Batman: Rebirth #1

Look! An actual NEW comic! That's the result of being back in the USA with east access to comic stores for the next few weeks.

Since returning, I have...

1) Picked up a small haul of items purchased via crowdfunding sites in the past year (and shipped to a US address), A couple of graphic novels are among those items, and I'll be taking those back with me to Vietnam to read and review over the next year.

2) Visited Newbury Comics in Hyannis. Newbury Comics has a 50%-off sale on all standard-format DC comics right now, so I bought a few of the new Rebirth books to see what all the hype was about. Included in the purchase was the Rebirth special itself, but I ended up starting with the Batman tie-in (see below).

3) Retrieved a big stack of random unread comics from my storage unit. Lots of indie and minicomic titles in this batch. These will also be heading back to Vietnam with me to provide some reading/reviewing fodder. I also managed to get the whole batch bagged and boarded for travel.

I still have two conventions and lots of comic shop visits coming up on this trip, so I'm looking to add some more good reading material to the stack I take back to Vietnam with me. In the meantime, here's my review of an actual recent release!

Title: Batman: Rebirth
Issue: 1
Date: August, 2016
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Scott Snyder, Tom King
Artist: Mikel Janin
Colorist: June Chung
Letterer: Deron Bennett
Editor: Mark Doyle, Rebecca Taylor
Cover: Mikel Janin

So... Calendar Man.

Not exactly the most exciting villain to start off my Rebirth reading. That being said, the interpretation of Calendar Man here is what I would consider a valiant attempt at making the character interesting. He's found a way to accelerate the changing of the seasons in Gotham, and is attempting to unleash deadly spores on the city as soon as Spring rolls around. In four days.

There's also a fun scene with Lucius Fox including some insight into Thomas Wayne, plus the beginning of the career of the Batman's latest partner. Not a new Robin, but a new costumed identity entirely. I wasn't familiar with the character who will be under the mask, but he seemed interesting enough that I'd like to see more.

Not a bad start for Rebirth. But really, guys... Calendar Man?

Rating: 6/10

Birds od Prey #5

Title: Birds of Prey
Issue: 5
Date: March 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Duane Swierczynski
Artist: Jesus Saiz, Javier Pina
Colorist: June Chung
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
Editor: Bobbie Chase, Katie Kubert
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend

The team finds themselves under attack, but even worse, they are all missing several hour of memories.

Left to figure out what happened in the missing time, they go their separate ways with plans to regroup after doing their own investigations. But can they trust those around them or even each other if they can't even trust their own memories?

The opening fight scene didn't seem to serve any purpose, but in a subjective reality scenario like this, it may just be that the significance has not yet been revealed. The same goes for pretty much everything in this issue.

In spite of the fuzzy reality of the scenario, this issue left a pretty decent amount of space for character development, and there were some good scenes. I particularly liked the training scene between Dinah and Tatsu.

By the end, we're not too far along from where we started, but I didn't mind the chance to let the characters have some individual and one-on-one interactions.

Rating: 7/10

Birds of Prey #4

Title: Birds of Prey
Issue: 4
Date: February 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Duane Swierczynski
Artist: Jesus Saiz
Colorist: June Chung
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
Editor: Bobbie Chase, Katie Kubert
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend, Sonia Oback

Great opening as Canary tries to sacrifice herself to save innocent lives, and Sparrow comes up with an alternative plan in an awesome splash page shot. We jump forward and then flash back and get the conclusion of last issue's train battle in fast-paced recap form narrated by Sparrow, which includes just the right touch of humor.

I think I'm starting to "get" Sparrow. She's definitely the most entertaining character in this issue.

From there, Batgirl gets added to the team makes a guest appearance. Okay, that was a bit of a bait-and-switch, and there really isn't much explanation given for Barbara's arrival at this juncture except for the need for "extra muscle". This just seems like an excuse to put her on the cover.

Also, they decide to split up the party. That NEVER works! (Actually, they get away with it here; it's just an excuse to show the team members crawling around in ventilation shafts and such).

Weirdly, the bad guys' lair uses the exact same gimmick that the Court of Owls uses over in Batman: hidden spaces between the floors of buildings secretly built into the original design. It was so similar that I kept waiting to see if it's an actual crossover. If it isn't, then it's a pretty blatant failure at the brand editing level to be running essentially the same idea in two unrelated books (especially since this particular detail was pretty crucial to the plot in Batman). If this does turn out to be a crossover with Batman, then I'm all for it.

The infiltration appears to lead to a dead end at first, but of course things are not as they seem, and the ending cliffhanger is actually pretty clever.

This was the best issue so far in this series, in spite of some (hopefully; we'll see) minor flaws.

Rating: 7.5/10

Birds of Prey #3

Last bonus review for tonight.

Title: Birds of Prey
Issue: 3
Date: January 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Duane Swierczynski
Artist: Jesus Saiz
Colorist: June Chung
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
Editor: Janelle Asselin, Bobbie Chase, Katie Kubert
Cover: Jesus Saiz, Nei Ruffino

Canary has invited Poison Ivy to join the team. That goes over about as well as could be expected, complete with all manner of pot-calling-kettle-black as trained assassins Starling and Katana suddenly get uptight because Ivy is "a terrorist and a killer". Which she has the audacity to just flat out deny! The inevitable fight-the-make-up follows, and in all of the grudging acceptance of Ivy by the rest of the team that follows, we don't get a single clue as to why Ivy would actually want any part of this.

We quickly move on to the clue-gathering portion of this issue's activities, which is made easier by the fact that the bad guys happened to leave a slip of paper with the names of their next two living-bomb assassin/victims in their abandoned hideout. Not exactly Batman-level detective skills needed here.

So the team mounts an "operation" on a train, and it very quickly goes badly as we finally get the rather contrived outcome of some odd moments in the main fight scene back in issue #1. At least there is some continuity here, folks, because not much else in this issue made any sense.

Writer Duane Swierczynski had to jump through some fairly ridiculous hoops to get to it, but the ending cliffhanger is really good. Sparrow continues to be entertaining. Otherwise, though, I had a too hard a time getting through the logical flaws to enjoy this one all that much.

Rating: 5.5/10