Similar to "Detective Comics" #18, this issue isn't much of a "requiem" for Damian. It's pretty clear that Fawkes, like Layman, was forced to insert news of Damian's death into this issue at the last minute. He does the best that he could, wisely deciding to have Barbara call Dick, who's too busy to take her call, and then throw herself into tracking down Firebug, to distract herself. It's as seamless as this sort of last-minute addition can be, though it really makes you wonder how half-assed the decision to kill Damian was in the first place.
Looking at the rest of the issue, I'm finding James, Jr.'s narration starting to grow tedious. I get that Fawkes is using the omniscient-narrator approach as a way to show how James, Jr. is watching Barbara, aware of her every move, but it's starting to stretch the boundaries of credulity. It's also, oddly, making him seems too psycho. Part of the genius of Snyder's James, Jr. was that it was extremely difficult to judge his motives. Was he just a misunderstood regular guy or was he a budding new Joker? You never knew why he was doing what he was doing. Here, Fawkes makes him into a little too much of a garden-variety psychopath. He just doesn't feel like the guy who's going to outsmart Barbara.
I just recently became aware of the fact that Simone was originally fired off this book in December; I was laboring under the assumption that Fawkes was really just keeping the pen warm. I'm glad that DC reversed that decision and look forward to her returning next issue. I hope that she'll put James, Jr. on the back burner again, since he's always best when he's lurking in the shadows.
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