Batman #9 – Review

By: Scott Snyder (writer), Greg Capullo (pencils), Jonathan Glapion (inks), FCO Plascencia (colors), Richard Starkings & Jimmy Betancourt (letters), Katie Kubert (assistant editor) & Mike Marts (editor)

The Fall of the House of Wayne Back-up: Snyder & James Tynion IV (writers), Rafael Albuquerque (art), Dave McCaig (colors), Patrick Brosseau (letters), Kubert & Marts (editors)

The Story: How will Batman deal with a Batcave full of Owls?

Review: This is a hard issue to review because of the expectations heaped on this creative team.  They have been SO good throughout this run (and on other projects over the years) that the reader starts to expect “issue of the year” excellence every time.  It’s a case of becoming a victim of your own success.

So, my initial reaction to this issue was: “not everything I wanted it to be”.  But, then as I reread it a second and third time (which I almost never do), I started to appreciate that even though this isn’t the best comic this creative team has produced, it’s still probably better than every other comic I’ll read this week.  It’s like an NBA playoff game where Michael Jordan didn’t have his best game, but still got 22 points and was the best player on the court, and his team still won.

One complaint is the “event”.  I’m usually the compulsive dude who buys all the tie-ins and then complains because I felt like the Captain Bogus miniseries (written by Joe Hack and illustrated by No-Fingers-Johnny) was nothing but a shameless money-grab.  But, for Night of the Owls, I’m only getting Batman.  I like the story for Night of the Owls, but I’m not buying the tie-ins.  If Snyder and Capullo told the complete story, I’d buy it in a heartbeat, but I have no interest in buying a bunch of issues by lesser creators.  We always hear about events, “You don’t have to buy everything.  You can just buy the main series and it’ll read fine.”  But, that isn’t really true, is it?  We get that one double-pager (with the super-awesome looking new Batmobile) and it shows us Robin, Batgirl and Nightwing fighting the Talons.  For me, that popped the bubble.  Now I feel like fundamental parts of the story MAY be happening in those other series.  But I also know I probably won’t enjoy all of those issues.

WCBR’s Top Picks

Dean’s Top Picks

Best of the past week: Mind the Gap #1 – Admittedly, it wasn’t the strongest week in comics history, and that’s allowed a comic that wasn’t “awesome” to win honors.  But….that’s how it goes sometimes.  It looks like Jim McCann and Rodin Esquejo have a nice, longer-form mystery to tell us and I’m personally looking forward to it.  This comic has three things that set it apart:  (a) wonderful art, (b) a sense of freshness and (c) not knowing what will happen next.  Runner-up: X-Factor #235 – Talk about running against the grain!  There are no characters I “love” in X-Factor.  The art is a little spotty sometimes.  It is never central to any big Marvel stories.  And….I’ve been trying to convince myself to drop X-Factor for years, but every month Peter David writes an interesting and compelling tale that keeps the series on my pull list AND makes me wonder why I keep it on such a short leash.

Most anticipated this week: The Walking Dead #97 – It’s amazing how much I still anticipate this comic after nearly 100 issues.  As much as I’ve criticized it during reviews for “nothing happening”, I KNOW that I’ll be downloading this onto my iPad and furiously reading it during lunch on Wednesday.  This issue probably won’t feature anything HUGE (as the big events will likely be saved for issue #100), but we should be starting to see the basic shape of whatever horrifying things are to come.  My anticipation is also increased by the fact that last issue was a big improvement over the series’ recent form.

Other picks: Batman #9, I Zombie #25, Morning Glories #18, Takio #1, Wolverine and the X-Men #10

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Alex’s Top Picks

Pick of the Week: Invincible Iron Man #516 – This book has been on fire lately, even if no one seems to have noticed.  Exciting, high-stakes, and character work that leaps off the page for both the good guys and the bad guys.  This is Iron Man at its finest with energy to spare.

Most Anticipated: Uncanny X-Force #25 – Rick Remender begins a big new arc of X-Force.  That alone should excite.  This promises to be more than the Otherworld “breather” (by X-Force standards).  This is also the first issue that’ll see Mike McKone on art and the preview pages have already shown that that’s as awesome as it sounds.

Other Picks: Batman #9, Demon Knights #9, Frankenstein: Agent of SHADE #9, Green Lantern #9, Fatale #5, Captain America #11, Journey into Mystery #637, New Avengers #26, Punisher #11,  Wolverine & the X-Men #10