The Dynamic Duo and the Man of Steel are entering their final battle with the 6th dimensional Imp Killer, but Batman has been turned into a puppet! Bat-Mite and Mr. Mxyzptlk have to step up and gather some additional help, or things will end poorly. But who will wind up sacrificing themselves to stop this threat? Batman/Superman: Worldās Finest #29 is written by Mark Waid, drawn by Dan Mora, colored by Tamra Bonvillain and lettered by Steve Wands.
Batman reveals exactly why he has gotten himself locked up in Arkham under an assumed name, while Dr. Crane focuses in on him. Harley Quinn makes a sale. Riddler gives Bruce a puzzle. And Barbara Gordon runs into the FBI. All this and more in Batman ā89: Echoes #3, written by Sam Hamm, drawn by Joe Quinones, colored by Leonardo Ito and lettered by Carlos M. Mangual.
Once upon a time, a boy named Jason Todd became Robin the Boy Wonder and died, killed by the Joker. But what would Batmanās life have been like, and Jasonās for that matter, if he had survived the explosion? Find out in From the DC Vault: Death In the Family ā Robin Lives #1, written by J.M. DeMatteis, drawn by Rick Leonardi, colored by Rico Renzi and lettered by Taylor Esposito.
Matt Lazorwitz: So, we now have some details about the Absolute Universe, and I have to say, I am ā¦ a bit more worried now. Snyder used the description of āmore badass,ā and that has a real worst-of-the-ā90s vibe to it.
Will Nevin: Our current iteration of Batman has spent the better part of a year fighting a robot version of himself ā is that not ābadassā enough? Really, this didnāt need to be any more complicated than a relaunch/retelling/reimagining of the earliest stories with modern storytelling techniques ā¦ like a certain Batman and Robin: Year One we just heard about.
And even though that will ruin a nice segue into āWorldās Finest,ā how about the Detective Comics news: Tom Taylor and Mikel Janin are coming on to the book. Thatās some team right there.
Matt: Janin has been a favorite of mine since his work on Grayson, and so seeing him back on a premiere Bat book is great news. Weāve talked about Taylor on the podcast, and as long as we get more of the Tom Taylor weāve been getting in Nightwing, and less of the one from Superman: Son of Kal-El? Iām good with that. Thereās a Dr. Taylor and Mr. Hyde thing I could come up with if I werenāt sleep deprived.
Will: Tom Taylor of Injustice and Batman Annual fame aināt so bad either. Will it be transformative like Ram Vās run? Nah, probably not. But Iām willing to bet weāll get some solid-to-good-to-great comics out of it.
Worldās Finest
Matt: And we wrap this arc pretty close to as we predicted, with Bat-Mite being the hero of the day. It gives the little guy a nice last hurrah, and he and Batman have a really nice moment at the end.
Will: Did you ever think Bat-Mite would get a touching eulogy only to undercut himself moments later? Well ā¦ the second half of that was pretty predictable, sure. But, yeah, this was a nice wrapup to an arc that probably needed an issue or two less. Though if decompression is the biggest complaint with this book ā itās still beautiful, it still has a ton of heart and Waid is still great in what is turning out to be his second (third? fourth?) act with DC ā we donāt have much to complain about.
Matt: Not in the least. If any character gets to undercut his eulogy, itās a fifth-dimensional imp.
Every time I think Dan Mora canāt impress me more, or in a different way, he does. The body horror of the Imp Killer, this thing that looks like Mojo from over in the X-Men line, has gotten grosser and grosser as the arc has progressed. And the little glimpses of our heroesā past, present and future as the dimensions were peeled away from it made for a cool visual. And again, credit to Waid for having set that up earlier with the imp-powered Parasite doing it; foreshadowing IS your gateway to good storytelling.
Will: Those wee little glimpses were so interesting. Congratulations, Supes fans ā youāre getting one hell of an artist.
Matt: Do you think that means this book ends with the next arc? Waid off to do Batman & Robin: Year One and Mora to Superman? Iāll miss it, but good on Mora for moving up the ladder, and Waid and Samnee are unbeatable together.
Oh, on another note: In the same way I can never get enough of someone punching Riddler for being an arrogant jerk, I love seeing people trick Mxy into saying his name backwards. Again, Waid has been setting that up from the start. Great touch.
Will: Iāve been prepared for this book (and Waidās DC run) to end almost as soon as it began, and yet it has persisted. I think youāre right, though ā with the team splitting up, it might be the time to wrap this up. And, really, you could do worse than closing this out with a Trinity arc.
Echoes
Matt: I really wish I had reread issue #2 before I went into this one, because I was pretty lost here. It has been nearly four months since the last issue came out. That is a long damn time for a book that feels like it is moving at a glacial pace.
Will: Not only is it slow moving, but this is a plots-within-plots kinda book when it comes to the number of characters we have and what theyāre trying to do. At least in this issue Bruce exposition-dumped it all out for us. Gotta say, this series was much better when it was focused on the tragedy of one character (Harvey Dent in the first miniseries) rather than the intricate machinations of three or four people who continue to look suspiciously like Hollywood stars of the late ā80s and early ā90s.
Matt: Do you remember any of this talk about Hugo Strange? I think there might have been one sentence in the earlier issues, and now that plot is coming on hard here.
I believe I said this in the columns for the first series, and I know I said it on the podcast when we talked about the first series, but Hamm writes this comic series like a screenplay, and they are not the same medium. It might work if this was being done as an all-in-one graphic novel, but releasing a series of single issues with all these machinations and having it happen as slowly as it is, and as obliquely, I feel would be a slight problem if this was coming out monthly. At quarterly itās making it very difficult.
At this point, we have Scarecrow using Hugo Strangeās patients for his own nefarious ends, Harley Quinn just looking to make a name for herself and Riddler up to ā¦ something. Thatās a lot even if there wasnāt also Batman, and Robin, and Barbara Gordon. Thatās a big cast.
Will: And each one of them is in a side plot, and weāre snowed under with constant developments for all of them. Matt, I donāt care that Babs is under investigation. I well and truly donāt.
Matt: I might care more if I felt like we had gotten much of anything with her for the past couple issues, but it feels like an F plot. The fact that weāre getting so little of Drake as Robin is a crime; heās the best character from the first volume outside of Harvey Dent, and heās just there in this issue so Bruce can talk at him. A shame.
Buy Batman ’89: Echoes #3 here.
Robin Lives
Will: Is Batmanās response to a traumatized Jason Todd to ask a ponderously boring 18-year-old specialist for help, or did I misread something? I had to misread that, right? JK, the lettering is a bit rough, and I see now itās 28 ā¦ but the narrator here still sucks out loud.
Matt: This is so, so, SO over-narrated. I enjoy a comic where I can sink my teeth into it and really read it, but not at the expense of the narrative in general. I have hope that this book will pick up, as this first issue had a lot of house cleaning to do. It had to take care of the weird āJoker is ambassador from Iranā plot, and set the stakes, but itās going to have to do a lot to get past the hurdle of a first issue like this.
Will: Weāre eventually setting up Jason for Jokerās murder, which is not a bad plot in and of itself (although it seems pretty clearly like that would be a Joker plan to once again take away/corrupt a Robin), but youāre right in that the series is going to have to overcome this rough opener. At least the story beats are sound so far? Thatās the best Iāve got for what was a disappointment. Itās also a shame the art couldnāt have been a better fit for the historical era.
Matt: The thing is, Leonardi was an artist who was contemporary to the era, just one who was working at Marvel. The physical comic was published on paper stock with no gloss, so it felt closer to the paper stock of the comics coming out at the time, which felt like a nice touch, but a lot of the art here was garbled. I am not a fan of Leonardiās wild-haired and eyed Joker; he just doesnāt look right.
But I agree, the beats are sound. We have Batman dealing with Jason, and not really able to. We have Jason acting out. These make sense.
And I wouldnāt put my money on it being Jason who kills Joker just yet. I am expecting a swerve on that before we get to the end.
Will: Oh, I would be absolutely shocked if Joker is *actually* dead. My money is on him orchestrating the whole thing. As a random question, did you make anything of the āFrom the Vaultā branding? To me, itās sort of muddying the idea of whether this is a new book or something they pulled from cold storage.
Matt: The branding is a silly little nod to the pseudo-reprint we got of the original ending, sure. I donāt think it is confusing necessarily, but muddying is definitely a term I could see.
See I think Joker is dead, but I either think it is self-inflicted to turn Bruce against Jason, or Bruce finally breaks the One Rule to keep Jason from doing it. Not something I would like in the main universe, but something that could be interesting to explore in a side universe.
Will: Bruce sacrificing the One Rule to help Jason? Now thereās an interesting twist.
Matt: DeMatteis has written a lot of great stories over his 40-year career, and a lot of them lean heavily into darker ends of the psyche, so I think he could definitely go down that route. If this were a lesser writer, I might be closer to writing this off after this issue, but from the guy who wrote āGoing Saneā and āKravenās Last Huntā? He has earned the benefit of the doubt, for sure.
Bat-miscellany
- This weekās BatChat podcast features three random books from Willās bookshelf, including the first volume of Batman ā66.
Disclaimer: As an Amazon Associate, ComicsXF may earn from qualifying purchases.
Matt Lazorwitz read his first comic at the age of 5. It was Who's Who in the DC Universe #2, featuring characters whose names begin with B, which explains so much about his Batman obsession. He writes about comics he loves, and co-hosts the podcasts BatChat with Matt & Will and The ComicsXF Interview Podcast.
Will Nevin loves bourbon and AP style and gets paid to teach one of those things. He is on Twitter far too often.
