Detective Comics #1,003: Given the state of affairs in "Batman," this series is pretty much the only coherent Batman series. After a somewhat rough start, Tomasi finds his footing here. First, he doesn't drag out the mystery of the Arkham Knight's identity too long: as Batman and Robin arrive at Arkham, we learn that she's Jeremiah Arkham's daughter. If she isn't going to be Jason Todd per the video game, Tomasi at least makes her connection to "Arkham" make sense. That said, her grand plan still doesn't make any sense to me: she's fixated on the "eclipse" that she's going to bring to Gotham to blot out Batman's shadow. But, Tomasi has plenty of time to tease out her motivations. Right now I'm just glad to be reading a Batman story with characters engaging in dialogue and not just quoting non sequitur lines of poetry.
Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man #6: This issue is an ode to "Amazing Spider-Man" #246, or "The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man," and a fitting one at that. Taylor reimagines the story for the current era, where Spider-Man would've worked with the parents of a kid dying of cancer to create an entire adventure for him. It's the sort of story that Taylor (and Zdarksy before him on "Spectacular Spider-Man") has been delivering for a while and exactly the sort of story that we've been missing in "Amazing Spider-Man" for a long time. Although it might lack the punch of "Amazing Spider-Man" #246, I'm thrilled to see Taylor swinging for the fences.
Invaders #5: Zdarsky continues to tell a tight story here. We learn that Roman was positioned at the base not to prevent the U.S. Navy from launching missiles, but to launch them, so Namor could justify his strike. Cap sends the Avengers to Atlantis, but Namor outsmarts him by hiding the missiles right off the U.S. coast. You don't often expect to see the bad guy win here, but he does, as we see a series of bombs successfully explode. Next issue, we'll see what they wrought. Also, Zdarsky assures us that Bucky isn't, in fact, an idiot, as we learn that he put blanks in his gun. In other words, Zdarsky really keeps you guessing, which is impressive given the fact that he's dealing with 70-year-old characters.
X-Force #7: This series continues to be well plotted and scripted, though I feel like we're just re-treading ground that we covered in the '90s. That said, my only real complaint is that Brisson throws "the Zoo Family" and "the Circle" at us here without any real explanation. It's hard enough to keep all the various factions in the Transian war in the present and Askani war in the future straight without more players getting randomly added. Cannonball and Shatterstar steal some sort of ion engine that Deathlok needs to activate the time portal that Stryfe left behind. They seem to steal it from the Zoo Family, but the Circle also claims it? I don't know. I feel like they could've just stolen it from some random thugs without fan-wanking the three people who might recognize either team. Overall, we're solid, but I'm still not sure how much longer I'm going to hang in here.
Also Read: Captain America #10; Conan the Barbarian #6; War of the Realms: Journey into Mystery #2
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