Comic Info
Comic Name: Superboy (Volume 6)
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Scott Lobdell/Tom DeFalco
Artist: R.B. Silva
# of Issues: 7
Release Date: 2012
Superboy (6) #5
Reprints Superboy (6) #1-7 (November 2011-May 2012). N.O.W.H.E.R.E. has created the ultimate weapon…and now they must learn how to control it. Hatched from incubation, the hybrid nicknamed Superboy is finding his feet in the world and trying to determine who is telling him the truth about his origins. While Superboy is carrying out attacks prison riots and the Teen Titans for N.O.W.H.E.R.E., Fairchild is working within the system to bring it down…and the Culling is coming!
Written by Scott Lobdell (with some dialogue from Tom DeFalco) and illustrations by R.B. Silva, Superboy 1: Incubation is part of the New 52 relaunch of DC Comics after Flashpoint. The series was met with average reviews.
I’ve always been a sucker for teen heroes, and I always liked the clone Superboy. With the New 52 virtually jumpstarting a number of series, Superboy’s relaunch felt new enough to not just be a clone (of a clone)…but it also had some crossover problems.
Superboy (6) #6
The story by itself is rather interesting. The clandestine N.O.W.H.E.R.E. is building a mysterious hybrid of Superman DNA for unknown reasons. The story gets into some problems with its ties to the New 52 Teen Titans book which Superboy is a member of and trying to mesh the two stories doesn’t work well in this volume.
What did appeal to me in the collection was the introduction of Fairchild into the DC Universe. The character ends up being shipped off the rather lame Ravengers, but the reveals that she was Gen13’s musclebound team member was a fun twist to the comic. I also enjoyed the triangle between her, Superboy, and Rose…unfortunately, the plotlines kept getting in the way of it developing.
Superboy 1: Incubation is a fun title, but the series really needs some reworking to make it a good title. The series at this point needs to be more of a stand-alone to establish the “new” character, but it is forced into the DC Universe a bit too quickly with crossovers. It was good to have me meet Supergirl, but I also felt that this event could have been better saved for later in the storylines of the two characters. The series builds to a bigger crossover with Legion Lost and Teen Titans called The Culling: Rise of the Ravagers (which was its own collection), but the issues were also collected in Superboy 2: Extraction.
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