Superman/Wonder Woman, Volume 2: War and Peace

Superman/Wonder Woman

by Charles Soule (Writer), Tony S. Daniel (Illustrator), Pascal Alixe (Illustrator)

The dust may have settled in Smallville after Superman’s encounter with Doomsday, but the Man of Steel did not escape unscathed: infected by Doomsday’s toxic virus, Superman is slowly turning into a greater threat to Earth than the alien monster ever was.

Soon the plague that affected Clark Kent’s hometown has spread to Metropolis, and the new “Super Doom” is leaving a path of destruction across the planet. Wonder Woman alone believes her partner can still be saved – will she be proven right, or will she be forced to do the unthinkable in order to save the world?

Writer Charles Soule and artist Tony S. Daniel lead an all-star creative team in SUPERMAN/WONDER WOMAN: WAR AND PEACE, chronicling the world's most powerful couple as they face down Doomsday!

Collects: Superman/Wonder Woman #8-12, Annual #1, Futures End #1 and Wonder Woman Futures End #1.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Dc Comics, Superman, Wonder Woman, Superheroes, Fantasy

224 pages, Paperback

First published March 24, 2015

About the author

Charles Soule is a #1 New York Times-bestselling novelist, comics author, screenwriter, musician, and lapsed attorney. He has written some of the most prominent stories of the last decade for Marvel, DC and Lucasfilm in addition to his own work, such as his comics Curse Words, Letter 44 and Undiscovered Country, and his original novels Light of the Jedi, The Endless Vessel, The Oracle Year and Anyone. He lives in New York.

Reviews

[Jayson]

(C+) 67% | Almost Satisfactory
Notes: Striking writing and art, but doesn't mean squat, contextually fraught, nearly all of the book's only fragments of plot.

*Progress updates: Preamble ◦ Issues #8-12, Annual #1

[Anne]

The writing isn't horrible & the art is nice, but this is one hell of a stupid volume. I'm not blaming Soule, this is just another one of DC's event fuck-ups.
Why they do this is just beyond my comprehension. This isn't a straight volume about Superman and Wonder Woman. It's Superman: Doomed, but without the rest of the issues to fill in the blanks. You need the rest of that story for this volume to make any great deal of sense.
And the best part?
Save yourself a few bucks and just buy Doomed, because everything in this volume is also in that one. I'm halfway through it right now, and I feel like I'm doing a re-read.
Only, you know, with the blanks filled in...



The gist is that Superman was infected with spores from Doomsday when he destroyed him (which you have to read about in Doomed), and now he's actually turning into Doomsday. Wonder Woman & Batman won't give up on him, but the government releases an aerosol version of Kryptonite that blankets the planet in order to drive Superman away.



Lois has been taken over by Brainiac, and she's got mind control powers now.
And it appears Clark drunk dialed her? Hmmm. Interesting.
Wonder if this is the beginning of the end for our Power Couple?



There's a Future's End story in the back of the volume, and (once again) I felt like I was missing a huge chunk of the story, so it didn't have any real impact on me. However, it's wasn't badly written, either.



I just can't recommend that anyone spend money on this when they won't be getting the full story. If you can find it at your library, or borrow it from a friend? Sure. Why not?
But if you want to know the whole story, you're still better off just reading Doomed, and getting it all in one shot.

[Chad]

Skip this collection and read Superman: Doomed instead. You're only getting about 25% of the story reading just this one collection and you're going to be really confused. I hate when DC does this.

[Calista]

Ok, I don't really see how we got from Vol. 1 to this. I guess the other single lines for Superman and Wonder Woman played a role.

I didn't really care for the last two volumes that was 5 years ahead. It connected to nothing and made little sense. I don't really care for the first one. I have decided to read some more of the Superman & Wonder Woman Volumes, but I really feel that DC has not done service to either one and they are both off character. They are not fun to read and they are simply a mess and the characters have lost their purity. I don't know why DC sees it so imperative to destroy the purity of these two characters. They are supposed to give hope and light and they aren't supposed to be these dark complex characters in the same way as others are. I'm very disappointed.

I guess eventually everyone is torn down and right now, that is what's happening to these characters. This was ok, but it didn't excite me in any way.

[Sesana]

This was not up to the standards of the first volume, largely because it wasn't allowed to be its own thing. It got caught up first in the Superman as Doomsday stuff and then in Future's End. And if you haven't read any of the Doomsday or Future's End stuff, good luck in following what's going on here. Maybe if I had, I could have scraped up a modicum of interest in the Doomsday plot. But I just couldn't, and it went on and on and on. The only issue that I liked was the one that wasn't attached to one of the events. It's just a little story about Superman and Wonder Woman's relationship. Which is what I wanted from this book, and what I'd liked about the first volume. Oh well.

[Eli]

This didn't flow very well. The art was generally alright for the most part. The plot didn't flow well. I feel like half of the book followed one story and the other half was another story. It probably did, but it wasn't obvious enough.

Edit: I have just learned that this is a collection of issues from a handful of other comic events. Which explains why this made no sense to me.

[Gavin]

What.
The.
Fuck.
Was.
That.
Shit?

Did they just recycle all of the 90s Superman story lines at once in one book that made ZERO sense? Ugh. Where did this all come from? What the shit?

Don't read this, try to keep a pleasant memory of the first volume. Soule isn't impressing here at all...overrated methinks?

[Sud666]

Allow me to preface my review with my desire for this to have been good. My desire is unmet. Charles Soule calls this one "War and Peace". Was he channeling his inner Tolstoy? Or perhaps it was Pierre-Joseph Proudhon: La Guerre et la Paix (The War and the Peace)? Or did Soule read some Suetonius' "The Twelve Ceasars", wherein he calls the Emperor Titus a master of "war and peace"? I'm going to take a stab at it and guess none of them. This should have been called "Clark and Diana catch a STD".

It started out decently enough. Good art at the start and a pedestrian tale that still wasn't too bad. Superman has been fighting Doomsday. Again. The whole point of Doomsday was supposed to be..well..umm..a Doomsday (the event not the character). So using him so much without causing a doomsday kinda defeats the purpose. But anyways..he's dead. Again. But he's infected Superman. Who is know doing some Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde shit (isn't it nice Soule is so well read?) with his inner Doomsday. Cool. Looks like this one is going to be a tough one for Wonder Woman to deal with.
Oh uh Brainiac is attacking. Does Superman fight his inner Doomsday or the external invasion? Halfway through the story-the art takes a nosedive (around the "Assimilation" story) as some intrepid high school art student takes over the duties. Cool (not really)..then as Doomsday-Clark fights Brainiac -it seems his dark "Doomsday" side has won.

Then uh...well the story with no breaks...no prologue..no this is WTF happened. Nope. In the next story "Metamorphasis", we find Diana being a soccer hooligan in Wembley Field with some 60 foot woman. Superman, fully cured, appears with a beard and the awesome "Stuck in a black hole. I couldn't find a mirror." Oh. Okay. Thanks Clark. THAT explains everything. Awesome. Meanwhile, while Clark was in a black hole growing a beard, Diana forgot to feed Clark's pet Little Shop of Horror's plant-entity (I am not shitting you) and it's rampaging around and Swamp Thing shows up.
Then it's Wonder Woman's turn and she gets infected by Nemisis. Rampages around for a bit and gets stopped. The art is nice though.
So lots of stuff going around. Clark/Diana get infected. Good art, followed by mediocre art and ends with good art. Sound awesome? Good for you-you'll like it more than I did. Since the title had "War and Peace" in it-I leave you with two quotes from Tolstoy's magnum opus that fit this story with the same name:
"We can know only that we know nothing" (here's look at you Clark and your Black Hole)
"If everyone fought for their own convictions there would be no war"

[David]

DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK. Let me repeat that, DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK.

This book only contains fragments of the Superman: Doomed storyline. You'll be lost reading this book. All issues of SUPERMAN/WONDER WOMAN collected here are also reprinted in the book SUPERMAN: DOOMED. So buy that book instead. Skip this one.

[Molly™☺]

A waste of over 200 pages, nothing here makes any sense as DC decided to include less than half of the event. None of the issues collected here follow on from each other and instead provide snippets of a decent story rather than the full experience. An editorial nightmare, it lets down the readers and the creators alike.

[Subham]

This was certainly something for sure.

It took me quite a while to read but this is mainly tying to the DOOMED event as we see Superman becoming doomsday and the affect that virus is doing to him and jealousy and war and battle until Diana save him and then the mental battle and him leaving Earth and Diana searching from help from the gods and some interesting view of the planet as the kryptonite clouds are here and also Brainiac invasion and it makes for some stories and well the ultimate triumph as the power couple along with JL stop this and yeah it reads much better if you read Doomed hardcover in its proper order but its still a fun read especially with Daniel's artwork and makes for some stunning pages.

Also I like the 2 part FE story with Diana battling Nemesis and becoming God of peace and her inner struggle to reconcile the two things and yeah its certainly something but okayish for a one time read and can feel short and a disappointing ending but its not something that happened anyways so yeah a one time good read.

[James DeSantis]

WOW this was HORRIBLE. Confusing, messy, boring are all the words that come to mind. So the first volume was fun, made sense, and had good dialog. Throw that all out for this shitty crossevent of Superman becoming doomsday light, and you get this damn story. Then you get a invasion, which is equally as messy, confusing, and boring. Like damn, who the fuck put this together or made it?

What I liked: Uhhh the bearded clark was cool...that's it.

What I didn't like: The plot made no sense. Huge chunks missing from the story. Art felt a downgrade. What the fuck was that ending? Doomsday superman is utterly STUPID.

The less I think about this title the better. Fuck this. I will try volume 3 though.

[Lexxi Kitty]

I have no idea what I just read. A bunch of disjointed stories smushed together with some underlying theme of war.

One of the reasons I started this specific series is because I thought it was outside the normal DC Comics universe, to a certain extent. Why would that be important? It's important because I just can't read DC Comics collections any longer. At least not the current series. When there is a story it's very bare-bones, basic and really simple. Most of the time there isn't an actual story-line. Or at least not just one. Just story ideas.

What the heck is Lana Lang doing flying around in outer space? Why is Lois Lane green and doing evil things? Wait, why is she now . . . not doing evil things, but still green, and now in the Fortress of Solitude? Wait, when did Supergirl become a Red Lantern? These and other thoughts struck me as I attempted to follow along. I have a very real sense that I was reading an over-arching series. One of those things to be read by those who have read, currently read, and will read everything put out by DC Comics. At least, I hope so, because this mish-mash mess makes no sense on it's own. I'd hate to learn that this actually was unconnected to the rest of DC Comics story-line. Because it makes no sense on its own.

Ah well. Something of a reoccurring theme for me. Attempting to read these things separate from the DC Comics universe and finding myself lost and bored. Like when I attempted to "finish off" Batgirl a while back. Didn't have a clue what was going on.

Guess I'm done with DC Comics except for things that I know are separate story lines. Not sure how I'll know. That and Harley Quinn. Quinn seems to be off in her own little universe, despite how I dislike the direction the character went, still mostly understandable stories.

Also - for the love of something or other: Stop with the bloody Brainiac stories. Personally I never cared for any of them, and they keep being dragged back into comic book series. Bah.

[Lost Planet Airman]

My electronic reader says this was only 192 pages, not the 224 gr lists...
The vast majority was already collected in Superman: Doomed, followed by two Future's End stories that make an excellent duological (!!!) finale to the whole New 52 Greek mythology super-arc that has been WW for the past 40-ish issues.

[Christine]

As a person who does not read Superman, I was horribly lost for part of this. There were some nice touches, but half the story is missing. The ending shorter stories were okay. The best being the one with the plant.

[Vikas]

So yeah!!! it was pure bizarre, we get 5 straight issues of the storyline and then without any rhyme or reason we get an unrelated story and then another one without any preamble. I get it that you need to keep the story going and I have ordered the further volumes too but at least leave some notes to the effect of the changes and not leave it totally abrupt that it leave a bad taste in the mouth ugh!!

So something something something and Superman killed Doom and now is infected by the doom virus and becoming superdoom himself while Batman and Wonder Woman try to help Supes the world government as usual fucks up and covers environment with kryptonite to drive superman away from the earth. Lot of bizarre things happen without much reason all of a sudden Louis Lane develops superpowers and is controlled by Brainiac of all villains.

All in all enjoyable graphics novel with good graphics but due to idiotic decisions by DC this became a mess with only 5 issues and at around 165 pages this would have made more sense than the 224 pages with additional abrupt stories which are just there without any mention or previous details.

I have always loved comics, and I hope that I will always love them. Even though I grew up reading local Indian comics like Raj Comics or Diamond Comics or even Manoj Comics, now's the time to catch up on the international and classic comics and Graphic novels. I am on my quest to read as many comics as I can. I Love comics to bit, may comics never leave my side. I loved reading this and love reading more, you should also read what you love and then just Keep on Reading.

[Emmett Spain]

Yet again, most of a DC trade is captured in other books. Here, it's the Doomed arc, which drags in the other Super books and a whole cast of DC's finest.

The only bonus comes from the Future's End additions, which I frankly found a bit of a snore. They assume a lot of knowledge that I wasn't across, and as such I found it hard to care.

Soule's writing and Tony S. Daniel's superlative art make the collection worthwhile, but I suggest buying the Doomed book and skipping this entirely.

[Althea]

Dear DC Comics,

People pick up trades because they want bigger, meatier stories than they can get in individual issues of comics. When you throw random issues together and call it a trade, your readers are left confused and unsatisfied. It's like throwing five incomplete puzzle sets into a box and expecting it to entertain people. I shouldn't have to pick up volumes from different series to get a complete story.

Love,
A fan who still has hope.

[Stacy]

Both the art and writing on this second volume are as strong as the first, but the collection is hampered by excessive cross-overs that make it difficult to read as am ongoing narrative, since there are too many jumps and disconnected moments / scenes. A shame, because I really enjoyed the first of this series!

[John Yelverton]

Again, you must get past the entire premise of Superman and Wonder Woman dating. Once you do, this book showed the first glimmers of the Superman and Wonder Woman characters that we know and love since this whole "New 52" garbage started.

[Brandon]

Although this book is sold under the Superman/Wonder Woman banner it would be more accurate to call it a Superman book. The bulk of the book is basically the Superman/Doomsday story line reprinted with a nod towards the romance between the two heroes. Bummer. The book is good enough as it is although it remains uneven because Superman and Wonder Woman have too few moments together - something that made the first volume so strong - and though the heroes storylines intertwine I felt this book could easily have been a Justice League book as much as the second volume of the Superman/Wonder Woman entry.

The Superman/Doomsday story is a good enough story, I guess, but I was never a Superman fan and in this book the story seems fractured and a little forced. Superman spends most of the book either metamorphosing into Doomsday or as a lame Clark Kent battling for control and though Wonder Woman does her part she's little more than a support player doing right by her man and not the calm, collected God of War-Queen of the Amazons-Wonder Woman with her shit together character of the first volume. I can live with the Man of Steels crossover storyline dominating the book but I wish Wonder Woman was giving more air time and that the book was truer to the first volume that was so brilliantly written and illustrated that it was one of my favorite books from last year.

The supporting cast of heroes also suffers. Batman just makes a token appearance not living up to the promise he has shown in this story arc in the Justice League book. Lois Lane finally shows up but seems to have no opinion on the romance between the heroes beside the fact that it's a hot story in the tabloid journalistic world she now inhabits. Later she is changed into a tool of the Brainiac and fades into the background. Like I said, I don't follow Superman but shouldn't this whole romance be a big deal to Lois Lane? Seems to me she should be freaking out someway. Going all crazy ex-girlfriend or something. Well, not in this universe. Also the side story of Clark Kent starting a website is underserved and soon forgotten. There are plenty of other DC heroes on display here too usually working under Wonder Womans' direction but their appearances are too brief and their input too insignificant to have any meaning or purpose. They just seem to be to there to fill panels.

Although this book wasn't what I had hoped for it was still a good read and this series shows strong potential. The tack on books at the end - a couple of Futures Ends and a Wonder Woman annual - showed greater potential than the bulk of this book although they are not directly related to the Doomsday storyline but the heroes are together in this tale and they are involving. The artwork is not my favorite in these books but the writing is strong and these few magazines are what I was expecting from a Superman/Wonder Woman romance comic book; ie. stories about the Superman/Wonder Woman romance played out the New 52 universe.

I was torn about the amount of stars I was going to give this book because it didn't live up to my expectations and the cut and paste method DC seems to favor makes the book a little directionless but there are some strengths in the book it's but it's comes across as too fractured when presented as a graphic novel. Having said that the writing is still strong and there's plenty of action between the covers and overall the story does move forward. The artwork is also of the high standard I expected but DC needs to let the Superman/Wonder Woman romance play out at it's own pace and live up to it's potential instead of letting the other storylines completely take over.

[Anchorpete]

There is a significant problem, that DC has had for years, with their Superman trades. In the New 52, Superman events are extremely complicated. They usually involve Time Travel, multiple Kryptonians, the Phantom Zone, and at least once character acting extremely out of character.

This trade has all of that, minus the Time Travel. It is still confusing as hell. The problem, and I am guessing this is a problem with the Superman/Wonder Woman title, is that if you don't read every issue connected to whatever Superman crossover is going on, you have absolutely no idea what is going on. A good comic can be part of a crossover, and yet still stay within the narrative arc of the regular series. From issue to issue, in this trade, major events occur.

Superman has turned into a Doomsday Monster.
The Entire Earth is covered in Kryptonite
Cyborg Superman and Brainiac are working together and are planning on taking over the Earth
Lois Lane has turned into some kind of vessel for Brainiac.
Non (the non speaking Kryptonian from Superman 2) and Mongul have teamed up in the Phantom Zone.
Superman is cured of his Doomsday affliction.

All of this happens within this trade, but there is little to no story connecting it all together. It is like looking at a corner of a complicated tapestry and having to guess all of the images that would be strewn across it.

All of this happens before the second crossover connected to the book- Futures End. They say that writers should treat every issue of a comic as if it is the first comic a person has ever read. Please don't give that first time reader this trade. They will believe the BS that people spout all the time about comics being a convoluted, impenetrable medium.

[Krista D.]

This was a completely disjointed collection of unconnected stories, as opposed to...ya know...a collection about Supes and the Wonder Lady having a relationship together while fighting crime.

Also, Superman was the main focus, with WW playing back up. This doesn't stand up alone at all, and assumes you've read everything else and is just rehashing with some nice art. As I haven't read everything else, there was way too much missing for me to make sense of anything.

Clearly, this wasn't written with any goal or focus in mind. I'm also not convinced the writers/directors of this read or understand romance because the relationship aspects were basically just rehashed TV plot lines and shallow interaction.

Pretty disappointed.

[Jonathan Roberts]

Confusing and disappointing book.
I had such high hopes after volume 1, what a cool idea and I loved how Soule started a story right in the middle and then took us back to the start before an awesome ending. So when I started this book and I had no idea what was happening with Doomsday and some battle in Smallville I just thought it was par for the course with Soule's writing style but when I got four issues in and we moved on to a new storyline involving Cyborg Superman I was totally lost and the reason? There is a missing volume that takes place between Volume 1 and Volume 2. Which is totally stupid and no where is this explained on the dust jacket or Ina summary inside the book. So after waiting patiently for the payoff to explain what was happening I have to now go find Superman: Doom, but after all that never mind I don't really care and sadly will probably not come back to this book.

[Eli Seibert]

Look, I'm sure the story wasn't that bad. It's just that this volume incorporates some kind of Event, and when Events in comics happen, things can get tricky quick. Especially when time comes to publish full volumes. Because I'm sure this story spanned multiple titles, but this volume is only giving us the issues of THIS title which deal with the story. So it makes it feel like I'm only reading like every third chapter of a book, and that totally ruins the emersion of what is probably a decent story when put together properly.

[Amanda]

This volume throws you into the middle of the Doomed Crossover so it doesn't flow well at all from volume 1 to this one. The Doomed Crossover in its entirety is actually not bad but edited this way it doesn't make a impact. After those 4 issues we have the two issues from the Futures End crossover, which has absolutely nothing to do with the previous issues. The next volume should be a lot better. 3.5. stars.

[Robert]

Not even going to rate this one as my feelings about Superman: Doomed are well-documented elsewhere.

A couple of Wonder Woman-centric issues toward the end, confusingly set 5 years into the future but featuring a Superman 4 years before that eras past...I guess resetting continuity can only take you so far in the DC-verse before things become muddled again!

[Phil Williams]

Although I enjoyed most of this book, it still held onto my one complaint about DC's trade books. Once the initial story is over, it begins what appears to be another tale to keep in sequence of the original comics. Why can't they just end the trade book at 100 pages with the end of the story instead of milking another fifty from the book? Is this just to keep the $24.95 price tag?

[Patrick]

While the artwork for the most part was great, The story doesn't hold up for me. This volume included a good amount of the Doomed crossover in it. Which I don't believe was very successful. Charles Soule is a good writer, just kind of trapped in this story arc. A solid volume, overall just okay in my opinion. Tony Daniels does fantastic pencil work.

[Scott]

It was back and forth between a two- or three-star rating for volume 2. While this edition wasn't terrible (although at times it was a little disjointed - I'm glad other reviewers explained the reasons for this) it paled in comparison to volume 1.