Written by: James Tynion IV
Art by: Christian Duce
Publisher: DC Comics
Detective Comics continues to be some of the best written superhero stories.
It’s been a while that Batman books have all been so consistent, in both writing and art department, and this is a part two of the arc that is turning out to be one of the best yet since the Rebirth story. When announced who the team would be, I was very skeptical, and it did take me several issues to fully get into the dynamic of the team. Batwoman was always one of the most interesting characters in a Bat family, mostly because it seemed it was a character that was mostly down to earth.
James Tynion continues his writing duties on this book, and even though a lot of the book was previously focusing on Batwoman and her taking the reigns of training the next generation of heroes reluctantly at first, and then with a sense of purpose later. This particular issue however it mostly concentrates on a villain of the story, as it was written from her perspective (that is the only spoiler you are getting!), and I always like Bat books that give villains more of a voice. It is that voice that is unique here, especially with the said villain interacting with our heroes. Tynion manages to convey true emotions here between them.
Issue is drawn by Christian Duce, whose work I am not too familiar honestly, but it very reminiscent of Eddy Barrows art, who was knocking it out of the park so far. Duce continues that tradition, and the action scenes here are fantastic. Having our heroes duke it out with League of Assassins is always fun to see, and we have plenty of that action here. But it is the main villain of the story is who steals the show and Duce draws her with grace and style, worthy of her. Needless to say is that Duce manages to capture the feel of this particular story-line and it’s always good when a team of an artist and a writer is chosen to give that particular arc a voice as it was.
The good thing about the Detective comic books in this iteration is that it has a continuity, where New 52 was mostly focusing on doing one story and then next and so on and so forth, with most of them not being interconnected, in Rebirth, everything has happened in Detective Comics so far, have the a thread of familiarity to all of the story-lines before them, and that is always fun to see as there is an actual consequence to the actions happening.
This book continues to impress in both writing and art departments, even though sometimes it can go into a little bit of a jumping the shark territory. But if you like Batman books, you will enjoy this story, but if you cannot get past the point of some villains from Batman mythos being heroes, now then it might not be for you.
