Birds of Prey, v. 8: Club Kids

Collects: Birds of Prey #109-12, 118 (2007-8)

Released: January 2009 (DC)

Format: 128 pages / color / $17.99 / ISBN: 9781401221751

What is this?: The Birds of Prey adapt to a new writer and developments in the DC universe.

The culprits: Writer Tony Bedard and artists Nicola Scott, Jason Orfalas, and David Cole

I had avoided Birds of Prey, v. 8: Club Kids for quite a while, afraid new writer Tony Bedard would turn the title and its characters into a flavorless waste of time. Happily, I found that was not the case.

Club Kids has little overall plot, as Bedard eschews an overarching story for the beginning of his run. Instead, he favors character pieces that deal with developments outside the title. Bedard deals with Black Canary choosing to marry Green Arrow and an assassin attacking the New Gods in #109 and #112. He also uses past continuity to his advantage in two other stories: the aftermath of Oracle destroying her clocktower base in 2004-5’s War Games crossover facilitates a face-to-face confrontation between Calculator and Oracle in #111, and Misfit’s origins are looked at in #118.

None of these stories are award winners. On the other hand, most of them are solid comics in the old-school mold. Huntress foils mad bombers, who turn out to be less “mad” and more naïve. Black Alice and Misfit are put into a superhero gladiatorial ring, a plot straight out of New Mutants. Lady Blackhawk honors a fallen comrade. Oracle and Calculator scrap over data. Simple stories, and all the characters are true to the personalities previous writer Gail Simone gave them. I would not say Bedard is as good with the characters as Simone was — although they easily coexist with Simone’s conceptions, they lack a certain je ne sais quoi. But Simone had several years to mold the characters; Club Kids contains Bedard’s first five issues on the title.

However, letting other titles dictate stories occasionally robs Birds of Prey‘s stories of their impact. All of #109 is dedicated to either reacting to a development outside the title or adding heat to a subplot running through the DCU. Although Oracle arguing with Black Canary over her boyfriend’s fidelity issues is long overdue, the discussion was engendered by Green Arrow’s marriage proposal in another title (Green Arrow). Developing another title’s dangling plots does no favors to Birds of Prey‘s narrative flow, especially since Black Canary wasn’t a character at this point — she left the title in #100. The issue still might have worked, however, if the assassination of the New Gods story hadn’t been shoehorned into the same issue. Bedard tries to give Knockout a fitting last moment, but her part of the story feels rushed. And the death Lady Blackhawk memorializes in #112, that of a prominent supporting character, seemingly comes from nowhere (the Death of the New Gods miniseries); #112 starts with a half page of her memorial service before getting on with the action. Brevity is laudable, but it feels as if the dead character is being cheated of the respect she is due.

(Although not as cheated as Manhunter is; I know she barely appears in Club Kids, but her head shot in the intro / recap section of the book is actually a picture of Scandal Savage, a villain, from #109.)

Why couldn’t Simone have worked with artists like Bedard gets? Nicola Scott draws #109, 110, and 118 and does an excellent job — action-packed, expressive, exceedingly pretty, with a tight line I admire. She even puts Huntress in a more modest costume than the Jim Lee monstrosity (thank God), although Big Barda’s red bikini costume is awful. (I don’t think Scott designed it, but it’s still awful.) Jason Orfalas does a good job on the quieter #111, and David Cole‘s slightly cartoony, looser style is perfect for the free-spirited Lady Blackhawk’s story.

Club Kids is the perfect book for a title that is coming off a big storyline and a change of writers; Bedard uses the characters respectfully, putting them in appropriate situations, and reacts to what DC editorial sends him. But that’s Club Kids’s shortcoming, as well: it’s reactive, and Birds of Prey loses all its momentum from Simone’s run without establishing any clear new direction. Over the long run, that’s death for a title, but for one collection, it can be enjoyable — and in this case, it is.

Rating: (4 of 5)

Birds of Prey, v. 7: Dead of Winter

Collects: Birds of Prey #104-8 (2007)

Released: February 2008 (DC)

Format: 128 pages / color / $17.99 / ISBN: 9781401216412

What is this?: Gail Simone wraps up her run on the title with one final mission and a battle for the team’s leadership.

The culprits: Writer Gail Simone and penciler Nicola Scott

For reasons I can’t quite recall, it’s taken me almost two years to get to the end of writer Gail Simone’s four-year run on Birds of Prey. But with Birds of Prey, v. 7: Dead of Winter, Simone reaches the end, and I catch up with her there.

You would think that in modern comics, which both hallows and cannot sustain long runs, that there would be a great deal of attention paid to the ending of a long string of consecutive issues by a writer — throwing everything the book has on the page or trying to make this an “end of an era” sort of book, with a knowing wink (“Here we go again!”) thrown at the reader or at least a heart-felt “Thanks!” from the writer. But there’s none of that, just a simple “The End!” to mark the passing of Simone’s 53 issues. I appreciate that, and either DC does as well or they mandated it; after all, they’re trying to convince readers that the writers who follow, Tony Bedard and Sean McKeever, supply either the same or higher quality stories, and signaling that something big has passed is never the way to do that. On the other hand, the non-comics part of #108 could have been filled with all sorts of weepy goodbyes and eulogies, for all I know.

But I wouldn’t have begrudged Simone the chance to go out with a big bang; it is a comics tradition, after all. It used to be said of Spider-Man in the Bronze Age that you could tell when a writer was leaving the title because he’d wheel out his Green Goblin story. But the only green I see in this story is on the costumes of Spy Smasher and Knockout.

In Dead of Winter, Simone gives the team its biggest shakeup of her tenure, sending a squad out on another mission as team founder Oracle’s authority is being usurped by Spy Smasher, the revival of a Golden Age hero’s identity. Spy Smasher gained control of the Birds by revealing she knew Oracle’s real identity and threatening Oracle’s father’s reputation and career. She’s the only person to crack Oracle’s ID after so many have tried, so this should be a giant showdown, one that unspools in every issue of the book and in the background of every scene — or, if not in every scene, then at least a few of them. This should be epic, a huge stone carved with letters that say, “I made these minor characters into something that actually matters.”

But it’s not.

It’s another mission, albeit one with a little tension. The mission itself isn’t even morally dubious, even though we’re told Spy Smasher is a bad egg: Spy Smasher leads the team on a rescue of a hero who has been missing for years.

The conflict between Spy Smasher and Oracle is resolved by half of a fight between the two, followed by a little intimidation by all the living Birds of Prey. It’s just 12 pages, four of them taken up by two double-page spreads that involve people standing around and looking at Spy Smasher (or the reader, depending on your point of view). It doesn’t even address the power over Oracle’s dad that allowed Spy Smasher to take over the Birds in the first place. It’s a letdown, to say the least.

And that’s a shame, because it diverts attention from a very good Simone story. The plot itself is relatively simple, but Dead of Winter matches Simone’s previous work on Birds for character moments, quick wit, and plot twists. Matching the Birds against the other team Simone has had success with — the Secret Six — gives Simone a chance to write villains who are as witty as the protagonists. She seems to have a lot of fun with Big Barda as well, from her casual disregard of oozing bullet wounds to her joyful decision to start a fight. Zinda, Lady Blackhawk, gets her moment to show that she knows a thing or two about what you do with “tightass tinpots.” Even Spy Smasher is appropriately ambiguous while getting a decent share of the good lines.

Continuing from where she started in #100, Nicola Scott provides the art for this volume. Scott’s work shows how things have improved since the beginning of Simone’s run; Scott’s characters are attractive people, but unlike those in the work of, say, Ed Benes, they don’t look like they’re being posed for a series of cheesecake pinups. She doesn’t overplay the comedy, matching the understated humor in the dialogue. As I mentioned in Birds of Prey, v. 6: Blood and Circuits, I do dig her clean pencils, and she’s excellent at drawing fight scenes. Sometimes her faces are a little too similar; without costumes, for instance, it would be difficult to tell who is who in the fight between Scandal Savage and Hawkgirl. Still, she is probably the best of the artists Simone has worked with.

Dead of Winter delivers the consistently high quality that readers have come to expect from Simone and her Birds of Prey, and I’m glad I’ve read the entire run. However, it doesn’t transcend that level of quality — it isn’t greater than what came before, and it doesn’t seem like it fully capitalizes on the title’s past. Perhaps I shouldn’t expect it; it isn’t an obligation, but I still mark the book down a little for it. Still, instead of giving the book a big sendoff, Simone gives readers just another volume.

Rating: (3.5 of 5)

All-Star Superman, v. 1

Collects: All-Star Superman #1-6 (2006-7)

Released: April 2007 (DC)

Format: 160 pages / color / $19.99 / ISBN: 9781401209148

What is this?: Morrison and Quitely respin Silver Age Superman madness into a modern tale of morality and mortality.

The culprits: Writer Grant Morrison and artist Frank Quitely

I almost decided not to review All Star Superman, v. 1 because I didn’t feel I could be properly reverential to a story that has gained nearly universal acclaim since it came out. After thinking about it, though, I decided to give it a shot.

I don’t think I’m spoiling anything when I say writer Grant Morrison and artist Frank Quitely’s All-Star Superman is the most acclaimed work on Superman in at least a decade and probably a lot longer than that. I never really understood why before I read v. 1. Really, I still don’t.

Don’t get me wrong. I can see that Morrison is telling a story that, if not unique in the Superman mythos, is darn close to it. He uses Silver Age trappings to tell an out-of-continuity story — one which could not be contained by continuity, one might say — in which Superman confronts mortality and performs a mythological set of tasks, on par with Heracles’s Twelve Labors. Morrison and Quitely know the mythos and know the characters; everything feels natural yet modern. The stories feel like Superman stories, with larger than life antagonists and consequences.

There are some parts I enjoyed — the issue with Clark Kent and Lex Luthor escaping from a prison riot started by the Parasite, Superman’s scenes with his father, the integration of modern Superman elements like Doomsday into the narrative. The funeral and Clark’s eulogy near the end of the volume are moving. I cannot deny Morrison’s craft is excellent, and that he has put together a narrative of high technical quality.

And yet — and yet, and yet, and yet … I didn’t enjoy this book. Perhaps because I don’t enjoy Superman all that much. I don’t have anything against the Big Blue Boy Scout, but neither he nor his supporting cast have ever interested me. Many reasons have been bruited about on the Internet for why readers might be disinterested in Superman; I suppose I don’t buy that Superman can ever be put in peril, and I don’t care about Clark Kent.

Morrison tries to get across the idea that Superman can be harmed, but I don’t buy it. I don’t buy the idea that the scientists will allow Superman to die. It is an out-of-continuity story — whatever that means for DC — so there is the possibility that Superman will be seriously hurt or end the story dead. However, when you’re dealing with a story that has such a strong whiff of the Silver Age, it’s hard to believe anything negative is going to happen.

I really dislike DC’s Silver Age stories. They are goofy, but generally speaking, not a in a good way; they are goofy in a halfwitted manner that makes me chuckle once or twice, then stop because I should not be laughing at such awful things. People worked hard at those stories, and by and large, they’re not worth re-reading. Morrison tries to capitalize upon the energy and lack of rules those stories enjoyed, but it mainly reminds me that the original stories were stupid, and no amount technobabble can disguise that — especially when the word “hyperpoon” is used. I mean, honestly.

Most of the characters in this book aren’t all that interesting; perhaps it’s because of the Silver Age-ishness. Other than this is his story, I don’t see a reason to get worked up about Superman: he’s not witty or fun or interesting. He’s stolid and heroic, which is not nothing, but it’s hardly unique. Superman might have gotten there first with those characteristics and with the most, but Nathaniel Bedford Forrest’s maxim aside, that’s not enough. He’s also a superscientist, but the story shows for the most part he’s cast that identity aside to be Clark Kent and Superman. Clark is an idealist, which, when he’s out of costume, is more annoying than not; his bleating that Superman and Luthor could have been friends if Luthor had just given up that gosh-darn evil is a low point for the book. Lois is … Lois is a “great” reporter who can’t believe the evidence of her eyes; Jimmy Olsen is wacky and obviously prone to abusing any power he gets.

The only character I felt empathy for was Luthor, which isn’t surprising. If Superman and his supporting cast are based off a Silver-Age template, then Luthor is himself based on an even older pattern: a Miltonian Satan. Better to rule in Hell, as Luthor does in prison, than to serve in Superman’s heaven. He’s interesting, and he’s fun in a supervillain sort of way. He’s the one person who can say the negative things the readers might be thinking, although he will always go too far. He’s obviously the antagonist, though, so while we can enjoy Luthor’s rants, we’re not supposed to root for him.

The art in v. 1, like Morrison’s writing, is something I don’t appreciate despite its widespread claim; I suppose I’ll just have to live with having an unpopular opinion. Quitely’s art did not bother me as much as usual with this issue. Since I’m not as familiar with the faces of Superman characters, his interpretations of their faces didn’t strike me as being wrong, as it might with Marvel characters. Quitely does a good job making Clark Kent and Superman look different; I wouldn’t believe they were the same character if I didn’t know better. (Which could be a problem, if other Superman books hadn’t given us super-disguise skills.)

The craftsmanship of this story is undeniable; I can see why other readers might enjoy it. But I can’t get into the story. It seems to accept as given some things that I can’t believe — that Superman is intrinsically interesting, that his stories have dramatic tension, that DC’s Silver Age plots and ideas are worthy of resuscitation. It’s not unlike reading a great author’s Dan Brown pastiche: well done, but what’s the point?

As for the rating, I went back and forth on this. Like I said, I recognize the quality of this book — it’s at least a 4 of 5. But my enjoyment, at most, is at a 2. So I averaged them together to get …

Rating: (3 of 5)

Birds of Prey, v. 4: The Battle Within

Collects: Birds of Prey #76-85 (2005)

Released: October 2006 (DC)

Format: 240 pages / color / $17.99 / ISBN: 9781401210960

What is this?: The Birds go after violent femme vigilantes, and then everyone tries to stop the Singapore-to-Gotham drug pipeline.

The culprits: Writer Gail Simone

I have been meaning to write about Birds of Prey, v. 4: The Battle Within for a couple of months now, but something always gets in the way: a Snowpocalypse, a Human Target, something. And now, here I am, getting to write about it, and I can’t quite remember what I was going to say in the first place.

I remember being slightly disappointed by Battle when I first read it. Looking over it now, I can’t quite see why. Battle is a heck of a value: ten issues for $17.99. (I tend to say this with the DC books I review but rarely the Marvel books.) It really feels like you’re getting two books in one with this one — and I mean that literally: #76-80 makes up one book, and #81-5 is a completely different storyline. Although it gives the reader more for the dollar, it does take away from a dramatic departure at the end of the first storyline. (On the other hand, that character stays in the book, if not always with the team, so the departure isn’t that big of a cliffhanger.)

The plot seems a little thin in places. The first half of the book follows the Birds as they hunt down female vigilantes; as Oracle later notes, they get a win, a draw, and a loss, and I don’t know that that speaks all that well of the team. Although there are some chances to work some obvious parallels in those five issues, I feel those opportunities were missed. The second half involves stopping a Singaporean drug supplier and an attempt to infiltrate the Gotham mob. The stateside story works fine, but the Singapore side seems too steeped in “honor” stereotypes for me to get into. And I still don’t buy Oracle’s cyberinterface or its complications, which are resolved way too easily here.

Writer Gail Simone keeps the team humming along. The dialogue is excellent, especially when Simone stays away from the sappy moments. Zinda (Lady Blackhawk), who was introduced last volume, shows why she’s part of the team; Simone never forgets that Zinda is both from a different time and very good at what she does, and she manages to get those characteristics across to readers without banging them over the head with it. (I think Zinda is my favorite Bird now.) Simone keeps track of her loose ends and keeps the reader feeling like it’s the characters, not the team or the book’s gimmick, that matters. Simone also uses the DC Universe to her advantage, bringing in characters that advance the storyline without letting those characters overwhelm her story.

The good news: this is the end of Ed Benes’s run on the title. If you’ve read my previous reviews of Birds of Prey, you might remember my complaints about his cheesecake art. Nothing changes about that here: he’s a good artist who lets his predilection for certain parts of pretty ladies show through too much.

His job is taken over by Joe Bennett, who draws five of the remaining eight issues in Battle. He draws action scenes pretty well, which is good, because he gets to draw a lot of them in Battle. I never warmed to his style, however; his women lack well-defined noses, have slack, open mouths, and generally don’t have much expression on their faces. They look a little like blow-up dolls, to be frank. I really like the art from Joe Prado, who draws a slightly scratchy #76, featuring the Birds vs. a Goth teenage Wicca with real power, and Tom Derenick, who draws #77-8 in a style more than slightly reminiscent of Sal Buscema, whom I never get tired of.

I suppose that feeling of disappointment I remember comes from being slightly underwhelmed by the story. Simone’s characters and dialogue once again meet my high expectations, but I miss the feeling of a deeper plot. Huntress’s storyline is a move in the right direction, and it might be even better in the next volume, but it isn’t quite there yet. I suppose I also didn’t care for the heaviest artistic workloads being given to my least favorite of the four pencilers.

Although, if I had paid for Battle rather than checking it out of the library, I suppose getting so much story for so little might have mitigated those feelings.

Rating: (2.5 of 5)

Batman: Hush, v. 1

Collects: Batman #608-12 (2002-3)

Released: July 2004 (DC)

Format: 128 pages / color / $12.99 / ISBN: 9781401200602

What is this?: The villains in Gotham City seem strangely organized as Batman investigates a kidnapping that leads to a plot against him.

The culprits: Writer Jeph Loeb and penciler Jim Lee

Before various Crises and Grant Morrison hit Batman, the biggest story in Gotham was Batman: Hush.

Writer Jeph Loeb, penciler Jim Lee, and inker Scott Williams collaborated on a twelve-issue run on Batman, introducing a new, bandaged-swathed villain called Hush. In Batman: Hush, v. 1, however, Hush figures very little in the story. Instead, this volume mostly sets up the villain’s plan while giving Batman some evildoers to fight.

(An aside: When deciding whether to review the entire Hush storyline in one post or write a review on each of the softcover volumes, I opted for two separate reviews. This allows for me to review the first volume, and if someone opts to read Hush on that basis, they won’t be spoiled as much, no matter how much detail I go into.)

Hush, v. 1, feels like a detective story. There is little of the actual character Hush here; there are suggestions that someone is pulling the strings of a few Gotham villains, like Poison Ivy, Catwoman, Killer Croc, and perhaps even LexCorp. There isn’t a payoff in v. 1 on the culprit — this is v. 1, after all, of two — so Hush, v. 1, is setup.

On that score, it works, although you have to wonder how you top a Batman / Superman fight. (It’s a credit to Batman’s reputation that Loeb doesn’t have to explain why Batman has a plan to fight Superman, in Metropolis, on the spur of the moment.) Two storylines may be hard to swallow, however: Batman beginning a romance with Catwoman and the introduction of Bruce Wayne’s boyhood best friend, Dr. Thomas Elliot. The former isn’t so hard to understand; she’s Catwoman, he’s lonely, and there’s no Bat accessory that’s going to help with that. The introduction of a childhood friend who meant so much to Bruce is more difficult to swallow, however; in reading v. 1, you have to wonder why Loeb goes to so much trouble to introduce a surgeon with boyhood ties to Bruce.

Lee is … well, he does Jim Lee work. His name sells comic books — or so we’re told — and he’s been a sought-after talent for almost two decades now. Hush, v. 1, is just another line on his resume. His work is impressive, if a looking a bit staged at certain “cool” moments. Still, it’s easy to see why his work is so highly thought of — each character has what looks like an iconic look, but Lee’s designs feel fresh. The fight scenes are well staged, as well. There are the standard, long-legged cheesecake-ish shots — as I said about Joe Benitez’s work on Batman: Detective, there’s nothing remarkable about that in most superhero comics. Well, nothing remarkable except that Lois Lane wears a skirt a bit short for a career woman wanting to be taken seriously as a journalist, and Lee likes the butt shots of Huntress.

Hush, v. 1, is mostly fun, even if it seems Batman absorbs an absurd amount of damage. I have reservations about parts of it, but it looks great and feels like it’s building toward something big, which is exactly what Loeb and Lee are aiming for.

Rating: (4 of 5)