Legends #30
What Happened Was...
Legends of the Dark Knight is back to deliver a brand new story with a brand new creative team. Off the heels of the solid three part “Off the Menu” story arc, new writer Paul Jenkins brings us yet another three part story. Does this one deliver a satisfying meal, or will this story turn your stomach?
In this issue, Detective Brian Kelly must uncover the events that led up to a tragedy at a Knight ballgame by talking to those that witnessed the devastation. It does not take him long to discover that the crime had something to do with Batman and Calendar Man.
Pretty Words Spoken by Action Figures
The dialogue on this issue felt exactly right. There were quite a few characters in this brief section of story, yet through each only had a few lines of dialogue a piece, they all felt imbued with individual personalities. It takes talent to capture that as a writer.
The overall plot also seems solid though it is always difficult to call the quality of a story so early on. The next two installments might be horrible, but I am intrigued by this issue. As you might have suspected from my issue summary, this story is going to use the “Vantage Point” style technique of telling the same events from different angles, but unlike Vantage Point, I suspect the author is going to unravel the yarn in such a way that the story does not become too repetitive.
The artwork which struck me as odd in some respects. Something about the presentation of characters made me think of them as action figures, but I cannot quite identity what gave me that impression. Part of it is definitely the slightly stiff body language and awkward hand positions, but there is also something about the coloring which reminds me of the plastic finish of toys. Another odd artistic idiosyncrasy was displayed when Batman swooped down from the night's sky from his plane. The artist outlined Batman and the plane in white lines presumably to make him stand out against the starless night, but I would have preferred them to leave the image unaltered with Batman blending in to the darkness.
All this might make it sound as if I hated the art, but that is not the case at all. The book looks quite nice in general, but I just found these elements questionable.
Conclusion 8/10
Altogether, this is a very solid first chapter for this arch. The art is not my favorite, but it is not bad and probably appeals to some. More importantly, the plot is good.
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