Knight Terrors is the first big event of the Dawn Of DC era for DC Comics. While we had Lazarus Planet at the beginning of the year that was not a cohesive event. Lazarus Event was a collection of one-shots with one main theme across them. Knight Terrors is a full big event that the entire DC Universe is being involved with, including pausing current ongoings for the month of July and August. In the place of the normal ongoing titles DC Comics is going to be publishing two issue mini-series as a replacement to coincide with Joshua Williamson’s main Knight Terrors event. As a prelude to their latest event we are kicking things off with Knight Terrors: First Blood. How will this one-shot set-up DC Comics latest big event? Lets find out with Knight Terrors: First Blood.
CREATIVE TEAM
Writer: Joshua Williamson
Artist: Howard Porter
Colorist: Brad Anderson
Letterer: Troy Peteri
SYNOPSIS
Dr. Destiny is attacked within his dream and overpowered by a mysterious force that defeats him inside a nightmare version of the Hall of Justice.
Later, Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman, with Deadman following them, discover Dr. Destiny’s body pinned on the Justice League meeting table. Harley Quinn calls the Trinity about something odd going on with John Dee (Dr. Destiny’s identity) body in Arkham Tower.
Deadman takes over Batman for a short period to provide a warning about a primordial being is responsible for the fusion of the realm of dreams and world of death being connected and having an impact on Earth.
The Trinity split up to respond to the crisis while Amanda Waller is shown also responding in her own way.
At Arkham Tower everyone is taken over by a primordial being coming out of Dr. Destiny’s real body. Batman and Harley Quinn try to fight back but even with the “No Sleep Till Gotham” protocol Batman falls to whoever is causing the current crisis.
At the same time, Superman, Wonder Woman, Zatanna, and other heroes across the world also fall into a nightmare world.
Before Batman completely falls Deadman takes over his body. He is immediately confronted by Insomnia inside Joker’s body. Insomnia demands Deadman join him in finding the Nightmare Stone. End of issue.
REVIEW
In terms of establishing the mission statement for a big event Knight Terrors: First Blood accomplishes that. But even then there are many things about the set-up for Knight Terrors that make this an event that will need to give a bigger reason than just everyone being asleep to pause all of DC Comics publishing line-up. Not fully selling this aspect of the event is where Knight Terrors: First Blood falls very short.
Joshua Williamson makes it clear that this event is being caused by the newest big bad of the DC Universe named Insomnia. The opening of Knight Terrors: First Blood works to establish how powerful Insomnia is with how it single-handedly took down Dr. Destiny without much effort. Dr. Destiny is the right character to feed Insomnia to establish their threat level. Because while Dr. Destiny has been shown as a big threat even the Justice League have trouble against he is not utilized very often. By defeating Dr. Destiny Joshua Williamson and Howard Porter are able to put over Insomnia’s power level.
That power level is further established with how much of a horror villain Insomnia turns out to be. Everything about how Insomnia utilizes the nightmare world is terrifying. You get how the way they bring in the nightmare world with the real world makes Insomnia a threat that the Trinity have trouble with. The biggest factor in this is how unexpected Insomnia’s attack was. There was no warning or time given for our heroes to counter. Insomnia showed that pinning Dr. Destiny’s dream body within the Hall of Justice was to split up the Trinity to make them and other heroes easy targets to take down.
So in terms of threat level, Knight Terrors: First Blood accomplishes that for Insomnia for a big event villain. But even with that in mind the concept of the DC Universes heroes and villains facing off against their worst nightmares is a story that has enough legs to cause a stoppage of the entire publishing line. This is a core concept that comes across that if you read more than Williamson’s main Knight Terrors event you will quickly grow bored with the story.
It doesn’t help that Insomnia is taking out everyone. Because as we see in Knight Terrors: First Blood, Insomnia’s minions are nameless blobs of that look like Venom’s Symbiote got a demonic upgrade. It creates a mess to keep up with in terms of action. Its not a very good first impression when it comes to what we can expect when it comes to the action set pieces Knight Terrors is going to have.
Because all this Deadman’s role in the story is a hit and miss. In terms of capturing Deadman’s voice Williamson shows he understands how to write Boston Brand’s character. At the same time, Williamson does a very poor job at building up Deadman as the protagonist of the story. There is very little to hang hope that Deadman is the one that can save the day. Williamson is going to need to do a much better job at this aspect of this event to get have the buy in of Deadman in Batman’s body being more than just a visual.
It doesn’t help Knight Terrors: First Blood that Howard Porter struggles to keep the artwork consistent. You can tell that Porter prioritize certain pages over the other. This is something never good as even when certain panels don’t have as much detail as others this is normally hidden by the artist. A problem Porter runs into is that because of how chaotic things are in Knight Terrors: First Blood he leans on the messiness of the visual storytelling, specifically in pages where the horror aspects aren’t as heavily emphasized. There is a lack of flow to the story art because of this, making the lack of consistency even more apparent.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Knight Terrors: First Blood does what it needs to do to set-up Dawn Of DC’s first big event. Joshua Williamson does an effective job at putting over Insomnia as a major threat. Unfortunately, the story of Knight Terrors is one that comes across as one that can get old fast. Given the horror tone of this story Knight Terrors is not set-up to be a must-have for DC Comics fans. At least not with this prelude chapter. Because of that you are left questioning if it was a good idea to dedicate the majority of DC Comics publishing line to Knight Terrors for the next two months.
Story Rating: 5 Night Girls out of 10
Art Rating: 4 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 4.5 Night Girls out of 10