Rating: *** 1/2*

The Blackest Night makes its way to Smallville in this first issue of Blackest Night: Superman as Black Lanterns resurrect the deceased Earth 2 Superman and Lois Lane. Our story begins with Pete Ross and some local Smallville townsfolk talking amongst themselves when they notice something flying in the sky. Being a Superman comic, someone is guaranteed to utter the famous “Is that a bird?” quote. Well it’s not a bird of course, but it’s instead the resurrected body of Kal-L, the Superman of Earth 2 as a Black Lantern. He arrives in Smallville and makes his way to the Kent farm where Superman, Superboy, and Krypto are sitting down for coffee with Martha Kent. 

I love that Conner is back and Superman has a “brother” of sorts; I love the little family that DC is developing here. I would have Supergirl start to develop a yearning to become a part of this family and have her mother become jealous—this would cause a big rift between them, resulting in a throw down with Superman and Allura with Supergirl caught in between. Speaking of which, we see Zor-El become a Black Lantern on New Krypton later in the issue. 

Superman and Superboy hear something and race to the cemetery where Jonathan Kent is buried. His grave is empty, and there stands Black Lantern Earth 2 Superman; he says that they will be seeing him soon. I would love to see a Black Lantern Jonathan Kent go up against Superman—how heart-wrenching would that be for Superman to fight his own father!

Back at the Kent farm house, we see Black Lantern Lois Lane of Earth 2 beat up Krypto and kidnap Martha. Superman and Superboy battle E2 Superman. E2 Superman hurts Superboy, which causes him to lose consciousness. Superman rescues him and they return to the Kent farm only to find it destroyed. They listen for Martha’s heart beat and head into town. There, they find it deserted except for Black Lanterns E2 Superman and E2 Lois holding Martha captive. We end there.

A good issue, but I found the flow of the dialogue to be a bit off as I read it. An interesting thing that I saw here was that I’m not sure whether this has been done in other Blackest Night books but, the Black Lanterns can “see” a person’s emotions, which result in them turning into the color of one of the various power rings that exist (Green=Will Power; Yellow=Fear; Red=Rage, etc). The Black Lanterns are also going after some of the residents of Smallville as well. With each body that’s taken over, their power level continues to grow. They’re almost up to 4%

A good start to this series, and I’m looking forward to reading the rest. Superman writer James Robinson provides the story here while artist Eddy Barrows does the art—Barrows’s art is very good.  I don’t read Action Comics, so this is my first introduction to his work. Pick this one up—it’s lots of fun.