Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Detective Comics #7 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Twins separated at birth?  You have to be kidding me.  Am I reading "Detective Comics" or watching "General Hospital?"  As usual, Daniel flubs the ending here.  I mean, the plot does come together in the end, but you're left scratching your head over the lesson that Daniel wanted you to draw from it.

As far as I can tell, Chase was hired by Penguin to kill his competition by planting C-4 near the vaults in the Iceberg Casino where he had just agreed to store their money.  When they bee-lined for the vaults after Snakeskin's tried to kill Penguin in the middle of the Casino floor on opening night, Chase would detonate the C-4, killing them.  Penguin would then get to keep the money and, in return, Chase would get part of the money and Penguin would help her father's mayoral campaign.  But, of course, Batman manages to save the competition and Penguin considers his deal with Chase broken.  Chase is arrested and a jilted Snakeskin scams his way into her cell at Arkham seeking revenge.

For the most part, I get the how.  I'm not thrilled with the how, but I get it.  I think that the main problem with the how is that it all turns on Batman finding a casino chip after Chase stole the briefcase in that alley, allowing him to track down Snakeskin (and thus her).  Chase doesn't strike me as the careless type, so it seems pretty unbelievable that she would stuff her pockets with casino chips before planning to jump all around an alley to steal a briefcase.  I didn't mention it earlier, because I thought she might have planted it on purpose to serve as misdirection.  But, it seems like Daniel really wants us to believe that she had that chip on her and accidentally dropped it.  It's that sort of easy solution that comprises my main complaint with Daniel on this title.  Batman never really has to be smart, because the criminals are always so stupid.

But, beyond the flawed how, I still don't get the why.  Why would Chase be so loyal to her father that she would be willing to murder several people (including her lover, since Snakeskin was presumably supposed to die in the botched assassination attempt without knowing that he was) just to get Penguin to help his election campaign?  Daniel gives us no background on her, even though I'm pretty sure that she didn't exist in the DCU.  He just has Batman assert that he knows about her whole sordid past, but we never learn it.  Why help a father who appears not to know she exists?  I mean, I don't really see Tagg Romney whacking people for the Mafia simply to raise some money for his father, who does, in fact, know that he exists.  Without any background on Chase, we have no understanding of what her father did to inspire such devotion in her, which leaves me scratching my head at the end of this issue, wondering how she thought it was all ready going to go.

No comments:

Post a Comment