......Silent Army of The Pit
Written By: Tom King
Art By: Joelle Jones, Jordie Bellaire, Clayton Cowles
Cover Price: $2.99
Release Date: November 1, 2017
*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*
In our previous issue we saw Batman and Catwoman kill a horse........ also, we saw them enter a forbidden land, which supposedly means death for anyone...... and inside this land we found Talia Al Ghul...... spending her time having orgies. Really though, the most interesting part of last issue was the Robins finding out about Bruce's marriage proposal so hopefully we get more of that because the rest just seemed to be underwritten, extended nonsense. Let's jump into this issue and see if that changes or not. Let's check it out.
Explain It!:
Our issue begins with Batman and Catwoman fighting the Silent Army of the Pit, which for some reason means that Talia Al Ghul is involved and I was left wondering during this whole fight what happened to Tiger and how the person who informs Talia about Batman and Catwoman being in the city knew that they were to be married......... Yeah, a lot of stuff just happens here and people know things for no real reason, but eventually we find out that Talia has sent out these soldiers to simply tire our heroes out so that she could come out and challenge Batman to a sword fight. It seems that even though no one is supposed to be allowed to enter this place that Batman is actually here to find Holly Robinson, who Catwoman took the blame for when she murdered 237 people.
In the end, Batman is allowed to go search for Holly, even though she shouldn't be allowed in here, but really, since we know nothing about this place, who knows what the rules are and Catwoman is left to fight Talia. During this issue though, we did have a brief moment where we did see that Superman was keeping Damian and Dick out of the cave entrance to this land........... so they'll just wait for Batman to come out......... and besides for seeing some love between Damian and Dick...... that's all we got of that.
That's it for this issue of Batman and like we've been getting for awhile now, this issue continues the trend where it takes pages for a single conversation to take place as everything is extended to make sure we get as little as possible per issue and while we could be using that panel/page time to understand what's going on with this place and the people who live there, we're completely left in the dark about it so that we can have Batman and Catwoman argue about what "a lot is". This could be a really interesting story, but because I don't know the rules of this place or why anyone is here in the first place it all just come off as a bunch of nonsense to give us a fight between Catwoman and Talia. The art in this issue is decent enough, but Catwoman's face comes off odd every now and again and some things seem rushed at times.
Bits and Pieces:
Dialog is repeated and scenes are extended for no real reason......... which if you've been reading Batman for a bit now, you're probably used to it and if you don't mind this, you might actually enjoy this issue, but overall, even with the art being decent, I find this story to be a whole lot of nothing with cheesy dialog just so we could get to the cliffhanger.
5/10
I've about lost my patience for Batman at this point. . .and you're talking to a guy with a working light up replica bat-phone in his mancave. It takes a LOT for me to take Batman off my pull. The last time it happened was when I couldn't put up with Grant Morrison for ONE MORE GODDAMN ISSUE. This issue gives me the same "This shit better improve soon" feeling that I got during Morrison's Black Glove madness.
ReplyDeleteThe biggest question left unanswered this issue is of course "how many horses did Damien kill crossing the desert?"
ReplyDeleteI feel like King missed a golden opportunity to repeat a scene. Just like Simon is saying he should have had dick and Damian crossing the desert on horseback. Dick telling Damian to slow down don’t push the horse so much. Damian over heats the horse. Dick rides up to Damian and his horse. Damian is crying again. Dick says here you go this is pistol that the joker used on Barbra use this to finish the job. Then Damian pistol whips the horse to death over two pages with nine panel grid with the focus on the pistol going up and down blood flying everywhere. Afterword Damian hands the pistol back to Dick. Who says there is that smile you are known for. The panel focus then turns on Damian who has a creepy ass joker like smile.
ReplyDeleteNot good, but sadly not the worst Batman comic I read this week...
ReplyDeleteWe're not being "left in the dark." I prefer to look at it as we are not being blasted with lots of inane detail about stuff that doesn't even matter. Why do we need to be bothered with how a network of super spies/ninjas/assassins knows whether two people are getting married? The Holly Robinson stuff is being played out as some sort of redemption arc for Selina, and she escaped to Khandaq for some reason following the "Rooftops" story arc - a reason we're obviously going to get more about in the coming issues. It's not the best issue of Batman, but there's some great art, a redemption story wrapped in a love story that is being played out, and some sword play. And some goofily out of place bro bonding time between Dick and Damian in the middle of a desert - outside the "place" where Damian's dad, mom, and soon-to-be step mom are battling it out with swords. See, a change in perspective turns this issue from being full of nitpicks to full of little wonders.
ReplyDeleteSo as long as I describe a turd using complimentary words it could be delicious..... Gotcha.
Deletei have a big wonder...how you can enjoy this! I don't understand how Tom King gets such a pass when he gives readers a bare bones story that they have to fill in the blanks. Plus, repeating "I love you Bat" and "I love you Cat" does not a love story make. Don't be fooled by the wow factor moments that keep getting jammed together without any connective tissue...he is treating readers like simpletons who are distracted by shiny objects while he laughs at them. Batman fans deserve better than this smoke and mirrors writing.
DeleteAnd a redemption story? We already know that Holly Robinson killed all those people. This is just to clear Selina's name with the police.
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