The New 52: Futures End #20 Review
By Steve Lam
Writers: Brian Azzarello, Keith Giffen, Dan Jurgens, Jeff Lemire
Artists: Aaron Lopresti, Art Thibert, Ryan Sook
Futures End #19 Recap
At TerrifiTech, Plastique discovers her dead, future, cyborg self. At The Fast Lane, Shazam implores Lois not to expose the fact that he’s impersonating Superman. In the Huron System, Ray Palmer is informed by Stormlord, overseer of Stormwatch, that he’ll be the leader of a new Stormwatch team. Ray also learns that Brainiac is alive and well. On Cadmus Island, Deathstroke and Lana Lang have a fight with Powergirl. Fifty Sue soon tells them that Brother Eye controls all of Cadmus Island and its inhabitants, but she was able to make a deal where their group remains unharmed. She quickly leaves to find Grifter, in order to remove the Brother Eye implant from him. In New York City, as Tim Drake browses The Fast Lane, we learn that Lois has gone public with the information that Shazam has been posing as Superman.
Spoiler-Free Reaction
Futures End #20 didn’t provide a lot of compelling mysteries or teases for the next issue, but it did provide a shocking moment which makes us beg for the type of storytelling seen in Futures End #0.
Plot Details and Spoilers and Deaths: Oh My!
Metropolis: Tim Drake (now known as Cal Cororan) breaks into the offices of The Fast Lane. He finds Lois Lane already waiting for him. Tim wants to make sure that since Lois outed Shazam as Superman, she’s not going to do the same to him — expose him as Red Robin. Tim then tells Lois the reasons behind him changing his identity and giving up being a superhero: during the war, he saw the killing of Wonder Girl and was saved by Red Arrow from a Parademon. After a bomb knocks him out, he’s brought to a hospital where no one knew his identity. Taking advantage of the situation, Tim chose to go into hiding. Noticing the box of mysterious paraphernalia on Lois’s desk, Tim identifies that the red arrow in the box is the same one that Red Arrow shot to save Tim from a Parademon. Tim then reinforces the idea that the coordinates still point to something valid in that location, but refuses to go with Lois.
Thirty-five years from now, New York City: Mr. Terrific is held prisoner in his own home by Brother Eye. In a conversation with Brother Eye, Mr. Terrific learns that Bruce Wayne was able to send an agent back in time to stop the events leading up to this future. Attempting to find out how Bruce was able to build a time-travel device, Brother Eye opened Bruce’s skull and extracted the information from his brain.
Cadmus Island: Grifter, Deathstroke, Fifty Sue, and Lana Lang are able to make it into King Faraday’s office. They find that he hasn’t been compromised, but is a prisoner nonetheless. After a cautious and humorous conversation about a plan (cautious because they fear Brother Eye is spying on them), Fifty Sue says that she has a plan to free the island from Brother Eye. Even though the surveillance equipment has been destroyed by Faraday, the team is still paranoid. Fifty Sue then claims that she has a secure location where they can hash out their plans.
New York City: As the Key and Coil sit in a cell at TerrifiTech, they’re visited by Mr. Terrific. Impressed by their ability to break into the building, Mr. Terrific proposes a deal: give him the name of who they’re working for and be able to work for him in security, or serve a life sentence. The two quickly give Mr. Terrific the name of “Bruce Wayne.”
Above the Wounded Duck (Tim Drake’s Apartment): Tim comes clean to Madison and reveals that he is in fact Red Robin. Madison, feeling betrayed and lied to, storms out.
Wrapping It Up
Futures End #20 is one of those rarer issues from the series that seemed to have more than one plotline pick up directly from the last issue. We get some continuation for the revelation of Shazam as Superman, the events on Cadmus Island, and the TerrifiTech heist. Overall, the issue was pretty average and didn’t have a lot of action. Most of the exposition was relegated to dialogue and future plans. The one thing that truly stood out for this issue was when they flash-forwarded thirty-five years into the future, where we see an older Bruce Wayne with his brain exposed and invaded by Brother Eye. These are the scenes I missed most about Futures End. The writers still need to strike a good balance of giving us some high-impact scenes that aren’t just done for shock, but pushes the story forward.