Nightwing #8

Well, I haven't done a mainstream superhero comic in a while, and I certainly have plenty lying around.

Here is one.

Title: Nightwing
Issue: 8
Date: June 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Kyle Higgins
Penciler: Eddy Barrows
Inker: Ruy Jose, Eber Ferreira
Colorist: Rod Reis
Letterer: Pat Brosseau
Editor: Katie Kubert, Bobbie Chase
Cover: Eddie Barrows, Rod Reis

This is a prelude to "Night of the Owls", and by prelude, we're going all the way back to Gotham City in 1910.

Actually, what we get is parallel stories. One is an origin story for one of the Owls, which is a nice way to put a human face on what has been essentially an army of faceless monsters.

Meanwhile, there is the present story, with Nightwing attempting to rescue the Mayor of Gotham from an attack by an Owl. This is mostly one big fight scene. Unfortunately, the near-indestructibility of the Owl actually detracts from the tension of the fight scene rather than adding to it, as various attacks on the Owl fail rather arbitrarily until eventually page count runs out and one doesn't.

Then it's time to move on to the shocking finale and the ending cliffhanger. The main story is unresolved, and the flashback story in also unresolved. The ending builds tension nicely, and the flashback story was intriguing, although I would have liked to have gotten a few more plot developments in that story.

Rating: 6/10

Nightwing #3

Done with my Arisia reviews. Back to the New 52.

Title: Nightwing
Issue: 3
Date: January 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Kyle Higgins
Penciler: Eddy Barrows, Eduardo Pansica
Inker: JP Mayer, Paulo Siqueira, Eber Ferreira
Colorist: Rod Reis, Allan Passalaqua
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
Editor: Katie Kubert, Bobbie Chase
Cover: Eddie Barrows, Rod Reis

Dick Grayson confronts his past as he investigates the murder of Mr. Haly, the owner of Haly's Circus. Actually, I should say that he's the former owner of Haly's circus. The current owner is, well, Dick Grayson.

This had some really great development of Grayson's backstory, including a fun opening flashback scene, plus plenty of insights and intrigue.

A shift of scene to Chicago has Nightwing confronting a former friend turned crime boss. The ensuing battle included an extended psychic attack sequence of the "face-your-fears" variety that went on for about five tedious pages (one would have been plenty) before Nightwing at least manages to salvage a satisfying resolution out of the scene.

That in turn leads to a really good scene between Dick and Raya, so it's not a complete waste.

Still, five pages? At least Saiko was kept to a minimum.

Hoping for more circus intrigue next issue. And maybe a better villain?

Rating: 6.5/10

Nightwing #2

Bonus Review! I goofed and bought the third issue of three DC titles that I had planned to drop after issue #1, so I went out and bought the second issue of those three titles today (yay for a good sale going on at New England Comics!).

Title: Nightwing
Issue: 2
Date: December 2011
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Kyle Higgins
Penciler: Eddy Barrows
Inker: JP Mayer, Paulo Siqueira
Colorist: Rod Reis
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
Editor: Katie Kubert, Bobbie Chase
Cover: Eddie Barrows, JP Mayer, Rod Reis

This was a big improvement on the first issue, especially once we got past the rather generic (and inconclusive) fight scene between Nightwing and new villain Saiko.

Dick Grayson's relationship with new love interest (well, old flame, actually) Raya Vestry developed nicely, with a decent flow to the dialogue and some advancement of the plot along the way.

This was followed by a BIG plot twist that was actually pretty clever, especially if they allow it to be a long-term development rather than something that gets resolved and forgotten at the end of this storyline.

Ending brings us round two with Saiko (still generic; this villain is doing nothing for me right now), and some tragedy and mystery to finish things up.

Saiko isn't doing the story any favors, but fortunately he appears to be a hired gun. Maybe there's a more interesting boss waiting in the wings. Other than that, the handling of Dick Grayson continues to be good, and the new plot elements in this issue raise a ton of potential.

Rating: 6.5/10

Nightwing #1

And still more New 52!

Title: Nightwing
Issue: 1
Date: November 2011
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Kyle Higgins
Penciler: Eddy Barrows
Inker: JP Mayer
Colorist: Rod Reis
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
Editor: Katie Kubert, Bobbie Chase
Cover: Eddie Barrows, JP Mayer, Rod Reis

Nightwing is one of those characters that I usually enjoy because he's one notch less extreme than the Batman, both in terms of his abilities and his personality. It makes him more realistic, and often more reasonable that Bruce Wayne, which can be refreshing in a universe of extremes.

Much of this book delivers just that vibe. We see Nightwing on patrol taking down a random masked killer on the subway. Dick is sporting a redesigned costume with a lot more red in the look (Possibly a throwback to the Flying Graysons/Robin? It really doesn't make sense for any other reason.). He's still in Gotham, and back to his Nightwing gig after a year under the cowl (when Bruce was "away"; so it's not entirely clear what elements of continuity were kept).

And Haly's circus is back in town.

So is a mysterious, and very dangerous man who's out to kill Dick Grayson. This may or may not tie into the events of Batman #1 (it really SHOULD; this is the perfect chance for a bit of cross-title continuity).

The introductory bit was good, and I loved Dick's interaction with the circus performers when he finally goes to visit. There's even a new potential love interest (and a potential rival) thrown into the mix.

But the last few pages, when the plot rapidly descends, were a problem for me. Dick allows two cops to die because he decides to powder out of a fight to do a costume change. This is the kind of trivial use of violence that I get really frustrated with in mainstream comics. And it didn't help that the random killer in the opening scene slashed three throats before Dick arrived to stop him. The writer makes an halfhearted effort to have Dick acknowledge the fact that he just cost two human beings their lives for the sake of protecting his secret identity, but after a quick couple of reaction captions ("This is on me." really shouldn't cut it here), we're back to business as usual.

And to make matters worse, the bad guy is an expert fighter who really ought to have no trouble figuring out that the guy who he's fighting in the costume is the same dude that he was fighting a couple of minutes ago without the costume.

Too bad, because for 21 pages, I really wanted to like this book.

Rating: 5.5/10