Forever Evil: Arkham War #4 Review and *SPOILERS*

Written By: Peter J. Tomasi
Art By: Scot Eaton
Cover Price: $2.99
Release Date: January 8, 2014

The Deadly Duo

Alright so this is a really late review, and not to mention I still have to get issue #5 up, and the entire Forever Evil: Argus run.  Man I hate running behind.  But I'll get caught up eventually, I've just been having some Jim Lee moments.  Okay so last time
in Arkham War we saw that the crazies of Gotham aren't afraid of Bane, which causes our local powerhouse to become his own Batman, and try to put the fear into people the way he used to.  That issue culminates in Bane beating Killer Croc almost to death, and then throwing him off Wayne Tower, so who knows he might have died, but I won't count him out just yet.  So I'll drop you right into this war that's already in progress.

Explain It!:

This issue begins with Bane awakening the only Talon he has left, since the Scarecrow and the other Arkham nut jobs stole the rest.  But this isn't any ordinary Talon, this is William Cobb the grandfather of Dick Grayson.  Cobb agrees to help Bane since they both want the same thing.  To free the Talons.  So off into the night the deadly duo strike fear into the hearts of Gotham's criminals.  Imagine if this was a Elseworld, this would be fun as hell.  

First they interrupt a fight between Bane's Blackgate crew, and some of the more famous inmates of Arkham Asylum.  The big fight in this huge brawl is between Reaper and Firefly, and if it wasn't for Sumo jumping in, Reaper would of claimed another victim.  I wonder if this is the Joe Chill Jr. version.  Man I hope not, just go back to it being Caspian and all will be well. Reboots are so confusing.  Even though Bane and Talon can take out all the crazies, all Bane wanted was to get information out of Zsasz, so once they have him, they just let the fight rage on.

I'm going to take a minute here to tell you something that is great about this issue.  During all this chaos we take a moment to see Bane being full on Batman.  A local hood is terrorizing people just trying to survive, and Bane swoops in and takes the scumbag out.  He tells these people to tell the other scavengers to go to Bane Tower, (Wayne Tower, now that Croc isn't hold up there) there they will be safe and provided for.  That was my minute, take it or leave it.  But I'm having a good time.

While Bane's beating the ever loving crap out of Zsasz, for the location of the other Talons, we're given a little exposition.  We find out that once Bane get's the Talons and takes over Gotham, he's going to turn over the city to the Court of Owls.  In return he expects them to give him an army of Talons, then he'll jack all them up with venom, and take them to what lies beyond.  That's a little vague, but that's all we get for now.  In the end we take a trip down into the sewers where Scarecrow, and Mr. Freeze are hooking the waking Talons up with some fear gas, and Hatter mind control tech so they're in a less murdery frame of mind when they wake up.  Well less murdery towards the Arkhamites, because they unleash the Talons and it looks like murder is on the menu.

Bits and Pieces:

Now I'm doing this review pretty late in the game, and I wish I hadn't because this is a really good issue.  I'm digging the Arkham War aspect of the book of course, but Bane's slide into Batman's shoes is so much fun.  The whole draw of this book is to see all the big baddies at once, and duking it out, but the Talon subplot is really interesting to me, and I hope it leads to a resurgence of the Court of the Owls.  Can't wait to read the next issue.

8.5/10