World's Worst

Wild Worlds: written by Alan Moore; illustrated by Travis Charest, Jim Baikie, Adam Hughes, and others (1997-99; collected 2007): From Alan Moore's pre-America's Best Comics, 'just paying the bills' phase comes this hodgepodge of Moore's non-WildC.A.T.S. work for the Wildstorm universe, which at the time was still a branch of Image Comics and not a branch of DC Comics.

OK, there is one WildC.A.T.S. story, an epilogue that doesn't work all that well with the other 13 or so issues it's an epilogue to. And those issues have their own collection, so why the epilogue appears here as well is...a mystery. I'm assuming it's probably because Travis Charest drew it, thus supplying the collection with one of its few artistic highpoints.

The best piece in the collection is a Majestic one-off depicting the immortal hero's adventures at the end of time, as entropy ends all. It's also reprinted elsewhere -- in a Majestic collection. But it is dandy, story and art.

The rest of the collection ranges from truly awful (the Spawn/WildC.A.T.S. miniseries features some of the worst 90's-style art I've ever seen professionally published. It could be used as a textbook-case on how NOT to draw superheroes. Or anything) to the competent (a Voodoo miniseries and a DV8 miniseries are both interesting, and Jim Baikie's art on the DV8 piece is typically enjoyable and slightly unusual for a superhero book). But really, not recommended unless you either get it deeply discounted (as I did) or are a rabid Alan Moore completist (as I am).