3 out of 5

I know the Valiant universe has its fans, but anything I’ve sampled from it just seems to confirm its status as an also-rans; just another shared universe strip with heroes who are re-skinned versions of other heroes.  That’s not a horrible thing if supes are your bag, and if you like one writer over another, but supes generally aren’t my bag, and those folks conscripted into the modern wave of Valiant don’t do much for me.

So: Bloodshot, nanobot-healable assassin – a Wolverine and his ilk blend – holds no great appeal for me.  But I appreciate this annual, which goes the anthology route (kinda) and lets various teams take various approaches to the character, three out of four of which lean on humor, and with the Michel Fiffe / Benjamin Marra oddball Ditko / underground comix entry (definitely why I bought it), make the ish certainly time-pass-worthy.

That being said, writer Jeff Lemire takes on two of these stories, and the first, a twist on Friday the 13th – Bloodshot hunts “Jacob,” a camp-counseler killer – is initially amusing until artist Kano surprisingly boffs the action timing and Lemire (I’d say predictably) adds an unecessary serious coda to the tale.  Meh.  Just to drive it into the ground, Ray Fawkes writes and draws a super-serious (and boring, and uninteresting) followup which digs into the mind of Jacob with annoyingly abstract water-colory art.  Triple meh to that, my friends.

Lemire livens things up with his next strip, a dig at crossovers and Infinite Crises and the whole nine, with an hilarious alternate universe Bloodshot – Squirt – done up as a pint-sized version of the character, and Lobo-ed to insanity.  Completely self-referential and earned its chuckles.

Then Fiffe and Marra close it out with a completely drugged out Bloodshot battle with Marra monsters of insane design.  It’s called ‘Hellcloud Awaits.’  Is it the best thing ever?  Nah – we’re still dealing with a generic snarky hero template, but the strip is trippy and definitely a unique entry in the book.