The Good
The Bat-Family just cannot catch a break. This issue opens on everyone’s favorite jailbird receiving an offer that he’ll likely have a great deal of trouble saying no to before quickly cutting to the Bat-family in action against the newly teched out and powered up villains of Gotham before Hush hits a very bad kill-switch at a very inconvenient time. It falls to the Bats to fend for themselves at Batman and Penny-Two scramble to seize control from the power-crazed Tommy Elliot and Jason Bard scrambles to exonerate Jim Gordon. Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, Kyle Higgins, Ray Fawkes and Tim Seeley are STILL managing to bring an absolutely wild amount of intensity, pacing and especially intrigue to a title that’s forty eight issues deep and STILL has the unmitigated gall to not only be readable, but be consistently good, if not great. The setups of last issue pay off dividends and while we only get snapshots of each fight, the writers have such a great familiarity with the characters, that it’s not difficult to understand what’s going on as it happens, whether on or off-panel. The greater emphasis on Bard, Vale, Gordon and Penguin are a welcome breather rather than feeling like a distraction from the breakneck fights. There’s also a fantastic twist near the end of all this chaos that not only makes things a little bright, but triggers a real lightbulb moment that quickly turns to absolute DREAD, as well as some elation at what a great idea has just been revealed.
Fernando Blanco handles the linework and his style has a realistic, grounded look to it, but he manages to transition into a more cartoonish bend whenever anyone costumes is on-panel. It’s a subtle thing, but it helps give the world a sense of realism without betraying the obviously fantastical goings-on and his panel blocking greatly helps the high number of focal points that this issue gives the reader. Marcelo Maiolo colors the book and once again shows how versatile he is, showing a grim palette of a Gotham engulfed by absolute chaos that somehow manage to not make anything brighter.
The Bad
When Hush takes control of the Bat-Computer, it would be obvious that he’d have a great deal of control over the Family’s equipment, but the level of control he manages to exert is almost otherworldly. Things like darkening people’s goggles makes sense, but why would the computer need direct control over every, tiny bit of minutiae, some of it just impractical? That last one actually not only sounds weird, but incredibly impractical. As cool as that scene is, there are a lot of little, and not in a nitpicky way, things wrong with it that lessens the overall impact.
The Verdict
This book remains one of the most consistent on the shelf and at this point, barring some catastrophic tailspin of an ending, the best weekly title ever produced. The creators manage to build upon one anothers visions without stepping on each others’ toes, and the art in this issue is one of the highlights of the whole series, making this a great one to jump back into or continue on with.
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