Injustice 2 – Quality and Quantity
ALFRED scores 0 to 100, average of 50
July 13, 2020
2017’s Injustice 2, spearheaded by Tom Taylor, delivered both a sizable number of issues, as well as 100% average or above-average quality issues. Let’s take a deep dive into the makeup of this series.
Reminder: Our comic scoring system ALFRED aggregates critic reviews and scores them 0 to 100.
Official Description
The comic book prequel to award-winning video game Injustice 2 begins here! Continuing the story from the hit series INJUSTICE: GODS AMONG US: Superman is imprisoned, and it’s up to Batman to put the world back together. But with Superman’s iron-fisted regime eliminated, other forces rise up to fill the void. And Batman doesn’t have a lot of allies left to help stop them…
Injustice 2 is a sequel to the original five series seen here. The original Gods Among Us series was the previous strongest score by ALFRED, but leap forward in Injustice 2 delivered the best reviews set in the Injustice universe.
One of the longest series in the ALFRED database, Injustice 2 ran for 72 issues. Sectioned into 6 graphic novels, each collection earned an ALFRED equivalent of ★★★★. Each individual issue was rated average or above, with 6 reaching Must-Read status.
Note: There are 72 digital issues, and 36 print issues (ex: Digital Issue 1 & Digital Issue 2 = Print Issue 1, and so on…)
Looking at a collection-by-collection summary, Injustice 2 had its strongest entry in the first graphic novel. From there, the series had very consistent reviews as it continued. How can the series overall reach an 81 ALFRED? It’s very difficult to maintain quality over a long run. Whereas most series would have a downturn as it progressed, Injustice 2 is a rare combination of quality and quantity and earned bonus points beyond its average rating. See detailed ALFRED ratings here.
Let’s look issue-by-issue. Most of the ★★★★★ issues are concentrated in the beginning of its run, and that is consistent with the graphic novel ratings we saw above. Similarly, most of the ★★★ issues are concentrated toward the end of the run. But again, every issue is at least average, and 80% of the issues in the run are above-average.
There consistency in issue ratings translates to a fairly flat ALFRED graph.
Its peak was at Issue 8 – A Knight Alone. Injustice 2 nearly reached that score again around Issues 51 and 52.
Tom Taylor is of course credited as the writer for each issue. For this long-running series, a variety of pencillers were deployed. Redondo and Sampere were the most frequent contributors, with Miller, Xermanico, and Derenick also taking on crucial issues or portions of issues. It should be noted that the average star rating was consistent across artists, with minimal variability around a 3.8-3.9 rating.
There was far less variety in terms of inkers, where Albarran regularly worked with both Reddondo and Sampere. Some issues did not have a credited inker.
Lokus primarily took on colors, with Nanjan also showing up in Miller and Xermanico’s issues.
Let’s end with some highlights of Injustice 2. Per ALFRED, it had the most total reviews, most reviews per issue, best reviews per issue, and best top issues out of the Injustice universe.
Give this series a read for a unique take on the DC Universe, or if you are a fan of the Injustice games.
