Invasion!

Invasion! #1-3

by Keith Giffen (Writer/Illustrator), Bill Mantlo (Writer), Todd McFarlane (Illustrator)

Launching a massive assault, the Dominators - alarmed by Earth's growing number of powered metahumans - invade Australia. But a resistance force led by Superman is standing ready to fight back, and they will find allies among the aliens. But will even this mighty army be enough to stop the Dominators' ultimate weapon - the Gene Bomb?

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Dc Comics, Comic Book, Science Fiction, Superheroes, Fiction

256 pages, Paperback

First published September 9, 2008

About the author

Keith Ian Giffen was an American comic book illustrator and writer. He is possibly best-known for his long runs illustrating, and later writing the Legion of Super-Heroes title in the 1980s and 1990s. He also created the alien mercenary character Lobo (with Roger Slifer), and the irreverent "want-to-be" hero, Ambush Bug. Giffen is known for having an unorthodox writing style, often using characters in ways not seen before. His dialogue is usually characterized by a biting wit that is seen as much less zany than dialogue provided by longtime collaborators DeMatteis and Robert Loren Fleming. That approach has brought him both criticism and admiration, as perhaps best illustrated by the mixed (although commercially successful) response to his work in DC Comics' Justice League International (1987-1992). He also plotted and was breakdown artist for an Aquaman limited series and one-shot special in 1989 with writer Robert Loren Fleming and artist Curt Swan for DC Comics.

Giffen's first published work was "The Sword and The Star", a black-and-white series featured in Marvel Preview, with writer Bill Mantlo. He has worked on titles (owned by several different companies) including Woodgod, All Star Comics, Doctor Fate, Drax the Destroyer, Heckler, Nick Fury's Howling Commandos, Reign of the Zodiac, Suicide Squad, Trencher (to be re-released in a collected edition by Boom! Studios)., T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents, and Vext. He was also responsible for the English adaptation of the Battle Royale and Ikki Tousen manga, as well as creating "I Luv Halloween" for Tokyopop. He also worked for Dark Horse from 1994-95 on their Comics Greatest World/Dark Horse Heroes line, as the writer of two short lived series, Division 13 and co-author, with Lovern Kindzierski, of Agents of Law. For Valiant Comics, Giffen wrote XO-Manowar, Magnus, Robot Fighter, Punx and the final issue of Solar, Man of the Atom.

He took a break from the comic industry for several years, working on storyboards for television and film, including shows such as The Real Ghostbusters and Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy.

He is also the lead writer for Marvel Comics's Annihilation event, having written the one-shot prologue, the lead-in stories in Thanos and Drax, the Silver Surfer as well as the main six issues mini-series. He also wrote the Star-Lord mini-series for the follow-up story Annihilation: Conquest. He currently writes Doom Patrol for DC, and is also completing an abandoned Grant Morrison plot in The Authority: the Lost Year for Wildstorm.

Reviews

[Jayson · Rating 3 out of 5]

(B+) 78% | Good
Notes: An often-clever weave, however, it's hardly meat supplyin': prone to doubt (a ton left out), real action's in the tie-ins.

*Progress updates: Preamble ◦ Parts 1.1-1.2 ◦ Parts 1.3-1.4 ◦ Parts 2.1-2.3 ◦ Parts 2.4-3.1 ◦ Parts 3.2-3.3

[Sophia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Buddy read with Chad and Jayson.

Average rating: 3.26 stars.

While I didn't read this trade, I thought this would be a good place to consolidate all my reviews of the single issues involved in this event.

But first, I'll share some overall thoughts.
I enjoyed how this gathered so many heroes we normally wouldn't see together.

I thought the pace was a little dragged out by the length of the main comics and while the tie-ins didn't move the plot along really, they did make this event feel more like a 'world' event.
I did like how many of the tie-ins continued their own series plots, like the Superman issues.

It was a little irritating that the main issues did not have consistent art between them. The second issue is definitely the weakest.

This is not DC's biggest event, you don't have to read it though, it is a pretty cool look at how events were and what was accepted back then.

Below is the order I found makes the most sense. Which differs from the publication order;

Prelude
The Flash V2 #20
Swamp Thing V2 #80
Spectre V2 #22

Invasion #1

First Strike
Daily Planet Special #1 (not read)
Power of the Atom #7
The Flash V2 #21
Manhunter #8
Spectre V2 #23
Checkmate #11
Animal Man #6 (not read)
Doom Patrol V2 #17
Firestorm V2 #80
Starman #5
New Guardians #6 (not read)
Justice League International #22
Wonder Woman V2 #25
New Titans #52
Detective Comics #595
Swamp Thing V2 #81
Captain Atom V2 #24
Superman V2 #26
Adventures of Superman #449

Invasion #2

Aftermath
Superman V2 #27
Adventures of Superman #450
Captain Atom V2 #25
Wonder Woman V2 #26
Checkmate #12
Doom Patrol V2 #18
Suicide Squad #23
Firestorm V2 #81
Starman #6
The Flash V2 #22
Manhunter #9
Power of the Atom #8
New Guardians #7 (not read)
Justice League International #23

Invasion #3


Epilogue (Only one more to read!)
Blasters Special #1 (not read)
Spectre: Ghost in the Machine (technically it's only issue #24 that's connected, but I read the whole storyline.)
L.E.G.I.O.N. #1
Doom Patrol, Vol. 1: Crawling from the Wreckage
Justice League Europe #1
Hawk and Dove Vol 3 #1
Starman #22

[Chad · Rating 3 out of 5]

Back in the late 80's, Keith Giffen had the idea to take a bunch of the alien races that pop up in Legion of Super-Heroes and have them attack modern day Earth. They are worried about the sheer number of metahumans on Earth and how they cause havok throughout the universe. Doing this really helped tie the DC universe together, especially once Giffen spun L.E.G.I.O.N. out of this crossover. L.E.G.I.O.N. takes over policing the galaxy after the fall of the Green Lantern Corps in Millennium.

Now as for the crossover itself, this one is a little different in that this is just the backbone of the event. Most of the action occurs in the individual titles. DC really needs to collect all of these issues. This would easily be a 5 star book if they had.

The crossover contains some rare DC art from Todd McFarlane from before he joined Marvel full-time. His character work is very cartoony but he draws some mean aliens, especially the Dominators.

[Ramón S. · Rating 2 out of 5]

Boring, very boring. I hope the following ones will bring more excitement

[Zac · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was pretty straightforward for a DC crossover: an alliance of different alien groups, each with different strengths, attacks the Earth to destroy or study its superheroes. The good guys seem to win by the end of book 2, but then have another challenge to overcome in book 3 (which they do, relatively easily again). I remember this being better, but maybe that's because the first time I read this it was just after reading the Millennium crossover, which was awful. At least Millennium lead into the New Guardians series, which sees them do battle with a HIV-positive vampire and a cocaine powered supervillain. Invasion! seemed to spawn a very bland team called the Blasters, who thankfully didn't stick around for long. Invasion! is easy to follow and mildly entertaining, but not that much happens really. I'm not sure whose idea it was to give the Dominators a bit of a yellow peril look, and what purpose it served. Also I also generally don't like anything Keith Giffen touches because of the bad corny humour.
Despite its many flaws, it remains enough of a guilty pleasure for me to give it 2 stars. Including Swamp Thing and Animal Man in the crossover issues doesn't hurt either.
I own the individual issues, not the paperback.

[Patrick · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well, that was a story.

I didn't much care for the art, dialogue, or plot. But, it didn't offend me so much as bore me most of the time. I picked this up to prepare for the 4-night crossover event on the CW this week. There is no way they could do this exact story and I wouldn't want them to do so.

I can't recommend this book, but I can see how maybe reading it back in 1988 it wasn't so bad.

[Little Timmy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the space war to end all wars. Starring almost every Superhero you can think of in the DC universe. A good story backed up by good art makes this an enjoyable read. Recommended

[Alberto Martín de Hijas · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ya no me gustó cuando la leí en su momento, y con el tiempo ha envejecido mal. El inicio plantea ideas interesantes, pero el desarrollo es un desastre. Hay demasiados personajes que apenas aparecen en una o dos viñetas sin aportar nada a la trama, y todo carece de tensión. En ningún momento se percibe sensación de peligro o riesgo de derrota. Un aburrimiento.

[Du4 · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm such a fag for this story. This was one of the coolest things I remember about reading comics in the late '80s. DC's sci-fi world is rife with awesomeness and virtually of it condensed in this company-wide crossover in 1988/89. Keith Giffen took a lot of the historical trappings of the LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES universe and combined them with OMEGA MEN, GREEN LANTERN, and some other sci-fi awesomeness to come up with INVASION!, which essentially had all the badass alien races of the DCU invading Earth to stop the rise of the super-hero population.

The story is cool, even though much of the events between chapters occur in individual titles and are thus not collected here. But you get enough to see the major beats of the story. It's also a fantastic showcase of the Justice League's international era, where heroes everywhere reported in through a series of international embassies. This is the first time in DCU continuity (to my mind) that showed an integration of a lot of behind-the-scenes DCU ephemera, like the Suicide Squad's Task Force X, the JLI's Max Lord, and the Doom Patrol's scientific backbone. It just felt like this would how a REAL response to an alien invasion would happen.

Giffen also lays the groundwork for a historical reinterpretation of the Legion through INVASION! Here are born the seeds of L.E.G.I.O.N., a spinoff series featuring ancestors of the 30th century Legion who come together to form a galactic police network to replace the recently defunct Green Lantern Corps. Giffen really has fun painting this huge sci-fi canvas and it shows through the amount of detail that goes into his plots.

INVASION! is also notable for the art of Todd MacFarlane before he made a name for himself at Marvel. The first chapter and half of INVASION! is illustrated to a tee by MacFarlane, and while I dug his superhero work, he really shines in illustrating the alien races of the Alliance. MacFarlane's Dominators will always be the true Dominators to me. MacFarlane is ably backed up by a Giffen-illustrated section, which of course ROCKS ASS, and a concluding chapter by Bart Sears, soon to go on to become popular on JUSTICE LEAGUE EUROPE.

All in all, this is a badass collection from DC, even though I wish someone would have taken the editorial time to go back through the 3-months of tie-ins in individual titles and integrated them into one big epic. Dan Didio take note: THIS is how you do a crossover.

[Will Cooper · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not amazing, but this is how you write a crossover book. There were obviously things that happened in other titles so the beginnings of some issues had some important occurrences recap. The story was fine, a bunch of alien races joining up to take out Earth. Cool.

[Dave · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some interesting ideas here, but the execution (and nature of how the material was collected here) leaves it a frustrating, incomplete mess.

[Guido · Rating 3 out of 5]

Primera recopilación de Invasión en castellano.

[Cristhian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Invasion! Tiene cosas que aún repercuten en el lore de DC:

-La Gene Bomb que le dio poderes a varios personajes que antes no tenían. Algunos los perdieron pero otros aún perduran como Maxwell Lord.
-Los humanos con poderes (metahumanos) fueron nombrados por primera vez en esta mini serie.

Fuera de eso, nada extraordinario. Los Dominators siempre me han parecido algo vacíos.

[Arjun Rajkumar · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good DC event covering the core story.. loads of tie in which I need to read up now! Old school art ..

[Shane Stanis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chrises on Infinite Earths: Wanna Cult About It?

In spite of some questionable alien design issues, I really enjoyed this story. I recently started JLI, and am starting to get what people loved about Keith Giffen. Issues are over 80 pages each, so be ready to buckle in.

Read for giant crossover sized alien threats to earth and all its heroes.

[Simon · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well okay the biggest problem with this 250+ page tome is that it is entirely incomprehensible.

Now I don't know if this is because the story was told across a dozen titles so you needed to read a whole range, but as presented here in this collection? It makes no sense. You cannot follow it. Characters appear out of nowhere, disappear to nowhere, stuff happens, there's no reason for it, things are resolved, we don't know how or why. It's a complete disaster.

I suppose there is a vaguely decent 1950s style alien invasion story in here somewhere. Which is... ye gods, this was written in 1988? Christ. See, this is why Gaiman and the like desperately had to come along and re-invent comics, so that we got away from this amateur level of storytelling and moved on to where comics genuinely have some depth and follow basic story-telling rules, with characters. There's not a single character moment in this entire thing, not one moment where anybody feels like an individual.

Awful. Just awful. If I could give it zero stars I would.

[Cassius Rovenstine · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you’re well-acquainted with and have an affection for the minor characters and obscure alien races of DC Comics, then you’ll love this simple but epic crossover story. If not, you’ll probably be pretty lost, but the artwork is still cool.

[Cecily · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was too confusing to keep track of.

[John Yelverton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Though this book was supposed to be an epic event, it was anything but.

[Andrea · Rating 3 out of 5]

Far better than the last crossover that I read (Millenium)

[Wallyeast · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting premise for a story. The story is pretty well-executed. The art is good enough.

[Erik · Rating 5 out of 5]

There’s about 14 other tie in books with this.

[JD Comics · Rating 4 out of 5]

I first heard about Invasion! because of the CW's Arrowverse crossover event, which was inspired by this miniseries. Invasion' is a DC event plotted by Keith Giffen, scripted by Bill Mantlo, and illustrated by Todd McFarlane, Keith Giffen, and Bart Sears.

The story starts with the Dominators entering into an alliance with other alien races to invade Earth because they fear that Earth's metahumans could be a potential threat in the future. They gave an ultimatum, i.e., for Earth to surrender its metahumans, which was declined by the United Nations. Hence, the invasion.

What I like about this book is that it was told from the point of view of the invaders. The readers get to see the politicking and political maneuverings that take place in order to assemble the alliance and launch an invasion of this magnitude. The readers also get a first-hand view of how the alliance eventually broke down. The downside of this book is that it does not collect any of the tie-in issues. I wish DC would have collected the important tie-in issues because that's where most of the battles took place. I would love for DC to release an omnibus of this story.

This is a really good DC event that showcases DC's cosmic universe. We get to see various alien races like the Rannians, Thanagarians, Psions, Khunds, Daxamites, and Durlans, as well as interstellar groups like the Green Lantern Corps and the Omega Men. This book is important in the DC lore because this is where the concepts of metahumans and the meta-gene were first introduced. This resulted in the retconning of the backstory of several characters.

This book collects Invasion 1-3. I thought the third part was completely unnecessary, though. It actually felt like the sequel to the main event, and, to be honest, it wasn't that interesting. For those wondering if Batman played a big role in this event, he did not. That's fair because this really isn't his forte, at least during the time when this book was published.

Chronology: I would read this before Batman: The Dark Knight Detective, Vol. 3 because volume 3 collects the Detective Comics tie-in issue.

My Batman Collected Editions Instagram page

[Richard Gray · Rating 3 out of 5]

After Millennium (previously reviewed), any event would be a step up. This collection of INVASION! isn’t perfect, but it’s a pretty fun crossover.

The 1988-1989 DC Event, co-scripted by Rocket Raccoon creator Bill Mantlo, ties together Keith Giffen’s big titles Omega Men, Justice League International, and Legion of Super-Heroes. Like Millennium before it, the story spanned dozens of issues, concerns an attack on Earth and several new heroes emerge from it.

While this collection shares many of the problems the Millennium TPB has, in that the story feels abbreviated and occasionally non-sensical without the weekly issues and side-stories, the overall arc is a lot tighter.

DC Comics clearly had a thing for or against Australia in the 80s as well: in Millennium, we got one of our first heroes. Here, Australia (and primarily Melbourne) is decimated and used as the Dominion’s Earthbase. Which is as amusing as it is terrifying. (The “former State of New South Wales” is turned into “a vast containment camp,” as an example).

The meta-gene stuff is probably the longest lasting legacy, and for those of you who are digging on Wonder Woman 1984 there’s some 80s Maxwell Lord stuff in here as well. It was also great to see that these were originally 80-page giants, which is something I feel should make a comeback in this age of declining sales.

NB: Read as part of my DC Crisis and Beyond Journey: #9

[Bryan Miller · Rating 1 out of 5]

Was hoping for a dose of nostalgia with this one, as I vaguely remember reading it back in high school. And while it was great to see iterations of beloved characters such as The Omega Men, the JLI, Captain Atom, and others, Todd McFarlane's art is even worse than I'd remembered. Superman's cape seems to float off his shoulders (more like propped up with hidden sticks), even when he's stationary and characters look so flat and gangly. Thank goodness Bart Sears took over somewhere in the latter half. The story was at times incomprehensible as characters would show up with no real introduction and have their story arcs just randomly jump to new conflicts or resolution with no sense of story unfolding (Flash is in Cuba with the Manhunter for no apparent reason; Snapper Carr is zapped by aliens, captured, and an issue later is suddenly free and part of some team called The Blasters (b/c they'd gained superpowers by being "blasted" by the bad guys; some members of the Omega Men and Doom Patrol are killed but we're told that after the fact and never see any of it happen) Weird. This thing is a mess of mostly bad exposition. I believe, as many have pointed out, that many of the side stories referenced got played out in tie-ins, which is a real problem when it comes to collected editions such as this one. These "event" stories really should be written with an eye toward cohesion as they're collected later on, something that, back in '87-'88, probably wasn't as much of a concern. It shows.

[Antonio Feitoza Gomes · Rating 3 out of 5]

When Diana Prince murmurs "Invasion!" in the scene where the Amazonian Temple in Greece is lit by fire, a message from Queen Hypolita in Justice League, little did I know that this was actually a reference to this book published in the year I was born.

A 30 year anniversary is enough for us to see if a book has survived the test of time or not, and in many ways Invasion has overcome its dating issues, but in many ways it has not.

That is to say: I like the book, but I don't love it. In fact, the plotting is so interesting but it feels so slow in parts that I really can't understand why this was a trend in the past. Coloring and art styles are very much like the eighties, and they feel nostalgic and vintage today, but the plotting, the plotting, the plotting...

So yes, I like the feeling of adventure and the scope the story transmits. What our heroes have to overcome is bigger than just what one single super hero can deal with. This requires a league of sorts. The drama is to the point, the character exploration is good, and at times, I dare say the writing gets to the magnificent stage.

But no, the narrative is not amazing - quite the contrary, it is sometimes a tad boring - and everything takes too long to happen.

So in the test of time, 30 years for me was enough to come to the conclusion that the book is good, but I can't be sure if it will be able to endure 3o years more.

There is only hope.

[Tommy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some things just don't hold up. The five or six years of DC post-Crisis be painful. there are individual stories that hold up (A Death in the Family, a surprisingly effective Superman in Exile story) and characters or groups who had good runs (Wonder Woman, Justice League and Suicide Squad are all personal favorites from that time), but in thirty years retrospect, DC was struggling for an identity after their attempt to Marvelize their Universe.

In the past couple of months, I've also re read Millennium, and while the reprints are beautiful, the stories end up having almost zero impact, because aside from an offhand comment here and there, if that writer or editor wishes to acknowledge it, these stores make little to no dent in the "History" of these characters.

Still, there is good here. Superman and the Daxamites is a fun bit. Captain Atom is cool, here, and I always wish that they'd stuck to their guns with the long game, with Captain Atom, and let him be shown to be Monarch a year or two down the road... between JLI, this and Armageddon 2001, it could have been an interesting Arc for the character.

Still, it's just meh. Could have been a lot of fun. could have had long-reaching impact. just feels flat all these years later.

[Max Z · Rating 2 out of 5]

The plot is as simple as the title says - it's an alien invasion by a bunch of cosmic races held together by a temporary alliance. The reason given for the invasion is that humans possess the danger to the universe by having the metahuman gene. The first of three double-sized issues mostly deals with pre-invasion preparation, the second one is the invasion itself, with most of the action only referenced to, since it was offloaded to tie-ins. And the third one is all about a twist. This book is not that interesting to read without the accompanying DC wiki page or deep knowledge into the DC multiverse state of affairs in 1988. I guess the most important thing is the introduction of meta-gene and metahumans concept. The rest of the changes were relevant only to that period. I was looking for signature Keith Giffen's humor but it's mostly nowhere to be seen, this is as serious as they all are. A more recent Convergence event comes to mind - it had the same goals and close structure.

[Brannigan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very interesting story but packaged horribly. Normally for these major event stories there’s a main title ‘Invasion’ and then each of the already established titles have an issue devoted to the main story. You would think then when collecting the story they would put them all together in the TPB and have a Vol 1 to Vol whatever. They did not do that here. Here you only get the main story which is really only half a story. In between the issue they mention briefly what happens but the story gets very confusing without actually being able to read everything. This event is crying out for an Omnibus edition with everything together in one place.

[Shawn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Having embarked on a read of all the "Crisis" stories in DC, this was the second one on the list. The story of an attack by a large group of aliens takes a long while to develop. Once the invasion happens, the entire huge armada of ships and legions of ground forces start strong and then quickly fall to the heroes (confirming the fears of the aliens that earth's heroes are dangerously overly powerful).
The last act of the aliens in releasing a meta-human gene disease seemed anti-climactic especially since it was a problem solved in less time than the alien armada took to build.
Overall, a fairly forgettable story but with some interesting allusions to bigger connections.