Not-Very-Deep Thoughts: The February 24 Edition (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

All-New, All-Different Avengers #6:  As usual, Kang's appearance in an "Avengers" series leaves me with a headache.  Was it "Secret Wars" that made Kang get stuck in our time?  If so, why is he the only one stuck in the present?  Why can he move people and items through the time stream, but he can't move himself?  Do I care about the answers?  (That said, it was fun to be surprised that it was him, since I was sure that Mr. Gryphon was Loki.)  Turning to the gang, I love the friendship of Jane and Sam:  they're really the emotional heart of the series.  It's putting together probably the most selfless members of the group.

Batman and Robin Eternal #21:  Snyder and Tynion continue to emphasize the difference between Bruce and Mother, showing us that it all boils down to their response to the same trauma:  the murder of their parents.  Whereas Bruce responded by going crazy, Mother responded by going even crazier.  (That said, her entire village was slaughtered and the guys that did it stabbed her a few times to make sure that she was actually dead.  It's not exactly unreasonable for her to have lost her marbles in that situation.)

Justice League #48:  Wait, Mobius is the Anti-Monitor?  Weren't they two separate people?  We learn in this issue (I think) that Mobius killed Darkseid to be separated from the Anti-Life Equation (and, presumably, his chair, though I'm not entirely sure if they're connected).  If he went to all this effort to be separated from the Equation, why does he want to be connected with it again?  Beyond some clarity in his motivations, we also could really use a diagram showing us how the Anti-Life Equation, the Anti-Monitor, the chair, and Mobius are connected.

Spider-Man 2099 #7:  Jesus Christ, I'm tired of the forced Inhumans stories.  First, I didn't realize that the guy last issue was Lash.  I mean, not that I really know who Lash is, since I've been intentionally skipping the various Inhumans series.  But, I do vaguely recognize him from the Point One series (I think).  Even though I recognized him, I still don't understand what his deal is.  The good news is that I know that I don't care.

Also Read:  All-New X-Men #5; Amazing Spider-Man #1.3; Bloodshot Reborn #11; Dark Knight III:  The Master Race #3; Grayson #17; New Avengers #7; Pathfinder:  Hollow Mountain #4

Not-Very-Deep Thoughts: The February 17 Edition (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Amazing Spider-Man #8:  I don't know how Slott's managing it, but this series keeps getting worse and worse with each issue.  First, we have pet peeve #1 in full effect here, with the intro page informing us that Ling is Peter's girlfriend.  (I mean, sure, she was feeding him dumplings a few issues ago, but it's exactly the fact that she hadn't been introduced as his girlfriend that made that sequence so weird.)  But, to make matters even worse, Peter is totally happy to overlook her being both the Parker Industries mole and trying to kill him simply because she was doing it to save her mom.  Hopefully he'll extend that same courtesy to the reformulated Sinister Six when they eventually attack him under the direction of the mysterious guy bringing back their families.  After all, they'll just be doing it for their families.  Also, Slott doesn't even bother explaining why Ling didn't feel comfortable asking her genius boyfriend running a cutting-edge bio-technology firm to help with her mother's illness.  [Sigh.]

Batman and Robin Eternal #20:  Aha!  I was wondering how Mother was somehow going to get control of the children of the world, but it makes total sense that she'd use Spyral's Somnus satellite to broadcast the Ichthys virus around the world.  Given how "Batman Eternal" discovered new and improved ways to defy logic, I can't believe that this revelation makes so much...sense.

Extraordinary X-Men #7:  It's interesting that Sunfire helped Scott do...whatever it is that he did.  That said, it's still unclear to me if the public thinks that whatever it is that Cyclops and Sunfire did caused the M-Pox (or the "cloud cancer") or if it's something else entirely.  I guess we'll see.

Mighty Thor #4:  OK, we have a full rebound here.  Between Freya's diatribe against Odin and Thor's amazing entry onto the scene here, I can't wait to see what the ladies do to show Odin just how much the patriarchy is done and done.

Also Read:  Avengers Standoff:  Welcome to Pleasant Hill #1; Dragon Age:  Magekiller #3; Star Wars #16

Not-Very-Deep Thoughts: The February 3 Edition (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Amazing Spider-Man #7:  Slott really needs a new shtick.  In the first arc, the villain, Hank Scorpio (or whatever we're calling him), invested in Parker Industries.  In this arc, Shen Quinghao invested in Parker Industries' green-fuel project, so Peter is going to give a humanitarian award to him.  However, we know from Mr. Negative that Quinghao (who I didn't remember at all from earlier issues) is a former trafficker.  Basically, if you're a new character and you invest in Parker Industries, we should all just assume that you're a bad guy.  (Also, why is Parker Industries giving out humanitarian awards?  It's not even the Uncle Ben Foundation -- it's very clearly Parker Industries.  Bizarre.)

Batgirl #48:  If Greg is the bad guy, I don't get why he had Barbara believe that she spent the night at Luke's place the night that she (allegedly) called the GCPD on the gang-banger.  It would be so easy to prove that "memory" false if she didn't actually spend the night there (as Fletcher and Stewart seem to imply).  A quick call to Luke would've exposed Greg as a liar.

Batman and Robin Eternal #18:  I totally didn't see the revelation that Cass killed Harper's mother coming.  It's a great twist, and it makes it clear that Snyder has been planning this story for ages, given how long ago it was that he introduced Harper.  Snyder and Tynion also make it clear that Bruce has to accept responsibility for the role that he played in her death, since it happened as part of the game that he was playing with Mother.  (Mother selected Harper to be Bruce's next Robin.)  It is indeed his greatest failure, as he originally said to Dick.  In fact, you could argue that leaving Harper and Cullen to be raised by their cowardly and crooked father was an even worse failure of judgment.  (Bruce himself would probably be on board with that assessment.)  Conversely, we're really hitting a new low on the art side of the house.  Everyone on pages 18-19 look deformed, like they had just been repeatedly beaten in the face.

Spider-Man #1:  This issue feels more like a Spider-Man book than anything that we've seen in "Amazing Spider-Man" lately.  It makes me realize why everyone loved Miles in the Ultimate Universe.  First, Pichelli is amazing.  She really has a sense of the epic, making you believe that Blackheart really could defeat the Avengers (even after multiple failed previous attempts).  Moreover, Bendis just does an outstanding job of showing us the challenges that an inexperienced adolescent hero faces.  I loved Miles taking advice from the onlookers.  (He's helping to evacuate people from a bus that Blackheart threw at him and he caught, and one of the onlookers suggests that they can handle the evacuation but only he can go after Blackheart.)  Bendis really uses it to show Miles' inexperience, not just tell us about it.  After all, the average middle-aged onlooker on Prime Earth's New York has seen his share of fights.  Miles actually could learn something from  him!  Moreover, Bendis gives Miles such a distinct voice; after only one issue, I feel like I know him and how he would react to a given situation.  I really want to know more about him.  At first, I was interested in this series since it seemed the most likely place where Marvel would deal with the aftermath of "Secret Wars."  By the end of this issue, though, I'm really here for Miles.

Also Read:  Captain America:  Sam Wilson #6; Captain Marvel #2; Detective Comics #49; Midnighter #9; Spidey #3; Uncanny Avengers #5

Still-Not-Even-Remotely-New Comics!: The DC and Independent Comics from January 20 Edition (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Batgirl #47:  As Barbara herself frets in this issue, Stewart and Fletcher are covering previously tread ground as she again struggles with her memory.  If I'm following the crumbs that they've left us correctly, a Bloom-like figure is affecting her memory through her dreams.

But, the problem is that, based on what we've seen, he's not just affecting her memory; it seems like he's affecting reality itself.  For example, Barbara tells Luke in this issue that she refuses to build the negahedron because she can't be sure that she's got the schematics right from memory.  That night, Not-Bloom restructures her memory to make it seem like she had agreed to build it.  But, his plan only works if he changed reality, not her memory:  he'd have to have gotten her retroactively to agree to build it.  After all, if he just changed her memory, she'd still have said no to Luke.  If she showed up the next day believing that she had said yes, he'd clearly know that something was wrong.  In fact, Not-Bloom would've also had to have changed her feelings as well:  otherwise, she could've woken up the next morning, remembered that she agreed to build it, dismissed that decision as odd, and again decided not to build it.  In another example, we now know that she tipped off the cops to the gang-banger whose mother she met a few issues ago.  But, it was pretty clear that Babs had no intention of calling the cops when she met the woman.  As such, her memory is correct:  she didn't call the cops.  For her to have called the cops, Not-Bloom would have to have gotten her retroactively to call the cops (after she decided not to do so) and then made her forget that she did so.

In other words, it's a mess.  Thrown into the mix, we've also got Babs' friend Greg rifling through her underwear drawer.  He arrived after Babs started having memory problems, so I'm hoping that he's not Not-Bloom (because it's too obvious), but, the way this series is going, I wouldn't be surprised.  I have a few other nitpicks from this issue -- like Spoiler knowing that Corporal Punishment has "electric muscles" in their fight with her at the GCPD -- but it doesn't seem worth it to mention.  This series is already sinking, so I don't need to add weight to it.

[On a side note, this issue seems to hint where "Batman" is going in the next few issues.  First, we see the "Batman Army" that Geri Powers seems to activate in issue #48 (but we don't actually see), and Gordon for the first time complains about a corrupt Powers using the GCPD as her own army.] 

* (one of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #16:  I should love this issue.  The story is everything that I've ever wanted.  St. Dumas uses the Ichthys virus that the Order created for Mother to force Red Hood to re-live his worst fear:  his death at the hands of the Joker.  This time, though, Ichthys gives him the chance to change the outcome; the catch is that he'll succumb to the virus -- and become a mindless assassin for Mother -- if he wins.  We learn that Ichthys works by making the subject lose all fear -- and, thus, his humanity -- if he defeats his worst fear through strength.  Tim is somehow able (in a way that the authors don't explain) to infiltrate Jason's nightmare and convince him that he's not a psychopath:  he's always been a hero, a Robin.  Believing him, Jason allows the Joker kill him again to prove it.  When he awakens from the nightmare, he tells Tim that he hasn't been OK for a long time, but he thinks that he might be on that path now.  The issue ends with Jason observing that Bruce thought that he was building an army of child soldiers as Mother was, but they decided to become a family instead.  It's their weapon against Mother, and it's a brilliant observation on the part of Snyder and Tynion.  (It does take away the agency from Bruce for creating that family, a position that I hope Snyder and Tynion correct by the end of the series).  We're left feeling like it's the moment, where Jason definitely returns to the Bat-family.  It's the one that I though we had at the end of "Death of the Family," but later came undone when Bruce ruined it in his drive to resurrect Damian.  The only reason that I didn't love this issue is that something in the execution is wrong.  I've always found Lanzing and Kelly's scripts lacking in heart, doing little more than conveying information and not emotion.  This issue is another example of that.  Moreover, the use of three artists means that we don't get the consistent facial expressions and body language that we need to really feel these moments -- everyone has oddly frozen smiles or blank faces.  I'm going to try not to imagine what Tomasi and Capullo could've done with this story and just be happy that we may be seeing Jason's continuing (and possible final) return.

*** (three of five stars)

Dragon Age:  Magekiller #2:  When the Archon tells Marius and Tessa that their target is the four leaders of the Venatori, I realized that we were dealing with a time period before the Rift opened in "Dragon Age:  Insurrection."  I was -- and continue to be -- excited about this development, since the game itself never went into much detail about the Venatori.  They were simply the cult that helped Corypheus put his plans into motion, full stop.  To be honest, Rucka doesn't go into too much more detail about them here, either.  Marius and Tessa make quick work (if you consider three hits involving careful planning "quick") of the first three leaders, only to discover that the last one, Calpernia, is Marius' former lover.  Along the way, we begin piecing together Marius' past, learning that he was a slave that somehow earned his freedom.  I'm still confused why the first issue implied that Marius actually forgot his past, as opposed to wanting to forget it, but it seems likely that Rucka will delve into it further, particularly because we still need the scoop on his relationship with Calpernia.  All we know at this point is that Marius calls off the hit on her and that he and Tessa spend months fleeing the Archon's assassins for their betrayal.  Rucka then confirms the story's time frame on the last page when we see the Rift open above the pair, moments after they've dispatched the latest group of assassins.  At this point, I'm intrigued to see where Rucka takes us, because he's got so many options:  Marius' past as a slave, his relationship with Calpernia, the status of the Venatori now that three of its leaders have been killed, the opening of the Rift, etc.  Looking at that, it's actually probably too many options, but we'll see which ones Rucka tackles.

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #15 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Snyder and Tynion get right to the point here, using Scarecrow's conversation with Mother in the past and Jason and Tim's raid on Gnosis, "the Secret City of St. Dumas," to reveal the next stage of Mother's plans.

It's been a while since we last saw Jason and Tim, so I had trouble remembering how they discovered the existence of Gnosis.  But, given that they discovered everything relating to Mother during their raid on Santa Prisca, I'll buy the fact that they uncovered the Order of St. Dumas' secret headquarters.  Tim bluffs his way into the city by pretending to have knocked out Jason as an offering to join the Order.  Azrael is skeptical, but St. Dumas (the latest in a long line of them) sees Tim as his savior:  he orders him and Azrael to fight to the death, punishment for Azrael's failure at Santa Prisca.  If Azrael wins, he redeems himself and remains Azrael; if Tim wins, he takes over the role.  Of course, it's all a fake.  Jason escapes his confinement and makes his way through the complex, finally finding a guy to interrogate about something called "Ichthys."

In the past, Orphan encourages Mother to cut loose Scarecrow, since the Order is in the process of upgrading his fear gas into the Ichthys Formula.  Mother ignores him, ordering Crane to Cairo and Orphan to prepare "the child."  Elsewhere in Prague, Bruce receives Mother's instructions and takes Dick to Cairo, allegedly to chase Crane.  In the present, Tim plays his hand:  he engages an emp blast, disabling most of the Order's advanced technology.  He tells Dumas that they're there to learn more about the Order's connections to Mother, particularly Project Ichthys.  However, Tim is surprised to learn that Dumas is one step ahead of him.  He reveals that he retains some control over technology, disabling Tim with an electric shock and announcing that he's going to kill him and Azrael.  He also announces that Jason has already been exposed to the Ichthys Formula, and we see him starting to relive his death at the hands of the Joker.

This issue is mostly plot, but Lanzing and Kelly do a solid job of moving us through it in a way that feels mostly natural, even when Dumas begins his super-villain monologue.  (We even get a great wise-ass remark from Jason.  He confidently asserts his ability to break free from the pit where the Dumasian troops put him.  When they put an iron seal on top of it, he quips, "Alright, that's trickier.")  Moreover, the authors open the door to Azrael joining the good guys, as he hears Dumas dismiss him as a failure and pledge to kill him.  But, it's the fact that all the other existing threads are coming together -- Jason and Tim's story in the present, and Bruce and Dick's story in the past -- that makes me anxious for next issue.

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #14 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

We don't necessarily make much progress here, because Tynion has to wrap up the loose ends in the past and the present before we can move to the next phase of the story.

In the present, it's clear that we've learned everything that we're going to learn about Cassandra and Orphan (at least for now), so it's really a matter of escaping the bomb that Mother set under the Nursery.  Thankfully, Dick has some pent-up anger at Batman, so he's sufficiently motivated to take down Orphan; his eye-scan allows the team to access a jet hidden in a hanger.  In their escape, Cassandra and Harper have a nice moment, where Harper stresses to her that she understands that Mother and Orphan made her kill and that she doesn't think that she's a monster.  I'll admit that I can't quite remember why Cassandra would specifically worry that Harper would think that, since I don't think that Harper knew about the blood on Cassandra's hands when they were last together, in Prague.  But, I think Tynion might be implying that Cassandra would worry that anyone would eventually see her as a monster once they learned more about her, so it works.  Tynion also has Harper lose her shit over their impending death, a reminder that she's still a newbie when it comes to death traps and Bond villains.

In the past, Scarecrow convinces Batman to send Robin to diffuse a bomb so that they can talk alone.  He confirms that Mother hired him to develop her trauma toxin, but he's appalled by the scope of her plans:  she wants to use it on the entire world, turning every child into one of her children.  He surrenders to Batman, since he knows that Mother will have him killed once he delivers the toxin.  But, Batman reveals that he needs Scarecrow to return to Mother and provide the psychological background on him -- as crafted by him -- that Mother wants.  Scarecrow balks, but he's left with few options.

As we move to the next phase of the story, it's time for us to start getting more information about Mother.  First, we still really know nothing about her motives. Last issue, we saw that she was kinder to her children than I expected her to be, but we still don't know what drivers her to make them "better."  (Crane tells Batman here that she's insane, which is obviously saying a lot, given the source.)  But, we also need some insight into her resources.  Even if Crane's toxin worked on every child in the world, how exactly does she propose to train them?  Is she going to take over a small country and use it as a Nursery?  She appears to have an unlimited amount of funds, and we really need to know where she got them.

I'm giving this issue three stars, as I did last issue, but I'll admit that they're weak threes.  The art has been inconsistent in both issues; better art might've strengthened the scores.  That said, I'm not giving this issue two stars mainly because Tynion does a solid job on the dialogue, and he and Snyder are still advancing the plot logically.  But, we're halfway through this story at this point, and both Batman and Mother's motivations (and, in fact, actions) remain a mystery.  We need to address that soon, before this series starts feeling like its predecessor, where the characters are doing things simply to stall so DC can sell more issues.

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #13 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

This issue focuses almost exclusively on Cassandra, in the past and the present, giving us the information that we need to understand her.

In the past, we get a quick but thorough tour through her nightmarish childhood, as we see her yearn to connect with the other children at the Nursery.  As we've seen, Mother has demanded that she be segregated from "her" children, so Cassandra is forced to watch them from the sidelines.  The Sculptor shows her some sympathy, but even she has a line:  when Cassandra hugs her -- replicating the affection that she's seen Mother showing to the other children -- the Sculptor recoils and tells her that she's made to be something different. Years later, Batman assures her that she's a hero, because she rejected exactly these attempts to make her into a monster.  (It's also the conversation where he tells her to go to Dick with the thumb-drive if he doesn't survive the fight with the Joker.)

In the present, Cassandra has traveled to the Nursery, revealed to be located in the heart of a Russian diamond mine declared off-limits after it leaked toxic gas.  She confronts Orphan there, but he reveals that he's already killed all the children; their bodies are lying in an open pit.  This part is confusing, because it seems to contradict previous information.  For example, I thought that the Nursery was in Prague.  After all, isn't Mother shutting down that operation to start a new one, since Dick compromised it through his actions?  Are there other Nurseries out there, or were there only ever these two?  It's pretty unclear.

We can say somewhat definitively that Mother does seem to be killing off all her children, with the goal of starting a new phase.  One of the robot nannies that Cassandra encounters in the Nursery refers to the children coming home, so it also seems like Mother has somehow managed to get all her children to return to the Nursery to kill them.  (That really ups the ante, since it implies that the bodies lying in the pit aren't just the kids that were already at the Nursery.)  Dick and Harper arrive to save Cassandra, and Mother appears on the monitors to announce that she's detonating a nuclear weapon under the Nursery.  She originally wanted to take out everyone at the same time, but, even though Jason and Tim aren't there, she decides that it's too good of an opportunity to miss.  (Orphan is somewhat surprised that he's included in that culling.)

This issue isn't particularly strong, since Tynion takes a number of short-cuts to get us to the end.  After all, Dick and Harper magically arrive to save Cassandra, even though we're never told how they found her.  But, Tynion does get across the horror of Cassandra's childhood effectively.  Even though we haven't seen the moment where she rebels against Orphan (and the person that he wants her to become), we see here that she never really accepted his programming in the first place.  The weakest part of this issue is probably the sequence where Orphan is insisting that he's not a monster, that he's trying to make her something better, as Mother did for him.  We don't know enough of Orphan's own history to know why he's such a zealot, but this moment of emotion (or what passes for it for him) seems disingenuous.  Does he really think that Cassandra is going to buy that?  After all, he makes these statements as she's covered in the blood of the other children after he dropped her in the pit.  In other words, it seems a stretch.

It's pretty clear that Snyder and Tynion are moving us to the next phase of this series as Mother starts to put her plan into action.  We now know what we need to know about Cassandra and Orphan (for the time being):  it's time to see what Mother has up her sleeve.

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #12 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Whoa.  Just whoa.

Let's start from the beginning.  As we saw last issue, Dick has entered the Sculptor's mind, and she takes him on a tour of the place.  She shows him Mother, with a young Orphan, murdering her parents.  The Sculptor tells Dick that Mother saw David as Adam and she as Eve in her pursuit to create Eden.  (Creepy.)  It raises some questions that the authors don't answer here, namely how Mother got her hands on David and why she went after him in the first place.  After all, the Sculptor tells us that Mother somehow knew about her telepathic powers.  What attracted her to David?  The Sculptor also confirms (not surprisingly) that he's a sociopath, enjoying inflicting the trauma on children that the Sculptor later molds.  For her part, the Sculptor accepts the role that she played in cultivating this trauma.  But, she stresses to Dick that she did it because she felt that she was the only one who could help the children, minimizing the trauma and then rushing them out the door of the Nursery for a chance at a regular life.  For his part, Dick believes her, and he begins to lobby her to help him fight Mother.

In walking Dick through Mother's methods, the Sculptor divides the children into two groups.  First, you've got the sleeper agents (like, it seems, Tim).  As the Sculptor says, they're doctors and lawyers and the like; Dick could never reach them.  To win, he has to stop Mother directly, but the Sculptor urges him to save the other group of children first:  the kids still in the Nursery.  They're not yet Mother's children, so they're vulnerable.  The Sculptor tells Dick that she's helping him because she wants to protect them, though she refuses to return with him, for reasons that she doesn't elaborate.  (It's implied that it would just be too traumatic, and she's trying to make her break.)

At this stage, though, we still don't know why Mother has developed this "new approach" that makes the trauma and the manipulation unnecessary.  (We learned last issue that she's using Crane's fear gas to do so.)  If the Sculptor has now been made redundant, as she says that she has been, then has Orphan been made so as well?  For an already unstable guy, it's probably not a good sigh of things to come.

But, this issue's big moment is when the Sculptor finally takes Dick to Batman's conversation with Mother.  When Mother confronts him with evidence that Dick revealed Bruce's secret identity to her by going after Crane on his own, Bruce agrees that Dick isn't the partner that he hoped that he would be. Dick is suitably rattled, particularly when Bruce demands that he be the one to kill the parents of the candidate that Mother has identified to replace him.  As the reader, it's easy to assume that Bruce is just playing along with Mother to get more information.  But, given the ending of the first issue, we also know (or, at least, think we know) that Bruce really does kill the candidate's parents.  As such, it lends some weight here to the idea that he actually does what he says that he's going to do here.  That said, Snyder and Tynion are going to have to explain why he agreed to kill so readily for us to buy it.  As Dick says, not killing is rule one.  Why does he abandon it?

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #11 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

The issue begins with Dick and Harper meeting the Sculptor, the woman who Mother uses to "mold" her children into their "new" selves.  However, the Sculptor has decided to rebel against Mother because she can't go through another purge like the other that Mother is conducting in Prague, since it means killing all the children.  She intentionally left the trail for Harper to follow to Cain's residence, expositing that Cain would never have left so easy of one.  (This explanation goes to my point from last issue, that the authors did a terrible job of showing how Harper tracked down Cain.  That said, it still would've been helpful to watch Harper find the trail on her own, even if it was a fake one that the Sculptor set.)

The Sculptor reveals that Cain is Orphan, and she offers to take Dick on a journey of her mind so that he can fully understand Mother.  Dick tells her that he can't, because of his Hypnos, so Harper goes instead.  Along the way, we're witness to Cassandra's brutal childhood, as we learn that Orphan was training her in secret to be the most brutal of Mother's children.  Mother is ultimately displeased with Orphan for acting outside her orders and forbids him to consider Cass as part of their family (if you'll excuse the expression).  The Sculptor then leads Harper to the moment when Batman seems to be ready to buy a new Robin.  (He refers to the Robin as "her," though it seems unlikely that it's Cass, given Mother's "disowning" of her.)  Harper mumbles his name, leading Dick to break the connection with a taser.  He then demands that the Sculptor take him to Batman, regardless of the danger.

Needless to say, it's an intense issue.  Brisson does a solid job of handling a story with so much exposition, keeping the focus on the characters in the flashback and not on the overly convenient way that we're treated to this information in the first place.  Although the art is uneven (due to the use of two artists with pretty different styles), I have to say that I'm pleased that we're making progress on the central mystery.  After all, this issue answers some questions, even though those answers raise more questions.

First, my theory that David Cain was Cassandra's father is proven correct here, though it complicates my theory that Batman killed Cassandra's parents (and not Cain's) in issue #1.  If Batman didn't turn Cassandra into who she is, then did he turn Cain into Orphan?  If so, it again raises the question of when exactly he started working with Mother?`

Second, we learn here that Mother was using Scarecrow's fear gas to simulate the trauma that she previously created the old-fashioned way, as Cain did with Cassandra (by murdering seemingly dozens if not hundreds of people in front of her).  She tells David that she went with the gas because "we must adapt or perish," but Snyder and Tynion don't identify the catalyst for her realizing that.  What about the old-fashioned way wasn't working any more?

Again, although heavy on the exposition, this issue helps right the ship a bit after the last two issues disappointed.  I'm hoping that we get someone like King or Seeley to handle Dick's confrontation with the (supposed) truth about Batman.  Talk about intense.

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #10 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Given the three different stories running through this issue, it's probably better to keep them grouped together.

- We learn here that Mother gave one of her children, Jean-Paul Valley, to the Order of St. Dumas in exchange for a suite of software so advanced that it can foil even Tim's attempts to hack it.  It's a pretty brilliant way to introduce Jean-Paul to the New 52, I have to say.  That said, the way that the guys get the information is pretty unbelievable.  They find Valley's file by searching for the "exact signal wavelength" that Mother used in Gotham.  How exactly was the wavelength searchable?  Moreover, why would the Order be so careless to keep the wavelength connected to Mother's file?  If they went through the trouble of using a fictitious name for Mother to cover their financial transactions with her, you'd think that they'd also be careful enough to make sure that her name wasn't attached to the product that they made for her.

- In a flashback, Dick refuses to take off his mask after Bruce orders him to do so and rejects Bruce's assertion that he's only "support."  Bruce returns to Mother and, in his conversation with her, Snyder and Tynion imply that maybe even Bruce is one of Mother's children.  He tells a story of a kid in the school yard wanting him to know the "truth" about the Wayne legacy.  Bruce didn't believe what the kid told him about his parents, so he beat him senseless.  Now, it seems unlikely that the kid in the playground knew that Bruce was bio-engineered.  But, Snyder and Tynion are hinting at some dark secret that the Waynes kept that somehow relates to the current story.

- The Dick and Harper story is the weakest, because Lanzing and Kelly skip a lot of steps.  Like, a lot.  First, we start with Harper somehow knowing Orphan's identity, without any explanation of how she discovered it.  We merely see her holding a bunch of bank statements.  Then, we see the two of them busting a number of heads, though it's unclear why they're doing so if they already knew Orphan's name.  It leads them to the residence of someone named David Cain, but it's unclear what connection Cain has to Orphan.  Is he Orphan (making Cass presumably his daughter or sister)?  Is he Orphan's father?  I'm increasingly convinced that Bruce didn't create Orphan, but Cass, in issue #1.  But, if he did, then Cain would be dead if he were Cass' father.  As such, we're still left with the question of his identity.

The first eight issues of this series were extremely well paced, with the revelations flowing naturally from the events that we saw unfold.  But, Lanzing and Kelly have failed to make those connections as well in these last two issues, with the heroes essentially waving their hands in front of the board to explain how they got the information that they needed (i.e., Mother's file with Jean-Paul's information, Cain's bank statements).  I get sometime that we're going to need to take shortcuts, but it's starting to happen way too frequently.  I hope the next issue returns to the slow-and-steady approach that so far has distinguished this series from its predecessor.

** (two of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #7 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

I'm sorry to say, but this issue unfortunately reminds me a little too much of the old "Batman Eternal."  As you can probably tell, it's not a compliment.

- The authors are definitely phoning in the Jason and Tim story, in terms of jumping from Point A to Point C.  Last issue, Jason magically recognized a bunch of black-market dealers, even though it was unclear why he though that they would know anything about Mother's technology.  In this issue, Tim learns (presumably from these dealers) that the Order of St. Dumas has been selling technology on the black market and that it matches Mother's signal.  Moreover, some "angel of death" has been attacking dealers that dealt with the Order.  I think that we're supposed to draw the conclusion that Mother and the Order are working together and that they're now cleaning house, possibly because the Boy Wonders have stumbled upon the connection.  But, Lanzing and Kelly (whoever they are) don't make that connection clear, though I'm not sure if it's purposefully obfuscating or not.  Moreover, they hint that the Order trained Orphan and that he could be the aforementioned "angel of death."  Jason and Tim head to San Prisca, where the Order has built a church on the prison that used to reside there.  Not surprisingly, they encounter Bane, and they offer to team with him to take down the Order.

- Harper's interaction with Dick is extremely awkward here, as Lanzing and Kelly have her just blurt out her family history to try to convince Dick that she's not "lucky."  Dick is apparently surprised by this information, but he also doesn't hit her with his own reality, to make the point that he knows from personal experience that she's taking too many risks.  Moreover, Harper says that he didn't know because she doesn't share the information with jerks...even though she just did.  (Yeah, I don't know.)

- Snyder continues to embrace his approach of Bruce as incompetent, as Mother completely outmaneuvers him here.  We learn that he put a "device" on her that allowed him to crack into her network, though we're not told how exactly that worked.  But, Mother immediately discovered it and fed false information about Scarecrow into it, though we're not told how she started with a hunch that Bruce was Batman.  (After all, it's possible that Bruce Wayne on his own was tracking her.)  When Robin appeared at the safehouses that she pretended belonged to Scarecrow, it confirms for her that Bruce is Batman.  Here, it's his over-confidence that undoes him, even though Snyder has used a number of reasons over his run to explain his incompetence.  Mother accuses Bruce of wanting a new Robin and not a new wife; Bruce denies it and flees from her.

** (two of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #8 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Let's just jump right into it here, because we have a lot to cover.

Mother tells Dick that Bruce approached her to build a better Robin, and this revelation fits with the story that Snyder and Tynion have been telling so far.  (Of course, it doesn't mean that it's true.)  After all, we've seen that younger Dick's greatest fear -- the one that Scarecrow's gas revealed -- was that he wasn't good enough to be Robin.  But, Mother's taunting of Dick reveals something else, another theme of this series:  she believes that Cass and Harper will lose to her ballerinas, because she can't conceive that they'd be good enough to defeat them.  It implies -- slyly -- that Dick's nurturing may be better than Bruce's (and Mother's) militaristic way:  where both Bruce and Mother only saw failures, Dick saw strength.

To underline that point, of Mother seeing only weakness, Mother claims that Dick was hobbled by the loss of his parents rather than driven by it, like Bruce was.  But, again, we're left to ask if caring about people really is a weakness?  Underscoring her point, Dick leaves Mother, as she offers to show him which Robin she created for Bruce, to go help Cass and Harper.  It's something Bruce probably wouldn't have done, but increasingly Snyder and Tynion are telling us that it doesn't matter what Bruce would've done.  After all, Bruce's all-consuming focus on the mission -- the same type of focus that Mother has -- resulted in his current state, as an assistant at a day-care center.  Despite feeling rattled, Dick stays true to himself here.  He sacrifices getting an easy answer to help Cass and Harper and, when Cass bolts after she has an unexpected flashback, he tells Harper that they have to stick together.  Snyder and Tynion are reminding us that Dick is confident that they'll get where they need to be despite temporary setbacks.

(I will say here that Snyder and Tynion are somewhat oversimplifying Bruce's approach to his sidekicks.  Yes, Bruce would've likely left the girls to fend for themselves to go after Mother, but he would've done so because he was confident in their ability to handle the situation on their own.  In fact, he wouldn't have brought them with him if he didn't have that confidence in them.  I get where Snyder and Tynion are going with showing Bruce as less caring than Dick, drawing a contrast between their styles.  But, they need to be careful not to oversell it, turning Bruce into little more than the heartless leader of a squad of teenage mercenaries.)

One interesting twist here is that it does seem like Bruce initially met Mother backstage at the ballet in Prague, when he was theoretically looking for a wife.  It's possible that Batman met her earlier, but increasingly it seems like the meeting in this issue really was their first one.  As such, it seems more likely that Bruce created Cass in issue #1 than he did Orphan.  But, we'll see how that develops.

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #7 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Ooo, it's getting good!  Let's get started.

First, we've got Dick with Cass and Harper in Prague.  They've identified the prima ballerina at the ballet as the next target on Mother's list, so Dick sends in Cass and Harper to keep an eye on her while he tries to follow Orphan's signal.  (Since almost everyone on Cass' list is dead, Dick assumes that they're cleaning house.)  Meanwhile, an angry Tim has recruited Jason to help him follow a similar signal, one reminiscent of the interference that he couldn't penetrate the night of the attack on Beacon Tower.  Along the way, Jason hilariously tries to get Tim to talk about his fight with Dick.  It's clear that Jason really does want to know how satisfying it is to punch Dick ("Punching Dick Grayson is kinda my dream date"), but he's also trying to get Tim to talk about how he feels.  (Look at Jason, going all Dr. Phil.)  Jason IDs some black-market pros to question in the bar where he's brought Tim, though I'm not quite sure why they think that they'll know anything about Mother.  Meanwhile, Dick realizes that it's all been a trap:  the Orphan signal was faked to lure him to the theater, and Mother activates the ballerina (along with seemingly all the dancers on the stage) to take on Cass and Harper.  More importantly, Mother makes her first appearance, telling Dick that it's good to see him again. 

Beyond the increasingly intriguing plot, this issue really sings due to its characterization.  I love that Dick already knows Harper well enough that he gives her his tuxedo from when he and Bruce were in Prague to wear to the ballet, since he knows that a dress isn't really her style.  But, a dress is Cass' style, so Harper steals one for her, and we get to watch as she enjoys for the first time getting to feel like a normal girl.  Plus, Valentine gets that the ballet would be particularly meaningful to Cass, given her ability to read movement like language.  Meanwhile, Jason's talk with Tim at the bar -- where he reminds Tim that he understands what it's like to be the Robin that no one trusts -- is touching, in part because of its bro-i-ness.  Jason isn't exactly the type of guy that handles emotions well, but he makes the connection that he needs to make with Tim.  Even the NPCs get great treatment, with the director of the ballet -- the adoptive mother of the ballerina -- conveying sorrow before activating the girl, wishing that Mother would wait.  (It's pretty clear that Mother gave the woman the girl.)

My only nit-picky point is that Harper comments that Orphan lost a foot; but, he actually lost a hand, in issue #5.  But, given the beating he gave Harper around that time, maybe she was just too concussed to remember.  #noprize

I think it's the first issue that I've read of Valentine's, but she can stay as long as she wants.  I can't say that I was as thrilled with Martinez's fairly generic pencils, but, overall, it was an exciting issue, particular since I didn't see the trap coming.

**** (four of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #6 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

OK, now we're getting somewhere.

In a flashback, Bruce learns of the existence of Mother at a party, when a social peer, Maxwell, tells him that he bought his wife, Alicia, from the Czech Republic for $40 million.  (Yup.  You read that correctly.)  Mother apparently manufactured perfect brides from orphaned children.  Unbeknownst to Maxwell, she herself orphaned the children "so she [could] take them at their greatest moment of trauma and shape them into playthings for the rich and powerful."  Alicia herself was a girl from London named Gwyneth who saw her parents killed in front of her by a man in a white hood; she disappeared without a trace, later emerging as Alicia.  Unfortunately, Maxwell and Alicia are later killed after a man that seems to be Orphan observed Maxwell telling Bruce this secret.  Beyond just worrying about Mother, Bruce also worries that he's doing the same thing that she did to Dick.  In the present, Dick wonders aloud when Bruce excluded him when it came to Mother; the flashback implies that it was when Bruce worried that Dick himself would be able to make the connection between what Bruce did to him and what Mother was doing to her people.

This prolonged sequence flows beautifully and really advances what we know about Mother.  In fact, we get a glimpse of her for the first time here, as we see her and two other people standing over Gwyneth's body in a flashback.  The only unknown is how it connects to the implication that Bruce seemingly created Orphan, as we saw in issue #1.  Bruce seemed totally unaware of Mother here, but, if Orphan was the one that helped turn Gwyneth into Alicia, he was clearly already in action by that night.

The plot also thickens when it comes to Bruce's connection to Cass.  Dick and Jason discover the training center that Orphan hid under St. Elijah's, where Cass would've been the night that Bruce and Dick almost caught Scarecrow with Orphan (before he escaped to Prague).  Given that Dick knows that Bruce gave Cass the thumb drive, Dick wonders if Bruce knew that the training center was there that night.  Again, everything keeps returning to this question of when Bruce knew about Mother and her operation.  This issue implies that he was ignorant of them until that night when Maxwell told him about Alicia (a few days after the failed Scarecrow confrontation), but his potential connections to Cass and Orphan imply that he knew much sooner.

In the end, Dick decides to head to Prague.  In the past, he thought that he and Bruce went to Prague only to follow Scarecrow, but he now realizes that he needs to discover the case that Bruce really went there to investigate.  Moreover, Jason -- the voice of reason in this issue, as scary as that is -- encourages Dick to bring Cass and Harper.  Dick initially wants to leave them in the dark so that they can't get hurt, but Jason reminds him that it was Bruce cutting out Dick that got them into this mess in the first place.  (Earlier, he even lectured Dick about the need to trust each other, after his attempt to dig into Tim's background.  Our boy, Jason:  holding the family together.  I couldn't be prouder.  Of course, we know Red Robin is an agent of Mother, so he's technically wrong.  But, I don't care.)

Honestly, six issues into this series and I'm a happy camper.  In the first series, the plot holes were obvious by the end of the first issue, and the situation only deteriorated from there.  Here, we have a legitimate mystery on our hands, one that Snyder and Tynion are doing a great job of advancing slowly so that we can wrap our minds around it.  In the meantime, Seeley and Tynion (in this issue) have given us some great moments of characterization, making the family feel like a family again for the first time in a long time.  Plus, we're getting to see Bruce in action as a detective, an unexpected bonus given his present state.  At the start, I found myself happy just because this series didn't suck like "Batman Eternal" did.  Now, I find myself happy because we could be reading one of the best and most epic Batman stories of all time.

**** (four of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #5 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

This issue is well executed, though I didn't get through it without a few raised eyebrows.

First, I was surprised to learn that Hypnos could not only hide the user's identity, but actually hypnotize someone, as Dick does here to Tim's parents.  I'm pretty sure that we haven't seen it used that way in "Grayson," though I wouldn't swear to that.  But, it certainly makes sense that Hypnos could do that (it's in the name, after all), so I'm not complaining.

The more interesting revelation, at least to me, is that Tim has created an entirely new identity for his parents.  Their name -- and his name -- isn't "Drake."  I vaguely remember something along those lines from the early days of "Teen Titans" in the "New 52!" but Tim's history has become such a mess after the reboot that it's hard to follow.  Tim is suitably pissed at Dick for tracking down his parents.  (He discovers that Dick did so when Poppy follows Dick to the house and attacks.  The interruption broke Tim's mother's hypnosis and allowed her to activate the security system.)  Dick says that he had little choice:  he previously could respect Tim's wish to keep so much of his life secret, but he can't afford that luxury now that any of one of them could be a sleeper agent for Mother.  That said, Orlando implies that Dick might be right to be suspicious:  Tim's dad refers to Tim as having "arrived," instead of being born.  Combined with Tim answering a call from Mother last issue, Snyder and Tynion certainly seem to be setting up the revelation that Tim is one of Mother's bio-engineered children.

The other main event is Cass leading Bluebird to a church where Orphan is hiding.  (In a flashback, we see Orphan meeting with Scarecrow there years earlier.)  Cass did so not to turn in Bluebird but seemingly to get her to help take out Orphan?  Maybe?  Her motives for bringing Bluebird there are really unclear to me, since Cass couldn't believe that just she and a wounded Harper could've stopped him.  Perhaps the most interesting part of this sequence is the fact that Orphan makes a comment about not caring if he kills his children (referring to Cass), drawing a parallel between him and Batman.  Snyder and Tynion seem to be putting him out there as Batman through the glass, darkly at this stage.

All in all, it's another solid issue.  It's not as thrilling as some of the other issues, in part because Orlando isn't the most emotional of scripters.  His style perfectly suits "Midnighter," but it works less well here, when the whole point of this issue is the confrontation between Dick and Tim.  But, everything makes sense and nothing occurs randomly, so I'm cool.

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #4 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Intrigue!

In this issue, we not only learn that some of the Gala guests were also on Mother's target list, but that they were actually the sleeper agents that Mother activated to attack Bruce.  Thankfully, the "We Are Robin" crew was there dressed as staff members and jumps into action to help Dick protect Bruce.  (Apparently they were following Bruce for his protection, though Orlando doesn't tell us what motivated them to do so.  After all, in "Batman," Bruce's relationship with Duke is described as strained.  Maybe it's clearer if you're reading "We Are Robin?")  Batgirl also arrives and the extended group makes short work of the attackers.  Duke challenges Dick, and Dick reveals that he was the original Robin.  He promises to have a longer conversation with Duke (though I'm not sure Duke feels one is necessary), but then goes to talk to Babs.  He apologizes for his behavior in "Batgirl" #45 and asks her to watch Bruce given "events."  Babs essentially rolls her eyes at him at the idea that his behavior would prevent her from helping, so I'm glad to see that we're good on that front.

We learn that Dick is concerned that the Robins' names are on the same list as the sleeper agents (now confirmed to be the "designer human beings" that Mother creates).  His concern seems validated by the fact that Tim gets a call from Mother at the end of the issue.  Dick is already suspicious of Tim for his failure to break through the "data moat" that Mother erected around Beacon Tower, particularly because the Tower was built with Wayne Tech.  As such, it's not surprising here that he goes dark and and heads to the Drake household.

This issue is solid, but I'd say that I find Orlando's banter to feel much more forced than Seeley's.  Snyder and Tynion definitely deepen the threat here, though it'll take me a while before I know if I buy them.  For example, it's unclear if Tim is working for Mother and, if he is, if he knows that he is.  Although Dick blames him for not breaking through the data moat to help him during the fight, we saw Tim actively trying to talk to Dick.  So, either Tim was trying and couldn't succeed to break the moat or Mother was somehow inhibiting his normal talent with computers.  It didn't seem like he was consciously undermining Dick.  It goes to the fact that the most interesting revelation is probably that the "designer human beings" are more numerous than we thought and possibly unaware of their status as such.  But, if Dick is suspicious of Tim, shouldn't he also be suspicious of himself?  Aren't they all sleeper agents if some of them are?  I guess we'll see.

*** (three of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #3 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Man, I'm a lot happier three issues into this series than I thought that I would be.

First, Seeley continues to do a great job with characterization, particularly with Jason.  In fact, I find myself longing for DC to realize that he writes the best Jason possibly ever and finally putting an end of Lobdell's control over the character.  Jason is all aggressive charm and wit here, from complaining that he's not in touch with music because he's too busy "getting into wacky adventures" to grudgingly acknowledging that he owed Cassandra $500 for breaking up a pool game that he was losing.  Also, let's not forget him telling Helena, when he's introduced to her over Dick's comm-link, "I hear you're hot."  Of course he does.  We finally have our Jason back, people.

But, it isn't just the individual characterizations that make this series great; it's the way that Seeley really makes the interactions between the characters sing.  My favorite moment in comics this year may very well be Dick and Jason sitting at the bar, with Jason drinking a beer while Dick explains how this job went wrong.  Seeley has show Jason fully embracing Dick as his big brother, even commenting to that effect (with a caveat) in this issue.  When Dick has to keep him from fighting Cassandra again, Jason whines at him ("She attacked me, Grayson!") just like a little brother would.  The two of them at the bar just cements to this brotherly dynamic.  But, it's made all the better by Tim having to remind them that Harper is slowly bleeding into unconsciousness while they enjoy "happy hour."  It's just...brilliant.  This scene just really distills their three personalities and relationship perfectly.  It's not just the guys, either.  I loved Harper debating whether she should follow Cassandra's signal to go with her deeper into the Batcave, acknowledging the possible ire of the "beefy, undoubtedly short-tempered Robin boys."  Like I said, I really could just watch this entire crew play charades at a housewarming party for 52 issues and be happy.

But, the plot also continues to get interesting.  First, I thought Dick's assessment that Cassandra was having a "conversation" with them by "attacking" them was brilliant.  Since she's not capable of speech, this "conversation" was the only way that she could verify that they are who they say they are.  Meanwhile, we learn that Poppy has gone MIA after she ate the nanites that Spyral implants in their agents to track them.  Helena is suitably disturbed, and her investigation into "Mother" leads to a 25-year-old reference in Agent Zero's journals about her claim that she can "build a human being for whatever needs arise."  Dick asks what sort of person would need designer human beings, and Jason insightfully (maybe too insightfully) comments, "Maybe someone who could use a loyal child soldier or three?"  Thus Bruce's connection with Mother gets all the more interesting.  It also gets more lethal:  the last nanite on Poppy's person crawled inside her cell phone and revealed that her calls were all going into the Beacon Tower, where Gotham was throwing a "re-welcome" gala for Bruce.  Cue the guests suddenly speaking into phones saying, "Yes, Mother," and Bruce getting led into a kitchen full of axe-wielding guests!

Again, I'm intrigued where we're going here.  Snyder and Tynion seem to want us to believe that Bruce may have had some sort of relationship with Mother that impacts what we know about the Robins, and the interesting part is that it might actually be true.  They're definitely hinting that the answer is going to surprise us.  That said, though, even the interesting plot pales in comparison to the joy of seeing the boys and girls all interacting together, without Bruce's presence changing the dynamics.  God, I hope this series manages to stay this good for as long as possible.

**** (four of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #2 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

I'm happy to say that Seeley does a great job here.  Not surprisingly, he's got down Dick's voice beautifully, and it really shows.

The highlight of the issue for me was Dick expressing surprise at the number of teenage superheroes in Gotham, climaxing with him asking if they were handing out costumes in cereal boxes when he meets Spoiler.  It goes exactly to the heart of what I think we all want this story to be:  Dick as the leader of the Robins, in all their official and unofficial iterations.  In other words, in the wake of the loss of Bruce, Dick is stepping into his role as head of the family.  (Stephanie essentially demands that he do so in this issue, complaining about the "robot" chasing them around the city in the wake of Batman's death.  She also keeps referring to him as "sexy Batman," which cracks up my shit.)

At the moment, Dick is more interested in just making sure that the people on Mother's list are still alive.  He arrived at Harper's apartment just in time to see Cassandra kick the Orphan's ass, and he's relieved when Tim arrives to help, since it means that he's also alive.  (Tim has apparently planted monitors in the girls' apartment, saying that the Orphan's attack justifies him keeping a particularly creepy eye on them.  It certainly fits with this more arrogant and ethically challenged version of Tim that we have in the DCnU.)  They then contact Jason, who's holding Cassandra at gunpoint.  I love this moment, since it really gives some rare credit to Jason.  Cassandra has so far been portrayed as an unstoppable fighting machine, but Jason has apparently managed to subdue her.

Speaking of Cass, she still hasn't spoken, though they know her name since the Orphan helpfully mentioned it in front of Harper.  Adding to the mystery, Dick and Stephanie smell fear gas in the apartment, and it appears to be part of the Orphan's costume.  (Its smell prompts Dick to remember his first exposure to the gas, while chasing Crane that first time.  His fear?  That he's not good enough for Batman.)

My only complaint -- and it's a very small one -- is that the Orphan wears his (and it seems to be a him) motivations a little too clearly on his sleeve.  He taunts Harper over her brother fleeing, asking if he's gone to get help or abandoning her like all families do.  Harsh, dude.  Harsh.

Otherwise, it's pitch perfect.  Although they're teenagers, they're all still remarkably competent, as Harper proves when she manages -- in her beaten state -- to grab her gun and electrify the fire escape just as the Orphan touches it.  I love the idea of Dick acknowledging this wealth of talent and assembling all of them into an unstoppable army.  In the meantime, I'm also loving the banter and relationships between them.  Seeley could give me 52 issues of them all at a house-warming party, and I'd be here with bells on every issue.

**** (four of five stars)

Batman and Robin Eternal #1 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

I'm going to warn you now:  this review is not short.

Yes, I've returned for the second season.  After the unmitigated horror that "Batman Eternal" was, I pledged that I wouldn't do it to myself.  I all but took a blood oath.  Then, I discovered that it was going to be about all the Robins working together.  I still resisted subscribing at that point, because I figured that it'd be more of Bruce acting like an asshole and Jason fighting back tears all the time.  Then, I realized that Bruce wouldn't be part of the story (at least in the present) because he was no longer Batman.  Suddenly, I just couldn't help it.  What can I say?  I'm a sucker for sidekicks.

The good news is that it's a great start.  For one thing, DC (at least initially) avoids the mistake that it made with "Batman Eternal," where the cast of thousands of authors and artists made for inconsistent storytelling.  Instead, we've got some of the best doing what they do best here:  Snyder and Tynion on the plot, Tynion on the script, and Daniel on the pencils.  You can tell the difference immediately.  The guys sound like the guys.  Dick is charming, Jason is snarky, Tim is arrogant.  Most importantly, they interact in the way that you want them to interact.  I don't have to worry about Bruce's shadow remaining ever present.  When Dick talks about Alfred leaning on him to clean out the Batcave, Jason calls dibs on a few Batmobiles and suggests that they all hit a bar.  Tim reminds him that he's only 16 years old, and Jason tells him that they can find somewhere in Gotham for him to drink.  Tim asks Dick respectful questions, and Dick clearly exults in sharing the experience with the guys.  It's all exactly how I wanted it to go:  they're brothers on the town without dad watching over them (perhaps for the first time).  Moreover, Daniel is maybe the first artist that draws them in a way where they look different:  Jason and Tim are no longer just clones of Dick.  They're visually distinct, and it helps you seem them as clearer individuals, making for stronger bonds between them.  As I said, it is tight storytelling.

But, it's not all family reunions.  As happy as I am that the tone and tenor of the relationships are exactly how I want them to be, we also have a pretty intriguing plot.  I'm going to deliver a detailed summary here, because, if I learned anything from "Batman Eternal," it's that small details are going to be really important later.

The issue starts with a kid in Cairo seeing his/her parents killed in an alley, mirroring Bruce's story.  We then return to Gotham in the present day, where Dick is in a motorcycle chase with, in the words of his partner, Poppy, a "drugged-up techno-futurist weapons designer that has nothing to do with what Spyral sent [them] there for."  Tynion doesn't exactly make it clear why Dick is chasing the designer, since he doesn't seem at all connected to the subsequent plot.  But, it does set up the aforementioned reunion of the Robins, so I'm not complaining.  He narrates that he pulled in the Robins for help since he was working on a deadline:  his mission for Spyral was preventing someone from detonating a dirty bomb during the reopening gala of Gotham State University's Tower of Enlightenment.  (Dick wonders why Spyral would send him after such a small target, but Poppy tells him that it's not their job to ask questions.)  Once the guys finish the job, Dick changes into a professorial costume and arrives at the gala.  He also enters a long flashback sequence, telling Poppy that the Dynamic Duo confronted the Scarecrow there years earlier.  In fact, it was Dick's first case with Bruce, and they later traveled the world trying to find the Scarecrow after he slipped through their fingers that night.  Dick gets lost in the memory, until a group of armed children try to kidnap him.  (Ah, Gotham.)

The children tell Dick that Bruce never respected him and, ominously, that he paid "top dollar" to "upgrade" to the new model.  Dick evades their gunfire, and the kids tell him that they're not trying to kill him:  someone named "Orphan" will do that.  They tell him that "Mother" needs to tidy up her mistakes and that Dick is exactly that type of mistake.  Dick leaps through the window and heads to Poppy's van, but we learn that she's working for Mother as well when she opens fire on him.  He manages to grab the motorcycle in the van and flee.  Poppy notifies Orphan that they may now need to take "the others" off the table immediately.  Orphan reminds her that s/he doesn't work for Poppy as s/he watches Dick drive from the scene.  Poppy asks which target is the priority, and Orphan announces that s/he's going to take out the one that could lead them to Mother if they knew "how to look."

In flight, Dick finds that his communications are blocked (just as his hypnos failed against the children).  He's then knocked off his cycle by Cassandra Cain!  She makes short work of him, but he realizes that she's pulling her punches.  He asks why she is, and she then hands him a thumb drive.  (She also merely responds, "Mother," whenever he asks her a question.)  Elsewhere, Harper Row uses a device that she created to fry the computer in Batman's suit, preventing him from detaining her.  (He's still hunting down costumed heroes in Gotham.)  She goes home, and Cullen tells her that Spoiler left in a huff after Harper went patrolling on her own.  Cullen expresses concern that she's going to wind up dead like their mother, since she's insisting on going on patrol without the training that she was supposed to receive from Batman.  Harper tells him that she'll be fine, only to find Orphan waiting for her in her bedroom.  S/he announces that Harper is the "key to everything they cannot know" and the she must correspondingly die.

At the Batcave, Dick asks the Batcomputer about Mother and the Orphan, but it reveals that it has no records on them.  He then loads up the thumb drive, and a list appears.  It says that Mother's "children" must die before Phase 3, and it has a list of names that includes Dick, Jason, Tim, Harper, and Cassandra, as well as other names that I didn't recognize.  Dick expresses shock, and his voice activates a recording of Bruce.  Bruce tells him that this recording is his confession.  He sent Cassandra with the thumb drive if he fell "tonight," and he tells Dick that their international journey to capture the Scarecrow all those years ago was cover for a mystery that ran much darker.  Bruce thought that it was over, but he realizes that it wasn't if Dick had gotten this recording.  He warns Dick that Mother is more dangerous than he can imagine and that anyone could be under her control.  He tells Dick that Mother is his greatest sin and beseeches him to stay alive.  In the epilogue, the kid in Cairo kneels over his/her dead parents, and Batman is revealed to be the gunman.  He tells Mother via a comms link that everything went according to plan.

Honestly, I don't have all that much more to say, since Tynion is really just setting up the mystery here.  The big questions are obviously the identity of Mother and why Bruce would help her in killing the kid's parents.  (It seems possible that the kid is either Orphan or, a more remote possibility, Harper.)  But, we also have a more immediate mystery here, in the form of the recording.  Bruce seems to imply in the recording that he was going to confront Mother the evening that recorded it.  If he died, he left instructions for Cassandra to provide Dick with the thumb drive.  However, it's clear that he didn't die, raising the question why Cassandra is just now providing Dick with the information.  Did she hear Bruce had died and figured the instructions stand? 

As I said, it's too early to talk about the mystery, because it'll probably be a few issues before we understand the full extent of it.  But, if this issue is any indication of the story that we have coming, we really could be onto something here.

**** (four of five stars)