Batman #700

From the Random Stack of Unread Comics.

Title: Batman
Issue: 700
Date: August 2010
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Grant Morrison
Artist: Tony Daniel, Frank Quitely, Scott Kolins, Andy Kubert, David Finch, Richard Friend
Colorist: Ian Hannin, Alex Sinclair, Tony Avina, Brad Anderson, Peter Steigerwald
Letterer: Jared K. Fletcher
Editor: Mike Marts, Janelle Siegel

I reviewed Batman #699 way back in 2011, in the early days of this blog (it was the first time I missed a day, something that I learned to get a lot less uptight about since then, as this blog has not usually been even close to daily since then).

I'm always a fan of "big round number" milestone issues. This one had two special features. The frist was a Batman pinup gallery by Shane Davis, Juan Doe, Guillem March, Dustin Nguyen, Tim Sale, Bill Sienkiewicz, and Phillip Tan. The other bonus item was a detailed map of the Batcave by Freddie Williams II.

The main story was something of a hot mess, a time-travel piece involving multiple version of the Batman, bunches of classic villains, and too much Damian Wayne. It did feature a lot of great visuals by its rotating cast of artists, some great action, and a ton of nods to past stories (I particularly liked the use of the Mutants gang from The Dark Knight Returns, and a rare appearance by Chief O'Hara). It was not very accessible to the casual fan, which is too bad, as these milestone issues often attract some casual fan interest, and the convoluted plot of this story would probably leave a lot of them wondering what the heck they just read.

I was a bit unsure myself. Very pretty issue, but not enough reward for the effort of parsing all of the time travel threads to try to get it to make sense.

Rating: 5/10

Batwoman #6

From the random stack of unread comics.

Title: Batwoman
Issue: 6
Date: April 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: J. H. Williams III, W. Haden Blackman
Penciller: Amy Reeder
Inker: Rob Hunter, Richard Friend
Colorist: Guy Major
Letterer: Todd Klein
Cover: Amy Reeder
Editor: Harvey Richards, Rickey Purdin, Mike Marts

I'm reading the early issues of this series in pretty random order (my reviews: Issue #1, Issue #2, Issue #3, Issue #4, Issue #5, Issue #7), and the fact that the story is loaded with time-jumps is not helping matters.

This issue brings us the origin of Gotham's Weeping Woman, a few bits of interlude including a nice scene with Kate and Maggie and their relationship, and a couple of fight scenes.

The art really stands out here. This has been my favorite Batwoman issue in terms of art. The use of splash pages and the flow of the action scenes is great, and the artwork on the quieter moments is pretty effective as well.

There is some nice character development, even if the overall progress of the plot is somewhat choppy.

Rating: 8/10

Forever Evil #1

Massive crossover in the New 52. I guess some things never change.

Title: Forever Evil
Issue: 1
Date: November 2013
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Geoff Johns
Penciler: David Finch
Inker: Richard Friend
Colorist: Sonia Oback
Letterer: Rob Leigh
Editor: Kate Stewart, Brian Cunningham
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend, Sonia Oback

It's major crossover time at DC. Actually, considering that this is a direct follow-up to Trinity War, it seems like it's pretty much always major crossover time at DC.

But this one is particularly major. The Crime Syndicate arrives on Earth, having apparently killed off the Justice League. I didn't actually read Trinity War, so I'm not really sure what the deal is, and I'm not really sure I'd have any idea what the deal is if I had read Trinity War, so let's just humor them for the moment.

The Crime Syndicate are essentially alternate-Earth evil twins of the Justice League with variants on their powers and weaknesses.

Anyway, they arrive on Earth, bust a bunch of villains out of prison and recruit a bunch more, and beat up Nightwing because he happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

This is all setting up a massive conflict between these off-world villains, and Earth's regular villains, although for the moment everyone is all pals because, hey, we're all evil. Forever evil.

The art is pretty, and it's gimmicky with a gigantic center fold-out crowd scene. Apparently there is a 3d cover variant for those collectors who want to party like it's 1994.

But the main problem with this issue is that not a whole lot happens. The best action takes place either before (what really happened to the Justice League), or is yet to come (okay, now that the Crime Syndicate is here and has assembled this big group of villains, what are they actually going to do?). The introduction of the new villains takes longer than it needs to, and the Nightwing subplot didn't actually seem particularly intense or interesting.

This story does have some potential, and DC has a huge slate of crossovers planned (at least one issue of all 52 titles, plus this series itself), but that is also a ton of investment in time/$ for a story that so far feels phoned in.

Rating: 5/10

Batman: The Dark Knight #8

Another Batman issue from the backlog.

Title: Batman: The Dark Knight
Issue: 8
Publisher: DC Comics 
Date: June 2012
Writer: Joe Harris
Penciler: Ed Benes
Inker: Rob Hunter, Jack Purcell
Colorist: Jeromy Cox
Letterer: Steve Wands
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend, Jeromy Cox
Editor:  Rickey Purdin, Mike Marts

A subway train full of bodies. They weren't killed by some supervillain. They killed each other. Is it something about Gotham that just drives people mad?

Mad... As a... Hatter?

This is not a spoiler. The Mad Hatter is on the cover. So are Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee. Well, so is White Rabbit, and she's not actually in this issue, so apologies if the Mad Hatter thing was a spoiler.

Very little in this issue makes any sense, except for Jim Gordon's advice to his shrink: Don't ride the subways. Actually, Gordon has a nice little subplot going on here with overzealous I.A. detective Forbes.

But other than that, the story here was routine if you avoid thinking too much about Hatter's plan and methods. Otherwise, the story just becomes, well, maddening.

Rating: 5/10

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

Batman: The Dark Knight #5

Title: Batman: The Dark Knight
Issue: 5
Date: March 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Paul Jenkins, David Finch
Penciler: David Finch
Inker: Richard Friend
Colorist: Jeromy Cox
Letterer: Sal Cipriano
Editor: Mike Marts, Rickey Purdin
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend, Alex Sinclair

A scarecrow fear gas story! How... unexpected. Not.

Scarecrow enlightens the Batman on his darkest fears and the Batman resists, and it's nothing we haven't seen before. When good old reliable fear gas doesn't work, it's on to the new stuff, which seems to be the New 52 version of venom. Batman becomes fearless and extremely angry. No, I mean more so than he usually is.

He even punches Superman around. And calls him a fascist.

This title has apparently been designated as the place where the Justice League guest appearances are going to happen, and the Superman appearance is pretty well handled here. The confrontation between the Batman and the Scarecrow is the part that needed work.

Rating: 6.5/10

Batman: The Dark Knight #4

Title: Batman: The Dark Knight
Issue: 4
Date: February 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Paul Jenkins, David Finch
Penciler: David Finch
Inker: Richard Friend
Colorist: Jeromy Cox
Letterer: Sal Cipriano
Editor: Mike Marts, Rickey Purdin
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend, Alex Sinclair

Caption-based narration by the (until the last panel) essentially takes the entire issue to tell us what the Eagles once did in two lines: "Somebody's gonna hurt someone, before the night is through/Somebody's gonna come undone, there's nothing you can do." Um, without the rhymes, though.

The plot is basically a series of random encounters. First an Aubrey II that Poison Ivy left to guard her lair. Then an encounter with a venomed-up Deathstroke. Much to my amusement, Deathstroke jobs clean and quick to the Batman.

By the way, I'm using the term "venom" here because we really do seem to be heading for a reboot of the "venom" concept. And no, I do not mean the alien symbiote guy over at the other company. I am expecting that the major villain revealed at the end of this issue is not, in fact, the mastermind behind all of the mayhem that's been happening in this series. There's one more enemy waiting in the wings, and they are timing his arrival for maximum movie-crossover potential. And if that's the case, than the drug that is turning all of these villains into bad 1990s Image Comics art is indeed the New 52 version of venom.

Until then, the Batman is getting no further direct help from the Justice League as they are busy rounding up more escaped Arkham inmates (Spellbinder and Electrocutioner get mentions but not actual appearances; Wonder Woman does actually appear in two panels). Bruce is left to content with Deathstroke, White Rabbit, and this issue's new (not all that surprising) surprise villain. Poison Ivy, meanwhile, is apparently an unwilling participant in all of this.

Random digression:

Something that I noticed: Batman has some of the most vicious and psychotic villains in comics... Except for the female ones. Ever notice how many Batman villainesses turn out to have some amount of goodness deep in their hearts, or at least manage to take on "anti-hero" roles on the side of good? Catwoman (own series), Harley Quinn (Suicide Squad), Talia (plenty of mixed motives/emotions in various past stories), Poison Ivy (Birds of Prey). White Rabbit gets played for sympathy in this series, and even Lady Shiva gets some sympathetic portrayals. Compare this to, say, Cheetah, who is typically portrayed (in modern versions) as an absolutely bloodthirsty monster in her appearances. Not sure what to make of this. Just an interesting observation.

Back to the story at hand. Interestingly, even though they weren't really meaningful scenes in terms of plot, I actually found the action sequences in this issue to be better than the more character development-related scenes. I blame the dialogue. A scene with Jim Gordon drags on without really getting anywhere, while Alfred's dialogue is hokey enough to be something out of 1966 TV. And Alfred is a character that can usually be counted on for good dialogue.

The action scenes are effective, but very little plot was actually accomplished here.

Rating: 4.5/10

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

Batman: The Dark Knight #3

Title: Batman: The Dark Knight
Issue: 3
Date: December 2012
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Paul Jenkins, David Finch
Penciler: David Finch
Inker: Richard Friend
Colorist: Jeromy Cox
Letterer: Sal Cipriano
Editor: Mike Marts, Rickey Purdin
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend, Alex Sinclair

After the mess that was the third issue of Detective Comics (see my review here), it was nice to see this title heading in the right direction.

Nothing profound here, but a lot of fun, even if it required a bit of "stunt booking" to achieve it.

We get started with a hulked-up (drugged-up, really) Joker and the White Rabbit. But things are not exactly as they appear, and the Batman's quick bit of on-the-fly detective work in the midst of the ensuing fight is one of the little touches that makes this amusing.

We go immediately to a high-powered guest star from the Justice League, who lends a hand in classic 70s-style team-up fashion. It's a nice nostalgic bit that makes reasonable sense and reminds the reader that there is a whole DC Universe out there. The guest star gets written out in somewhat over-arbitrary fashion later, but I still enjoyed it.

I'm also starting to warm to White Rabbit as a villain now that we're seeing her in action a bit more. Still not thrilled with the Playboy Bunny costume, but at least her actions are starting to make a bit more sense.

Also starting to grow on me: new romantic interest Jaina Hudson. Might just be a matter of personal taste, but she's one of the few women in comics that gets a "Wow, she is really beautiful!" reaction from me. Her scene with Bruce Wayne was mostly just more flirting, but I did like the detail that a text from Alfred did NOT result in Bruce abruptly calling off the date. Nice little bit of cliche breaking.

Ends with a bit more thickening of the plot and a little bit of crossover with the events of Birds of Prey. Oh, and a preview of The Ray, which was just kinda there.

Rating: 7/10

Batman: The Dark Knight #2

Title: Batman: The Dark Knight
Issue: 2
Date: December 2011
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Paul Jenkins, David Finch
Penciler: David Finch
Inker: Richard Friend
Colorist: Alex Sinclair
Letterer: Sal Cipriano
Editor: Mike Marts, Rickey Purdin
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend, Alex Sinclair

Harvey Dent's tagline at the end of the first issue actually makes no sense at all, but that doesn't stop the drugged-up and muscled-up Two Face from beating on the Batman in a pretty one-sided brawl that ends when the Batman is effectively saved by the bell.

It turns out that someone has been injecting the Batman villains with a drug that I at first assumed to be Venom, but is actually some variant on the scarecrow's fear-gas. Its effects include superhuman strength, fearlessness, and really badly-drawn anatomy.

In spite of the rather goofy nature of the premise, the creative team milks it for all its worth, including a montage of Bat-Family members getting trounced by an array of second and third rate villains on (for all intents and purposes) steroids.

Some minor gripes:

More dead GCPD officers. Is this really necessary? These guys must spend their off-duty time doing nothing but attending funerals for their fellow officers. I don't have a grip with violence when it serves a purpose, but to draw in a few dead bodies of cops just for the sake of getting a villain over is lazy storytelling, and it has been happening way too much in the DCnU (in the old DCU in recent years too). How about doing this a lot less often but making an effort to get the readers to care?

Also, Damian Wayne only appears on two pages (good!), but he is completely out of character in this scene. Some consistency would be nice (even if it involves making a character consistently intolerable).

I was also a bit puzzled with the kid-gloves approach that the Batman takes with the White Rabbit, who is pretty clearly one of the bad guys.

On the good side, the pacing was great. Art was solid aside from the Image Comics 1990s look for all the drugged-up villains. And the story was a lot more complex than in the first issue. All in all, despite some problems, an improvement.

Rating: 6

Batman: The Dark Knight #1

Back to the New 52. Still working my way through first issues.

Title: Batman: The Dark Knight
Issue: 1
Date: November 2011
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Paul Jenkins, David Finch
Penciler: David Finch
Inker: Richard Friend
Colorist: Alex Sinclair
Letterer: Sal Cipriano
Editor: Mike Marts, Rickey Purdin
Cover: David Finch, Richard Friend, Alex Sinclair

You know the line in Austin Powers where Dr. Evil gives up on making a creative plan for world domination and just says "The hell with it. Let's just do what we always do and hijack a nuclear weapon."?

This book felt a lot like that. No original ideas? No problem. Let's just do what we always do and have a mass breakout from Arkham Asylum. That always works.

In the lead-up, we get a little bit of narrated monologue on the nature of fear, followed by a scene of Bruce Wayne doing his playboy/philanthropist gig. Two long-term complications are introduced right off the bat (Bat! Get it! Never mind...). First there's a Gotham internal affairs detective who's got his sights set on Bruce Wayne and Jim Gordon. Then we have Jaina Hudson, a possible new love interest, who's flirting more than a bit outrageously at first sight.

From there it's mayhem at Arkham, and as usual, it doesn't matter how many cops you've got. The only way to restore order is to have the Batman lead the charge fists-flying. Oh, and in the midst of it, there's some random villainess in what is basically a Playboy bunny outfit who manages to strike pretty much the most sexist pose possible while dodging bullets. But that's not who the Batman is going after. He's heading straight into the heart of darkness to find Two-Face before he gets... Oops too late. Harvey Dent has been redrawn by way of the Rob Liefeld School Of Excessive Muscles.

The two new supporting cast members seemed decent. Everything else here has been done before. Only a lot better.

Rating: 4/10