Batman #49: Usually, if I have a problem with King's writing, it's because he goes a little too Jonathan Hickman. By that, I mean he exaggerates his economy of words to such an extent that it's unclear what he was trying to convey. Here, we have the opposite problem. Catwoman and Joker lie on the floor of the ruined church, clutching the wounds they gave each other to prevent themselves from bleeding to death. So, despite Catwoman having clawed out his throat, Joker is able to hold up his end of a chatty conversation. He insists Batman can't be both Batman and happy, and it's why he opposes the wedding: if Selina makes Batman happy, Joker will lose his north star. (For her part, Selina is able to hold up her end of the conversation despite a gun shot to the stomach.) But, the final sequence is a little...much. I had to re-read the issue to realize Selina's hysterical laughter in the last panel implies she won, taking Joker off the board. But, are we really supposed to believe Joker is dead? After all this time and all those deaths? Plus, if he is, isn't Batman going to be furious? The whole point of him and Selina going to Khandaq a few issues ago was because Selina wasn't the killer the authorities and public believed her to be; she needed the friend who actually committed the murders to confess to them. But, it's OK for her to murder Joker now? It seems unlikely Bruce is going to be OK with that. Plus, it's problematic at this stage that we're getting almost all our information about the wedding from non-"Batman" sources, particularly the "Batman: Prelude to the Wedding" miniseries. If you were just reading this title, you'd really have very little context, after this arc and the terrible Booster Gold story. I also still don't fully understand what King plans. Is Bruce not going to marry Selina because she killed Joker? Is all this hoopla really over a fake-y "superhero" wedding? I can't have two of them in one month.
Batman: Prelude to the Wedding - Red Hood vs. Anarky #1: The fact Bruce asks Jason to keep an eye on Selina while he attends his bachelor party with Clark and Dick is a pretty good summary of their relationship. But, Jason says he's honored in his own way, though not honored enough not to ask for $150,000, which he later uses to buy off the mob Anarky assembled. (Lonnie is clever, I have to say. He convinced everyone in the mob that she was meeting people who thought like her for a rally. Instead, Lonnie assembled a series of groups with wide-ranging and conflicting beliefs and planned explosions to scare them. As their fear hit a crescendo, he'd use the Anarky masks he sent them to show their affiliations, kicking off a riot. Pretty brilliant, I have to say.) The highlight of the issue is Jason punching out Lonnie as he laments how he was just a street kid who couldn't do anything right. No one deserved that punch more. I'm increasingly wondering why Seeley isn't writing all the Bat-family books, because I would 100 percent read his "Red Hood and the Outsiders." His Jason is all about repression, where you feel his struggle to control himself to stay on the side of angels. (He must do a lot of yoga.) I'd love to read that Jason.
The Wild Storm #14: I'm not sure how, but it was only as Alex Fairchild was describing her Thunderbook implant rewarding her violence with strength that I realized Michael Cray was also a member of Thunderbook. Based on the Wikipedia entry of Team 7, long-time Wildstorm readers obviously put together a long-time ago that Lynch is contacting former members of the team, as he does here with Alex. His intentions are unclear, but we know he's going to go find Alex's daughter Caitlin...dun dun DUN! Lynch mourns Alex here as she heads on a suicidal mission to take out the gang that harasses her adopted town, and Ellis hints pretty clear that she's doing it in part to silence the Thunderbook implant after too many years with it. It's possibly the first time we've seen real emotions from him, and maybe he really is just on a mercy mission. (Davis-Hunt and Buccellato have perhaps never been better than they are here, using the gorgeous emptiness of the Utah desert as a metaphor for Fairchild's lostness. Moreover, the simple gestures Alex and Lynch use throughout their conversation make you forgot you're reading a comic and not actually witnessing two people chatting.) Meanwhile, Miles warns a screaming Bendix that his crimes against IO -- hitting Hightower station, invading his servers, and killing Mitch -- results in this one warning. Elsewhere, the Doctor cures the Mayor of his illness (which seems to drive his need to eat cities' pollution), and Slayton (I think) encounters a Skywatch "altered person," confirming his suspicion IO wasn't the only one to create them.
The Wild Storm #14: I'm not sure how, but it was only as Alex Fairchild was describing her Thunderbook implant rewarding her violence with strength that I realized Michael Cray was also a member of Thunderbook. Based on the Wikipedia entry of Team 7, long-time Wildstorm readers obviously put together a long-time ago that Lynch is contacting former members of the team, as he does here with Alex. His intentions are unclear, but we know he's going to go find Alex's daughter Caitlin...dun dun DUN! Lynch mourns Alex here as she heads on a suicidal mission to take out the gang that harasses her adopted town, and Ellis hints pretty clear that she's doing it in part to silence the Thunderbook implant after too many years with it. It's possibly the first time we've seen real emotions from him, and maybe he really is just on a mercy mission. (Davis-Hunt and Buccellato have perhaps never been better than they are here, using the gorgeous emptiness of the Utah desert as a metaphor for Fairchild's lostness. Moreover, the simple gestures Alex and Lynch use throughout their conversation make you forgot you're reading a comic and not actually witnessing two people chatting.) Meanwhile, Miles warns a screaming Bendix that his crimes against IO -- hitting Hightower station, invading his servers, and killing Mitch -- results in this one warning. Elsewhere, the Doctor cures the Mayor of his illness (which seems to drive his need to eat cities' pollution), and Slayton (I think) encounters a Skywatch "altered person," confirming his suspicion IO wasn't the only one to create them.
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