Batman Eternal #37 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

To be honest, this issue is actually pretty solid, though the larger problems with this series weigh it down a bit.

Catwoman is in the process of solidifying her hold over the Gotham Underworld, and she's spying on a coterie of Arkham escapees not just to keep tabs on them but to offer them to Batman.  If I were Selina, I'd be quite happy to have Bats take my logical competition off the board, so everything she does here makes sense.

My complaint with the Catwoman story is that it feels like a detour from other stories that we should be following.  We not only have Catwoman in play again, but Batwing also resurfaces, as he apparently brought some of the ghosts haunting Arkham home with him.  Honestly, we only have 15 issues left.  Can we maybe get to the bottom of the nano-virus story?  Maybe we could spring Jim Gordon from jail?  We were really worried about that, but now we don't seem to care so much.  Last issue, Bats sent the team into the field to get some answers to these questions, but it seems that Snyder and Tynion used that as a way to take them off the table (at least for now).  Also, what happened to Spoiler?  Last I remember, Bats saved her from Hush, but where is she now?  Are people still trying to kill her?

Also, I'll say that it would be nice if we got some consistency in the portrayal of Bullock and Sawyer.  Here, they won't even help Bard to his feet, but they've been more or less supporting him (even if grudgingly) throughout this series.  If they're really as good of detectives as we're supposed to believe that they are, shouldn't they be a little suspicious about his vendetta against Bats?  Also, conversely, shouldn't Bats be warning them that they're dealing with a guy who collaborated with Hush to kill his own men to achieve his goals?  I'd certainly like to know that my boss has no problem sending me to my death.

On a side note, has Jason always had a knee injury?  I thought maybe he was using the cane after Batman roughed him up last issue, but I checked and he had the cane before then.

Again, it's a solid story, but I still feel like we're just sort of veering from unresolved threat to unresolved threat.  It feels almost pointless to complain about it at this point, but, here I am, complaining about it.

** (two of five stars)