[Editor’s Note: This review may contain spoilers]
Writer: Magdalene Visaggio
Artist: Sonny Lie
Colors: Chris Chuckry
Letters: Todd Klein
Summary
About to be scattered to the four winds by the RSM, Caroline takes control of herself and destroys the lab from the inside. Madame Atom is there. Crash is there. And Dani arrives just in time to watch it all with Sloan. Not comprehending what’s transpiring she grabs a rifle and goes to the lab floor from the observation booth. There she sees Caroline heading off, she’s not sure where, but she follows. She then encounters multiple versions of herself and she begins to understand. Dani wants to help her. Madame Atom encourages her. Crash wants to stop Caroline from destroying everything in creation.
Crash stops to talk with Dani and gives her a little information. Caroline intends to become one with the tower holding up the sky and then let it fall to destroy the universes. It takes Dani intervening with Madame Atom to buy Crash enough time to explain the universe to Caroline.
No one means anything. Everything is choices. The choices one makes, defines what you become. Crash tells her to choose life. Dani steps in and gives her own testimonial about the power of being able to remake herself through choice. This allows Crash to finally get through. In that moment she remakes herself and instead of destroying becomes a creator. Crash offers her the opportunity to work with the Lords of Order and fix some of the damage she’s done over the past few days. With a new outlook on existence, Caroline finally gets to be more than Chrysalis and use her powers of eternity.
Positives
There’s a great message in this issue about the power of choice and how one’s own actions can positively affect one’s own life and outlook on life. Sometimes you have to chose to have a good day because the world will not chose that for you. That choice though is something that you have to make everyday from the moment you get out of bed.
It’s good that the issue of choice is seen in a positive light. Caroline chooses life for the universe instead of death for everything just to save herself from the pain of continually reincarnating and feeling like she cannot continue to live and relive things. Her ability to remake herself is crucial for her being able to continue on. Sometimes in life we face the world with the need to make a change in our lives. It’s a choice we make, a choice for the positive to remake ourselves to continue on.
Negatives
While it’s clear that Caroline has made a positive choice for the life of the universe, the notion of choice as explored in this issue seemed quite self-centered for Caroline. And, while it may seem obvious that Caroline needed to make a choice to save her life and find a way to remake her own world, the whole series has also implied that someone with her powers and power levels has a huge responsibility with her choices.
The finale didn’t seem to acknowledge the difference between selfish choices and altruistic choices. Dani reached Caroline on a personal level which showed that you can make a choice to carry on through change, but Crash’s explanation about the interconnectedness of the universe didn’t address the impact of Caroline’s choice on the universe explicitly enough. Caroline chose not to destroy the universe, but it seemed to come about through a selfish motive. This is a very dangerous attitude for someone with her powers and for any of us lest we think our actions affect us and us alone.
Verdict
With this being a mini-series, this issue wrapped up the story line effectively and explored the importance of choices one makes in one’s life and the impact those choices have on one’s own happiness. This is some real high level thinking and clearly an analog for situations people face in the real world. Everyone has crises in their lives and often making the right choice is important, and sometimes it has to start with just getting up out of bed every morning.
