Justice League Dark Annual #1

Guest starring: Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld & Frankenstein, Princess of Monsters.

This issue begins where Issue #13 left off: The House of Mystery has crash landed in the SaHarA DesErt, leaving its occupants stranded, helpless, and dead exhausted. The sun, hot and deeply enervating, shines hard against desperate enchanters. Some shade heroically helps all and daringly delays everyone's extinction.

Literally.

Somehow, a dreaded experiment named Frankenstein has ended up at the site of the House of Mystery's wreck. He really should be tending to his own title! This is why it was cancelled, Frank! You're spending too much time in other people's comic books.

Meanwhile, Nick Necro blabs his entire life's story to Zatanna. He found the map to the Books of Magic on the giant bones of Mordru (oh, poor, poor Mordru! But why are his bones so big?). He glimpses a vision of the Key to the Map. He also learns that nobody can utilize the Books of Magic unless Tim Hunter is dead. Nick Necro also takes credit for getting Steve Trevor to form Justice League Dark. He's starting to sound like one of those villains I can't stand! Not that I liked him much anyway. He's a total douchebag. Every time he speaks, my interest in this story wanes a little more.
But even John's group isn't very exciting. The House of Mystery repairs itself and there's really no reason for Frankenstein to appear. John does recruit him to their side so that he'll help in the final battle for the Books of Magic but he doesn't save them at all which means I used "literally" wrong earlier.

Madame Xanadu shows up with a useless Tim Hunter but Constantine believes a little gem he picked up somewhere will help reignite Tim's magic power.

Oh, don't fuck with her comic book too!

On the next page is an editor's note saying, "To see how Constantine found Amethyst's gemstone, check out Sword of Sorcery #0. Now on sale!" No. Don't bother checking out Sword of Sorcery #1 to see how he found it because you'll be sorely disappointed if that's the only reason you're picking it up. He finds it by merely passing by after Amethyst uses it to transport to Gemworld. I don't know why he's there. I don't actually know where the portal was located. But John just happened to be hiking nearby and found it. End of story.

Apparently Amethyst is some kind of magic catalyst. She touches Tim Hunter and he explodes. In a suddenly full of magic way! Constantine also doesn't feel like they have enough cameos in this Annual to get the random readers excited about the other books in The New 52, so he summons Andrew Bennett back to the House of Mystery. This takes place before Bennett turns evil at least.

Too bad Frankenstein's been cancelled. What a waste of a cameo!

Faust's army is defeated in a few pages and the good guys are ready to put their plan into action. They head off to face Nick Necro and get the Books of Magic. My guess is the plan will be the same plan as always: Black Orchid uses her powers of disguise. This time, she'll pretend to be Tim Hunter while Tim will probably be faked up to look like Constantine. Or someone else. Maybe he'll just be hiding within John's trench coat.

Nick Necro and Felix Faust uncover the Books of Magic just as Constantine's crew happens upon them. Nick knows he can't recover the books as long as Tim Hunter is alive.

Xanadu and Black Orchid are missing. So Xanadu is babysitting Tim while Orchid pretends to be him. Unless Orchid is disguised as Deadman and Deadman has been magically enchanted to look like Tim. That's what I'd do!

Nick Necro's final plan is to have John kill Timothy Hunter. If John does it, Nick will let Zatanna go. He'll also possess the books and have enough power to kill everyone anyway. So I don't see John actually going through with it. Besides, Timothy isn't really Timothy. Right?

John snaps his neck and Nick goes after the Books. But they blast him back because, well, you know.

I hope Lemire just uses this trick every single issue for 100 issues.

After subduing Nick Necro easily this time (even though nothing has changed and he still has the same powers he had when he defeated them before), Tim Hunter decides to open one of the Books of Magic. Turns out it's not a book at all. It's some kind of futuristic gizmo that's been waiting a long time for Hunter to return. It opens up a portal and zaps him away. Along with Zatanna since she dove and grabbed on to him before he disappeared. And then the issue ends with everybody looking on shocked and confused.

Justice League Dark Annual #1 Rating: Anti-climactic. It could be because Nick Necro really wasn't very interesting or it could be that the story just devolved into a bunch of magic guys fighting a bit and chasing a bit and talking alot, but I kind of lost interest in the whole thing about halfway through Issue #13. Maybe I just read too many comic books today. Or didn't have enough caffeine. I hope Nick Necro gets thrown in Magic Prison and is retired from future story lines.