Friday, March 25, 2016

Batman #50

   I hate to beat up on our old friend Batman on the same weekend when his feature film, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is getting mugged by reviewers, but man, was this issue a letdown.

   For the 50th issue special, we have the wrap-up of the storyline that has had Commissioner Gordon filling in as Batman while the Dark Knight has been missing (recovering from a nearly-fatal battle with the Joker).

   The story has introduced a new villain, Bloom, a monster who's part plant and part computer, able to control machines, transform people into monsters (and control them), alter his form, send out spikes that can cut through anything - in other words, he's a living Calvinball (he can apparently do anything he can imagine).

   But the real focus here is the return of Bruce (Batman) Wayne to action - or so you'd expect. Instead, he really doesn't do much other than debuting his new costume (it's a nice enough design, though I'm surprised they didn't follow the movie's template - or the video game).

   Oh, there are a few action sequences, but the story is just kind of a mess - it's been slogging on for far too long, with too many characters and subplots to manage, and the villain doesn't really make sense - and the solution to the problem makes even less sense.

   It's great to have the real Batman back, but that's about the only real takeaway here.

    (Oh, and I hope to catch the new movie in the next few days - a review will follow posthaste.)

Grade: B-

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