REVIEW: Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #43

Bizarro World is literally falling apart, and times is running out to save it in the finale to Bizarro World Tour in Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #43. The last stories that ended in three issues in this series tend to have a habit of wrapping up in ways that work against it –either it wraps up to quickly and feels everywhere at once or something that happened in an earlier issue was just more spectacular than the intended finale. This issue misses that trap. 

Dan Mora brings the new villain Brainzarro to the cover. Demented Brainiacs are an underrated take on what is meant to be a cold and calculating character. Absolute Superman proves they can still be appealing. One this cover it’s hard to tell if Batzarro and Bizarro are with him or against him. It’s also kind of misleading because it builds Brainzarro to be the finale villain.

Mark Spears is the perfect artist to draw Bizarro because of his work on classic monsters like Dracula and Frankenstein. And it just so happens that Bizarro is partly inspired by Frankenstein. Spears brings Bizarro, in what could be based on his first appearance, in glorious photorealism. The cracks on his pale skin really do look like stitches from a far. The classic trading card border instead of the usual banners is unexpected but welcome.

Adrian Gutierrez gives us what could be the last cover to feature Bizarro and Batzarro for a while. The best part about these issues is seeing lesser known or used characters back on the front of them. Batzarro will be missed, and it was great seeing him again. This variant also takes all the elements of Batman and Superman covers like Gotham City and Metropolis but inverts them –even down to the colors. 

Variants featuring Batman and Superman are available from Dustin Nguyen and James Harren. 

Brainzarro was not the one responsible for the sanity pandemic on Bizarro World. It was some space explorer who knew of the planet’s coming destruction, but none of the Bizarros would listen with reason being taboo on their world. The explorer instead created a virus that would change their thinking to what is considered normal, but this led to chaos –even for Bizarro World standards. Now, it’s all coming to a head. Bizarro and Superman head to the planet core to stabilize it. 

Meanwhile, Batzarro, Batman, and Robin have their own theory to test regarding the unorthodox science and physics that make up Bizarro World. It’s actually elaborated on disturbingly well. They’re also continuing to try and find a cure for the inhabitants of Bizarro World. In order to do that, they seek out renowned Bizarro World chemist Bizarro Bibbo –guess the opposite of bartender is chemist. It’s the World’s Finest vs. planetary destruction and Bizarro extinction all at once. 

For the last couple of story arcs that ended in three issues, Mark Waid has had some trouble giving them satisfying endings. The Eclipso story felt rushed with several things happening at once. While the Atlantis story ended more on pace and gave satisfying emotional conclusions, it did very little to top the action of the previous issues. Waid may have been able to top Brainzarro as an antagonist, but he does give Superman and Batman the next best thing to fight against –natural disasters. But with that said, this is also the second story in this series to deal with an evil virus. Letters are by Steve Wands. 

If you love seeing Superman red streaking around the pages then this is the issue for you with art and colors by Sean Izaakse, Adrian Gutierrez, and Matt Herms. There’s a certain art form to watching Superman avert natural and planetary disasters. He goes about it like maintenance on an oil ring –speedily swimming, or in his case flying, to all the points that demand his attention. Superman does this on a planetary scale all the time. We also don’t leave Bizarro World without meeting a couple more residents. Like the rest we’ve seen, they’re also pastiches of supporting Superman characters. That’s always a delight. 

(8/10) Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #43 avoids the same traps that previous concluding arc issues fell into. It also reminds us that superheroes rescue, and advert disasters as opposed to just beating and subduing villains, even though we often like to see the latter.