Starman VOL 07: A Starry Knight Paperback – Import, 1 March 2002

And I like Robinson's Starman.Mind you, the whole run is sold more on its enjoyable, endearing vibe and not so much on its well-crafted and action packed story telling. Actual stories are often quite dull and formulaic (how many times does Jack get beaten up or knocked out and miraculously saved by a third party?), but it's the characters and their interactions, not to mention the revisiting of some of DC's more fogotten corners, that make Robinson's Starman a rare comic treat.With that said, this book is lame and unnecessary (see, not just a clever title). We start with Jack, Mikaal and a Mother-Box projection of Ted (if you have to ask, then you shouldn't be reading this in the first place) on their space voyage to find a fallen Starman. After that, it all pretty much goes to pot.I understand that space flight takes a long, long time even with the alien technological enchantments one can gain in the DCU, but this book plods on without point and only succeeds in pushing the "finding Will Payton" story (the reason most of us bought it) back to yet another Graphic Novel . We visit an interstellar Solomon Grundy, Rann, and, thanks to time travel, a pre-destruction Krpton and the Starman of the 30th Century. None of which have enough time to develop into solid yarns, so the entire book reverts down to nerd shout-outs and anti-climax. The only thing that has any use whatsoever is the Rann connection which will carry on into the next book (Stars My Destination, which is awesome and everything you hoped this book was going to be), but even the Rann thread doesn't justify an entire book of conveniently stumbling on to familiar characters with in a realm of infinity.Oh, and for bonus fun, Jack is killed, then cloned and has his soul put into the cloned body. Try to let that plot point slide.All in all, the one, singular let down of an otherwise great comic run.