Best of this Week: Metal Men #1 – Dan DiDio, Shane Davis, Michelle Delecki, Jason Wright and Travis Lanham

Will Magnus is a monster.

Now, that might come off as a little harsh for one of the most brilliant minds in the history of DC Comics, but this new series, or at least this first issue, builds off of past characterizations and reestablishes the Metal Men back into the DC Universe in a far more sinister light. Magnus used to be a bright spot, a brilliant mind that challenged the idea that machines couldn’t gain sentience. However, here, he falls more in line with his contemporaries in T.O. Morrow and Professor Ivo.

Will Magnus has always had something in the way of a susceptibility to mind control or falling prey to his own mental neuroses. At least with the Metal Men by his side, he’s either been able to mask this or overcome it by doing some good with his creations. When the Metal Men were supposedly the spirits of his dead colleagues, Magnus did what he could to fix them and make them heroes only for it to later be revealed that it was never the case and that his own mental illness convinced him to use that story to make the Metal Men seem unique.

When the New 52 reboot happened, Magnus was first seen as a depressed scientist who had seen his Metal Men project used in black ops missions and later as assassins before they destroyed themselves, later appearing in Cyborg’s DCYou series in a much happier state. Magnus is a brilliant mind, but time after time something will drop him from his course and cause him to retreat into himself over and over.

This series takes all of these past origins and brings back the Pre-New 52 Magnus, but paints him as a callous scientist that seems to have internalized all of his failures and lies and only talks about them to a Nameless bot that he’s created. The Nameless bot never talks, but looks at him disapprovingly. As it never moves, it’s hard to get a read as to whether or not Nameless is like the Metal Men or simply just something for Magnus to talk to without feeling judged.

The book mostly unfolds through this conversation with Nameless, with small cuts to Challengers Mountain for the exciting subplot. Magnus talks about how he was given various awards and accolades for The Metal Men, their sentience and just how lifelike they were. Though as we come to find out, as Magnus chucks one of his trophies into the glass case holding one of his Responsometers, it was all a lie and he wishes he never built the device. He admits that he just wanted to same notice that Ivo and Morrow received for what he calls “toy robots.”

Shane Davis draws this scene with a cold fury to it. The sterile nature of his trophy room is offset by the palpable rage of his words and his face in the last panel. Davis Used a lot of pulled in shots to focus on the trophy, the Responsometer and even Magnus’ finger pointing at his many certificates and plaques. It comes as an extreme shock the moment the trophy is crashing through the case that the Responsometer is in. It was so sudden and so violent that we can feel how angry he is, especially with how much the glass flies.

Professor Ivo, best known for creating Amazo, has often been seen as one of the Justice Leagues most brilliant and terrifying foes because of Amazo’s ability to copy those of any hero he encounters. T.O. Morrow is another brilliant scientist that created the Red Tornado, one of the Justice League’s most trusted allies. Both of these robots are treated with so much more regard and respect than the Metal Men ever have and Will Magnus knows this most of all, but can’t get over that they are noticed, but he is not. So he toils away with his Metal Men, constantly trying to find the edge and bring them real sentience, but he just can’t.

We flash back to the inciting incident of this talk when Gold finds a room containing the broken, dismantled and cast aside parts of Metal Men from the various eras of their existence. Where Gold, Tin and Mercury are enraged that Magnus thinks of these other versions as junk waiting to be recycled, Lead, Iron and Platinum are hurt and disappointed at finding all of this. They all confront him, asking why was all of this hidden away and Magnus answers by saying that he wishes he could have been honest with himself, but then he’d have to admit to being a fraud and he just can’t do that.

Gold looks a lot like Magnus, so when he screams at his creator it’s almost as if a mirror is being held up to him. Shane Davis uses this symbolism well in conjunction with the room of parts and old models showing Magnus’s failures. Platinum has always had something of an affection for Magnus so her disappointment hurts even more. Tin is always such a timid thing, so seeing him angry is a change for him and shows just how deep the betrayal goes. 

He tells them that the Responsometers just allow them to act and react and that it doesn’t give them personalities or sentience of their own. They’re all either shocked or angry, accusing him of being a liar, but he explains that their personalities are based on his own traits. His dimwittedness, his anger – hell, even their metal bodies aren’t even real with the Responsometers converting a base metal to the supposed atomic structure. Magnus couldn’t afford to make them out of real gold or platinum. Before their rage can get even worse, Magnus snaps his fingers and they immediately turn off.

What’s most disgusting about this isn’t the fact that he’s built failsafes into his “crowning achievements,” but that he mentions that they discovered the room “again.” This has happened more than once and he doesn’t know how many times they’ve done this. It shows a level of darkness and sociopathy that really chills the blood. He knows what his problems are, but instead of facing the embarrassment of admitting it to himself and his larger scientific community, he chooses to hide it and reprogram the Metal Men when they become aware, but not self-aware. 

When he’s made aware of living Nth Metal in Challenger’s Mountain asking for him by name, he gives a smile and says he has a team to rebuild…

I’m ultra excited for the future of this series because I’ve liked the Metal Men and their scant appearances in the DC Universe in recent years. Giving them this new and darker edge underneath the feeling of nostalgia. Given the cover of this issue, it’s likely that they’ll be going back to their 1960s-1970s looks, eschewing their more recent designs. Hopefully this has some interactions with the current Year of the Villain stuff as Will Magnus has the mind and motivation to receive something from Lex Luthor.