A Good Old Fashioned Team-Up — Reviewing ‘Absolute Wonder Woman’ #15

Symbols, whatever shape or form they may take, are a grand source of power in various aspects of our world. Superheroes, both on and off the page, very much find themselves within that realm time and time again.

Two symbols come together for the (sort of) first time, as Absolute Wonder Woman #15 brings the warrior princess and the dark knight into each other’s orbit. This crossover of titans comes from Kelly Thompson, Hayden Sherman, Jordie Bellaire, and Becca Carey.

On a monthly basis, this series continues to defy expectations and become better and better. Standing as the first moment that the heroes of the DC Absolute Universe meet up, it’s pretty much everything that it could and should be.

There is a kind of throwback feeling to what is presented here. That is accomplished more in the format than in the actual content or process used to bring things to life. This is still very much a modern tale in this modern darker version of the DC Universe. What makes it feel classic is how contained and straight to the point this team-up happens to be.

We don’t dance around things, as Thompson drops us right into the meeting and into the case they are dealing with. The characters have a warm familiar vibe despite being strangers at the beginning. There are great bits of character building, fun banter, dark tones, big fun superhero fight action, and ties to both characters solo adventure futures.

Fresh off drawing twelve issues of Batman: Dark Patterns, Sherman gets another crack at the Bat in a different capacity. Something truly otherworldly is felt any time I come across the work of Sherman. It does what it needs to do to bring moments from the script to life and then goes even further than that. Seeing the top of the tiers and saying, “I can go even higher” and actually doing so.

Just look at the post-title page opening shot of Gotham. The stacking panels show where action is happening within the full shot of the city. Bat ears on the next page panels. How swift and dense every bit of action and setup feels, as each panel is hefty with a truly lived in gritty and deep feeling.

Because of the dueling nature of the heroes, Bellaire gets to play with some fun coloring aspects. Gotham is a darker and grimmer place than what Wonder Woman usually deals with. Not that she’s not in darkness, since this whole universe is built on Darkseid’s darkness, after all. There’s a nice melding of the darker palette and one where flashier colors that resonate with the hope that Diana embodies comes together here.

So many blues, greens, reds and others dominate the page as sort of filter colors, giving the backdrops a really resonating feeling, without losing any of the other colors or feelings. Bellaire is one of the best.

Plenty of bits of dialogue come in with very different personalities, voices, impacts, and emotional resonances to them. This is the case for all the lettering that Carey is tasked with giving bold refreshing life, allowing it all to flow and really strike as it must for the fullest impact. Even when the fonts and bubbles for Diana and Bruce are similar, the softer and gruffer tones of their voices are still resoundingly clear.

Thompson knows each character well and Carey knows how to make that feel clear in the lettering.

That this wrapped up in one issue with the duo meant to also meet up in Absolute Batman #16 for another adventure, is really fun. As I said at the start, it feels very classic comic book. We don’t need some multipart arc when they can just bounce off one another in these fun one-off style stories.

Absolute Wonder Woman #15 is now available from DC Comics.