Batman and Robin #6:
Summary: This issue opens with Robin(Damian Wayne) pulling the trigger to kill the trafficker(!). Didn't see THAT one coming... It turns out the gun was empty, and that Nobody was just testing Damian to see how committed he was to Nobody's cause. Now confident that Damian had truly left Batman, Nobody takes Damian to his hidden lair so Nobody could get information about the trafficker's network. Meanwhile, Batman is racing around Gotham trying to find a trace of Damian while having a flashback to the first time he met Nobody(in the grand scheme of things, it's not that interesting, so I'm just gonna ignore it... Suffice to say, Nobody met Bruce Wayne while he was training to become Batman, and the two became enemies). After getting the trafficker to spill his guts, Nobody decides to toss the trafficker into a vat of acid, thus eliminating that bothersome evidence. Damian doesn't want to see that, and decides to activate his homing beacon, since he had discovered Nobody's lair and proven that he was more useful than Batman thought(oh yeah, and he only pulled the trigger earlier on because he knew the gun was empty due to it's weight or something). Bats gets the signal and begins speeding towards Nobody's hideout. Pissed by Damian's betrayal, Nobody manages to beat the hell out of Damian, while taunting Batman over Damian's communicator, ending this one.
Thoughts: Don't you just love misleading covers? Misleading cover aside, this was a damn good comic book. It was a bit bogged down in the middle, what with the Nobody origin story, but the stuff set in the present was really good. I liked Damian's reason for joining up with Nobody, as it fits with his whole MO of trying to gain his father's approval. I also liked that Nobody beat Damian up WHILE making sure Bruce could hear the whole thing, as it gives us a reason to really despise Nobody, and want to see Bruce catch up to and beat the hell out of him. I have to say, I'm definitely looking forward to the next issue of this series.
Score: 8 out of 10.
“Yaggh”? “Rragh”? That's some inspired dialogue there!
The best part of the ending for me is the fact that it gave me flashbacks to Bruce racing to save Jason, but it also made me think of Bruce and Tim trying to get there in time to save Jack Drake, neither of which ended too well for the parties involved. Of course he WILL save Damian but the tension there was great.
ReplyDeleteyou know the whole time i was reading this review i kept forgetting that nobody was an actual character so i kept reading sentences and having to stop for a minute each time to go over it until i remembered.
ReplyDeleteYeah, the Jason comparison was REALLY obvious here, JT. The cover for the next issue is even a play on it I think(or at least that's what I kind of recall seeing...). But I must say, this was a surprisingly good read! Way better than I'd have expected from a Monday comic.
ReplyDeleteHA! I didn't even think about that until I glanced back at the review... I mean yeah, a line like "Nobody takes Damian to his hidden lair" doesn't make a whole lot of sense in retrospect...
I'm really loving this series, its been a bit of a break-out star from the DC reboot for me. This issue especially as it highlights and fleshes out Damien's character brilliantly, showing that although he is a willing killer and tough, he's also a young, vulnerable boy who just wants his father's approval.
ReplyDeleteExactly, B-Guymer. The fact that Damian's entire plan here was to try to prove himself to Bruce made this storyline THAT much better to me. It totally fits with his character, as he's always been trying to impress Bruce, even when he first came around and was killing criminals because he thought that was the best way to help Bruce. And the ending took Nobody and turned him from a villian-of-the-month type of guy and turned him into a character that I now REALLY want to see catch a beating from Bruce.
ReplyDeleteI've been disappointed with the last few issues of this series, but this issue ROCKED! I thought Tomasi did a brilliant job paralleling the rage Bruce felt towards Nobody in the flashback with the rage he felt in the present. It actually makes me believe Bruce could actually kill him (even though I know he won't), which just goes to show the excellent character work Tomasi does here. For the first time with this series, I can't wait for the next issue!
ReplyDeleteTotally agreed, JW. I wasn't feeling this series at all coming into this issue. It was okay for the most part, but it wasn't a comic that I'd go out of my way to read. Now? After this issue? I can't wait to read issue #7! Nobody went from... well, a nobody, to a major villain over the course of a few pages. So yeah, kudos to Tomasi for busting out a really good story here.
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