Batman #18 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

I really wanted to like this issue.

I mean, don't get me wrong.  I love Harper Roy and approve of Snyder's pretty obvious plan to install her as the new Robin at some point in the future (even if it seems somewhat absurd that Bruce would ever allow another child to be Robin).  I also approve of Snyder purposefully invoking "A Lonely Place of Dying," using Harper to serve the same role as Tim Drake, stopping Batman from getting himself killed as a result of his grief-induced recklessness.

But, Snyder seemed to try to do too much at once here, particularly in forcing Harper to reflect all aspects of Bruce's mourning.  At times, Harper seemed too childlike, insisting on telling Bruce the story of her mother chanting "Resolve" to herself, even after Bruce told her that he didn't care.  Snyder seems to have decided to include this story in order to introduce the mystery of how Harper's mother wound up murdered, something that we're told was something of a scandal.  But, it seems like something that he could've addressed later, given how crammed full of exposition this issue already was.  Although it leads to the touching moment at the end, we could've gotten there some other way.

Paradoxically, Snyder seemed to make her too adult at times, mostly in terms of her speech patterns.  She's not speaking like a teenage girl here.  I mean, I'm not saying that he should be peppering her conversations with "like" and "um."  But, at times, particularly in her closing speech, she sounded like an adult using terms that she learned after years of therapy.  For example?  "When I get close enough, I see it in his face.  The pain I know all too well.  Trying to find meaning in the world in familiar actions.  Pushing himself to keep going, long past its making any sense."  I mean, no matter how preternaturally composed Harper is, it's still hard to believe that she'd have the level of emotional intelligence that she displays here.  Sure, as Snyder establishes here, Harper works in part because she shares the same darkness as Bruce.  Her brother serves the same role as Dick did to Bruce, convincing them to give the world a second chance even if they suspect that the world doesn't really deserve one.  But, by having her somewhat unrealistically exposit that parallel, rather than letting us draw it naturally, Snyder weighs down the entire narrative.    By the time the Wayne Tower gets illuminated, I was pretty much just skimming her monologue.

Finally, stepping back a moment, it also seems weird that we jumped right into Harper, given that Damian's body isn't even cold.  I've read three of these "Requiem" issues so far and Damian is barely mentioned in any of them.  In fact, I'm not even really sure how Damian died, despite the fact that I get six Bat-family titles.

Hopefully, this issue serves as an awkward transition to the post-Damian era, an era that hopefully won't last too long.  I'm excited about the day that Damian returns, having been resurrected by a Lazarus Pit, and realizes that a girl has taken his place.  That's a story that I want to read.