghold called The Eyrie. By the way, he's escorted by a dark-skinned member of the team named Canada. Okay-now this is getting ridiculous! Attila gets patched up by the doctor while Kundichi gets busy with Wildman. Hey-it's the NEW 52. Everyone is having sex these days! So Delegate Schmidt meets with Andrew Lincoln, who I guess is Blackhawk but is certainly rocking the Scott Summers look.
Yeah-we've got a problem as this covert mission is no all over the Internet.
Meanwhile, in a Asian Meta-Human facility, some woman in some kind of hooked up power suit fries some Russian subservient. And Kundichi bolts out of Wildman's bed and discovers she has been infected with some sort of Nanobite. That can't be good!
If this is the new take on an old classic it's pretty lame. The dialogue by Mike Costa is badly cliched and the story is just plain awful. I know we need to set up the characters and such but I really don't care about any of them. Make THEM the Suicide Squad and blow them up on the next mission. PLEASE!!! Graham Nolan's artwork is far from his best and it looks like he was just going through the motions on this one.
Maybe it's because I long for the classic simplicity of the old series or maybe I'm just hankering for them to whip out the old XF5F Skyrocket they used to fly, just for ONE PANEL. This is just another glossy team book with no soul.
BTW: the mysterious hooded woman is on page 8 watching someone take a picture of the covert mission.
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