Straczynski is the creator and (almost) sole writer of Babylon 5 which wasn't a show I ever got into. The few episodes I saw were uninteresting and I think the best thing to come out of it was the line in Spaced.
This comic is his attempt at superheroes. He's going for the big concept aspect here and while Rising Stars certainly doesn't suck it falls way short of what he was aiming for.
The basic plot revolves around a group of 113 people affected by some cosmic energy or other whilst in utero. Focusing on their subsequent travails when one of the costumed meatheads amongst them realises that they all get more powerful whenever one of them dies and so goes on a killing spree.
It was horribly cliched for the most part and some of the plot development was just utterly ridiculous - I'm thinking here of the sudden team up between costumed meathead #1, his so-called arch-enemy (who we'd had next to no previous introduction to) and the god-bothering closeted gay lightbulb and his dad where they immediately convinced the government that the other powery types were eeviillll - bwah-ha-ha!
From that point on things just degenerated into a non-stop plunge into violent absurdity. There was little nuance and even less plot development. Instead it was full steam ahead to the intermission and it's big reveal. The only hint to this came a couple of pages before which left it feeling a lot like an afterthought.
I read this lying in bed, half drunk on cheap lager and even cheaper (but surprisingly tasty) brandy. It passed an hour and that was good. If the second volume turns up in the library I'll borrow it because I'm a completist saddo but on the whole this was pretty damn weak.
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