Aquaman #25: Good art, somewhat confused story. Mildly recommended. $1.75/$2.50Cn

"Rooked Again" Award to Aquaman #25

Aquaman "Betwixt and Between" or Bemused, Befuddled and Bewildered. While I suppose the intent here is for Aquaman to be cleverly outwitting his foes when he can't outfight them, it's more a case of his enemies leaving their brains in their other pants. Kordax, Koryak and Tiamat teleport in to attack Arthur in the White House and systematically give up just about every advantage they may have had. Arthur only ends up winning the battle because Accord boosted his mental powers, allowing him to quite o'ercrow Kordax's spirit and command Tiamat to go to hell.

Then, just as it looks like Accord's faction is going to come out of this looking great (since they helped fight Tiamat), Accord foolishly blabs his real plans over (effectively) an open mike. Sure, they plan to bring prosperity and plenty to Earth...about the same way Ra's Al Ghul does. By first killing almost everyone.

Basically, this issue suffered from an embarrassment of Dei ex Machina, although at least it doesn't look like the subsequent issues will be too badly marred by it.