There may be no such thing as bad publicity, but there is certainly such a thing as too much hype.

Identity Crisis is pretty good.  A beloved character is killed, and the DC heroes rally round to attend her funeral and investigate her death.  (By the way, I'm not going to keep her identity secret.  I figure that pretty much everyone who cares has read the issue by now.)  The series is apparently meant to be a murder mystery. 

It's a strong first issue, which really makes you believe that all these disparate characters cared that strongly about the deceased.  Plenty of neat little character moments, and a nice take on her relationship with her husband, with both happily going through established rituals even though they know the other one isn't really going to be surprised.  It's a comfortingly stable relationship of the sort that cheap drama and chronic lack of imagination normally preclude.

Artists Rags Morales and Michael Bair are well cast for the material.  They provide charming, fairly traditional superhero art which supports the story rather than trying to be flashy, adding to the depth of the characters with solid acting.

It's a good comic, as I say.  The difficulty is that DC has chosen to promote it as the second coming of Christ.  The cover strap - "The comics event of the year begins here!" - can be safely ignored because nobody ever pays the slightest attention to claims that something is "the comics event of the year."  But DC have also been pushing this one aggressively for newspaper coverage, resulting in some baffling articles in which (following a no doubt helpful discussion with DC's PR people) journalists have solemnly reported that Identity Crisis has been compared to Watchmen.

Let's be absolutely clear about this: oh no it hasn't, and on the strength of this issue, I would be astonished if it ever was.  It's a good genre piece, primarily superheroics (mid-to-late eighties vintage) with a dash of murder mystery.  Perfectly solid idea.  Does it well.  But let's keep a sense of perspective here.  This is not a ground breaking title.

DC have also bizarrely decided to hype the story around a major death.  Depending on your definition of "major", I suppose the Elongated Man's wife might conceivably qualify.  She has, after all, been around for years.  But Sue Dibny is really a long-established supporting player rather than a truly major character.  The Marvel equivalent would be to kill somebody like Edwin Jarvis, an established part of the landscape who never actually does anything.

If you took the hype seriously, you might well be sorely disappointed.  Ignore the hype, which vastly overplays its hand in promoting this perfectly decent - indeed, comfortably above average - comic.  Take it at face value instead, as a story rather than an "event", and it'll be a much better read.

Rating: B+

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