City Boy is another six-issue limited series that spins out of Lazarus Planet. We have already examined The Vigil which is the other mini-series spawning forth from Lazarus Planet. City Boy stars a South Korean superhero named Cameron Kim who is also known as City Boy. City Boy’s superpower is to speak to cities in order to find lost and hidden treasures and goods to pawn. Kim has already made friends with Gotham City.
The creative team for City Boy is Greg Pak and artists Minkyu Jung and Sunny Gho. That is a great creative team. Pak is a veteran writer with a long resume of writing some excellent superhero stories. Minkyu Jung is an incredibly talented South Korean artist. Jung has produced plenty of slick superhero artwork over his career.
With this creative team, there is no doubt in my mind that City Boy will be well-written and beautiful to look at. I love Kim’s codename City Boy. It is very much a Legion of Super-Heroes codename. City Boy’s power is also a quirky power that is reminiscent of the Legion with the various Legionnaires who possess unusual powers.
I am unsure how the ability to take to a city is going to be employed to make City Boy a compelling superhero. This is rather unique and is going to be a real challenge for Pak in making this story interesting. Despite my concerns, I am intrigued by such a unique power and I am curious to see what Pak has in store for us.
Rokk’s Excitement Level: 8 Night Girls out of 10. This is a really good creative team that DC Comics has put on City Boy. This is a unique gimmick and a pretty cool-looking character. The cities of the DCU have always been almost characters themselves and have been important pillars in the foundation of the DCU. I am curious to see City Boy communicating with Gotham City, Metropolis, Keystone, Central City, Coast City, and others. Each DCU city has its own distinct personality and I am interested to see how Pak fleshes out those personalities in this story.
Rokk’s Prediction: I have to set aside my personal bias when predicting what type of sales success City Boy is going to have in the sales rankings. I may like this creative team and I may be willing to give this new character a try, but I am not feeling confident in City Boy being a strong seller.
Greg Pak has been writing for Marvel Comics since 2004 and started writing for DC Comics in 2013. Pak definitely has tons of experience. However, Pak has always had lots of ups and downs and hits and misses in the sales rankings. So, I do not think that Pak is a writer that is going to draw a big readership just with his name. Nor is Pak the kind of writer who always hits the ball out of the park with every title.
City Boy will be spinning out of Lazarus Planet. To this date, Lazarus Planet has been all over the sales rankings. Lazarus Planet Alpha #1 debuted at the number 13 spot. Lazarus Planet Assault on Krypton #1 debuted at the number 47 spot. Lazarus Planet We Once Were Gods #1 debuted at the number 79 spot.
Monkey Prince is another Asian superhero closely tied to Lazarus Planet. Monkey Prince #1 debuted at the number 24 spot in the sales rankings. Monkey Prince #2-6 averaged the number 179 spot in the sales rankings. Monkey Prince #7-8 were both unranked and outside of the Top 200. Monkey Prince #9-10 averaged the number 186 spot in the sales rankings.
So, in the end, I think City Boy has a chance to debut in the Top 50. But, I think that City Boy will quickly drop out of the Top 100. I do feel that City Boy has a chance of finishing the six-issue mini-series in the Top 150.
Conclusion: City Boy is a character with an interesting power. I am excited for Pak to delve into the various personalities of the iconic cities in the DCU. I am going to give Pak two issues to hook me before I drop this title.