This new Noble Causes mini-series brings with it several changes, notably a switch to black and white instead of color and of course a new number one issue. Unfortunately, what it doesn't bring is a lot of new material in terms of story, and the "series of mini-series" approach seems to have forced Faerber into a situation where he's spending as much time on recap as he is on new story. This makes the series very accessible, but it's also starting to make it feel a little repetitive for the long-term reader.
There is a need to keep books accessible to new readers, especially when they haven't quite reached the critical sales mass necessary to keep the book going. However, too often the method of inserting exposition and backstory into the comic is obvious and intrusive, and that is unfortunately the case with this issue. Instead of Liz Noble, our outsider/point-of-view character, being interviewed by the media, this time out she's talking to her sister, who helpfully asks every question that a new reader might want to know. It's useful exposition, but it's stuff that most of the readers of the book already know, and more to the point the way it's introduced will probably feel clunky even to those who need the info.
What's strange is that Faerber introduces some new information in a less-clear manner, and while it may have been the intent to twist reader expectations with the nature of Frost's encounter with Doc Noble, I was mostly confused by the sudden revelation about Gaia, which had me wondering if I'd missed an issue rather than assuming that Frost was not necessarily talking to "our" Doc Noble. Mind you, it's a neat idea, and a cool revelation about the true parentage of Frost (although I would rather have heard about it in-story than picked it up out of a Frost profile page), and the implication about Race makes for a good teaser.
One of the things I find most frustrating about the new series of mini-series approach, necessary though it might have been, is that Faerber is also sticking with the choice of using backup stories to contrast the past with the modern day. It's a good story technique, and the backup stories are always entertaining, but given how truncated the main story feels, it seems like maybe it's time to lose the backup story device. Certainly the story of Rusty getting Celeste's ring has more room to breathe than the main (and more important) tale, and it strikes me as the kind of thing that could have been imparted just as easily as a conversation between two characters rather than a full-fledged backup.
The other unpleasant surprise for me this issue was the loss of color. I'm no color snob; I buy a fair amount of black and white books, and count some of them among my favorites, but to me this is a book which really looked good in color, and while the art still looks solid gray-toned, it also loses some of the brightness and life that color brought to the book. Given that it was most likely a sales necessity, I don't feel it fair to complain too much about it, especially since the art is still very solid, but the one thing I noticed about the art more than anything else this issue was that it suddenly wasn't in color.
