Brain Boy, №2, October 2013

📖 "Brain Boy" №2 opens with a visually arresting continuation of issue №1’s cliffhanger. Fred Van Lente pits the psychic powers of Brain Boy against an opponent much like himself. This plays as an appropriate choice for a ground-up introduction of the Brain Boy character, but also an overly safe approach to superhero storytelling, without much spin on it. Our hero is a telepath working for the Secret Service to protect international dignitaries – it’s nothing fancier than that. We’ve been reading about telepaths since before Charles Xavier was hanging out listening to beat poetry in the ’60s, man. Putting Brain Boy (don’t call him Brain Boy) into a stuffy government contractual situation offers a little intrigue, I suppose, but aside from the fact that he’s a self-depricating guy, the story itself is pretty standard. Pitting our hero against telepaths and dictators, “Brain Boy” №2 sets up a bunch of little mysteries surrounding these cases – which are enough to pique interest, but maybe not enough to make the exposition along the way a little bit of a drag. Regardless, the fact that his newfound enemy is a remarkably despicable, yet influential guy works really well in execution that I won’t dare spoil it.