Grayson: Futures End #1 – Review

By: Tom King & Tim Seely (story), Stephen Mooney (art), Jeromy Cox (colors)

The Story: Dick tries his hand at political assassination and finds it doesn’t suit him.

The Review: As my first serving of the Futures End crossover, Action Comics left a bad taste in my mouth and a deep dread of what the rest of the month would bring. With its poor use of the five-year jump, its distant connection to the Event itself, its tenuous handling of the Superman mythos, the issue checked off every trademark of a forced tie-in. You could just as easily throw it away and it would make no difference to any storyline anywhere.

Thank goodness I read Grayson second. It’s not a cleverly finessed tie-in the way Daredevil‘s tie-in with Original Scene is, but at least it does everything Action Comics does not. And it starts with King-Seely’s decision to tell its story backward, a risky move that pays off by tying Dick’s (potential) future with his famous past. Tying it all together is the motif of a rope; it’s the visual that starts off the issue and upon which the issue ends, the beginning of Dick’s life as we know it as well as its conclusion. It’s a fitting symbol for a hero who’s always placed himself on the line.

Grayson #1 – Review

By: Tim Seeley & Tom King (story), Mikel Janín (art), Jeromy Cox (colors)

The Story: Grayson—Dick Grayson.

The Review: I’m no comic book history expert, so I can’t tell you about the actual origin of superheroes according to such niceties as facts. But I like to believe that among their closest ancestors is the spy. The idea of a person meting justice while living an apparently normal life is such an integral part of both that it’s not hard to think of them as arising from a common nucleus. So if one decides costumed vigilantism isn’t one’s thing, spywork seems like a natural alternative.

It’s thus not entirely surprising to find Dick muttering into earpieces and adopting codenames now that his public outing has made being Nightwing impossible. Besides, playing secret agent seems right up his alley. Not only is he more than qualified, skill-wise, he’s got the daredevil charm that’s so essential to the modern spy. As he dons a blond wig,* tries out his Russian, and acts out the douchey American tourist to perfection, you can tell that he’s thoroughly enjoying himself, so maybe you should, too.

Batman Eternal #6 – Review

By: Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, John Layman, Ray Fawkes, Tim Seely (story), Trevor McCarthy (art), Guy Major (colors)

The Story: Even bats can be scared of ghosts—or, more specifically, spirits of vengeance.

The Review: Having stuck by this series for some weeks now, it’s become painfully clear that a weekly series really takes a bite out of your budget. You are talking about a quadruple (at times quintuple) investment than your typical monthly comic, so even if you want to, you have to think twice about a long-term commitment to spending that kind of money. Next to the bigger-impact Futures End (and upcoming World’s End), my bucks just don’t stretch as far with Batman Eternal.

I want to make it clear, however, that my decision has little to do with the actual quality of this series, which has been fine, if not spectacular thus far. It’s true that issues can vary wildly from week to week, depending on who’s charged with scripting duties, but everyone on this writing team pretty much stands on even ground. In fact, considering the number of cooks in the kitchen, it’s remarkable how the finished dish comes out tasting kind of the same each week, which is part of Eternal‘s problem.

Batman Eternal #5 – Review

By: Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, John Layman, Ray Fawkes, Tim Seely (story), Andy Clarke (art), Blond (colors)

The Story: Red Robin and Batman briefly consider getting the band back together again.

The Review: Let’s review some Batman basics,* shall we? Great as the Dark Knight is, he’s still only one man struggling against a vicious city, which is why the Bat-family exists. But calling them a family gives an impression of a cohesive working unit when they’re actually more like a handful of government agencies. Their objectives and methods are different; they’re supposed to work in different spheres; and when they take jurisdiction over the same area, there tends to be more tension than collaboration.

Such is the way when you have obviously derivative characters trying to prove that they can stand on their own. Red Robin voices that conflict from the first page of this issue, rebelliously establishing his own data networks (his “Robin’s Nests“) in the city separate from Batman’s, declaring, “I don’t like people looking over my shoulder while I work.” Aside from that basic barrier to working with Batman, Tim reminds us of personal obstacles between them post-Death of the Family, Damian Wayne, and Dick Grayson. Gotham needs its heroes to stand together, but between Batgirl’s angry departure last week and Tim’s prickliness here, that’s going to be a very tall order.

Batman Eternal #4 – Review

By: Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, John Layman, Ray Fawkes, Tim Seely (story), Dustin Nguyen (pencils), Derek Fridolfs (inks), John Kalisz (colors)

The Story: Never get between a girl and her dad.

The Review: The downside to a weekly comic is the same as its upside: getting four (or five, depending on the month) comics a month. You’re talking about a quad-/quintuple investment than your ordinary monthly comic. So it had better be good! I don’t mind if one issue is slower or less substantial than another, but I won’t be able to abide a weekly series if it’s badly or even just blandly written. Contrary to the impression I give on this site, I am not made of money.

That’s why I’m a little iffy about the multiple-writer situation on Batman Eternal. While I have the utmost confidence in Snyder’s plotting, I have less when it comes to his co-writers’ abilities to execute it. Having read the superhero works of Tynion (Talon), Layman (Detective Comics), Fawkes (Constantine), and having unceremoniously Dropped them after relatively brief periods of time, I’m naturally wary about the idea of reading them week after week. Unfortunately, this Layman-scripted issue does little to alleviate that concern.

Batman Eternal #3 – Review

By: Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, Ray Fawkes, John Layman, Tim Seely (story), Jason Fabok (art), Brad Anderson (colors)

The Story: When your dad spoils your fun, it’s only proper to spoil his back.

The Review: And now the moment of Batman Eternal I’ve been waiting for: the return of Stephanie Brown, a.k.a. the last pre-relaunch Batgirl. Of course, part of the charm that made her so popular (and thus her exclusion from the DCnU so reviled) was Bryan Q. Miller’s specific take on her, which was taking Buffy Summers, removing the angst, and tweaking up the playfulness. In a comic book world of increasing grimness, Stephanie was unbeatably upbeat—which made her special, damn it.

Excited as I am, I’m also a little apprehensive as to how she will fare under another writer’s pen. Right now, it’s difficult to say. What we see in this issue is not the confident, put-together Stephanie who wore the Batgirl mantle, but a Stephanie predating her more annoying Spoiler days. As such, much of her sparkling wit is replaced by your commonplace teenage sarcasm, both withering and not a little mean-spirited. Blowing off her mom’s concern about dropping in unexpectedly on her dad: “Oh, no! I’m going to spoil his puzzle night with his loser friends!”

Batman Eternal #2 – Review

By: Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, Ray Fawkes, John Layman, Tim Seely (story), Jason Fabok (art), Brad Anderson (colors)

The Story: Who knew it would only take a scarred mafia man to freak out Batman?

The Review: I’ve never reviewed a weekly series before, but I must say, I’m really liking the pace of it. My biggest gripe about monthlies is how insubstantial they seem when spread against a month (or more) of waiting until the next installment. In the cost-benefit calculation, monthly comics are kind of a raw deal, falling short of the satisfaction you get from a TV show or movie. With a weekly comic, even if a single issue doesn’t have much to it, you know you have more coming in just six days.

This allows Snyder-Tynion time to play out an event in much greater depth than they normally would be able to. Had Batman Eternal been a typical monthly, the first five pages of this issue would probably have been reduced to a single page of reactions from all the relevant Gothamites. You might not have lost the point of the sequence, but the impact of what happened to Gordon would’ve been diminished. Seeing in detail how each character takes in the event—Vicki Vale’s reluctance to publish the story and “destroy a good man’s life”; the Bat-family’s varying degrees of shock (it even elicits a “Damn…” from Jason Todd); Mayor Hady’s bewilderment of the situation, despite his corruption—gives you a better sense of Gordon’s position as one of Gotham’s most important pillars.

Batman Eternal #1 – Review

By: Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, Ray Fawkes, John Layman, Tim Seely (story), Jason Fabok (art), Brad Anderson (colors)

The Story: As if the Gotham underground doesn’t experience enough delays.

The Review: In a comic book world that already seems overpopulated with people following the bat standard, did we really need another ongoing Bat-series, and a weekly one at that? I’ve made this complaint before (and again before that), but surely there’s got to be a limit to how many titles one franchise can creatively support at one time before they all start blurring together. Batman Eternal can’t get by on just being a decent title; it has to set itself apart from a family of eerily similar siblings.

This issue alone doesn’t do it, even if Snyder-Tynion* start things off by coming at the story from an appreciably different angle. It’s not exactly common for people to talk about Gotham and emphasize its light and brightness, after all. As a metaphor, this talk about light suggests that hope springs eternal in the darkest corner of the DCU, but that idea runs counter to the apocalyptic Gotham that greets us on the issue’s opening page. Gotham’s light may be a more sinister thing in this world, an electric lamp that lures good people like GCPD cop Jason Bard to perish in the city’s dispassionate maw.