Detective Comics #969 Review

The Real Victim

Written by: James Tynion IV
Art by: Joe Bennett, Sal Regla, Jason Wright and Sal Cipriano
Cover Price: $2.99
Release Date: November 22, 2017

I really was excited to get Tim Drake back, but I have to say, the actual event was...well, uneventful.  I am wondering if we are going to get back to the warning of what Batwoman was going to do to ruin everything and also want to see the eventual reunion of Tim and Stephanie Brown.  Do we get any of that this week?  Let's see...

The issue opens with new Mayor Akins taking questions about Batman and what's going on in Gotham.  It actually feels like a lot of nothing, but at least we kind of know that he won't be shutting down the Dark Knight anytime soon...he's just not keen on having the Detective Squad running around.

We then go to Arkham where Steph is visiting with Lonnie and he continues his talk of "Power to the People", but when he mentions the First Victim, she gets up to leave.  Before leaving, however, he gives her an address and then she runs into Clayface...for some reason.

We continue on with what I've been waiting for...Tim goes to tell Steph that he is alive.  I really want to say this scene gave me the feels, but it didn't.  I tried to figure out why and I really can't say it's just one thing, but a bunch.  Again, we've known for a year that Tim was alive, the odd choice to have Tim make jokes when Steph opened her door and the fact we don't even see him for a page may not even be all that's at work here, but...no feels.  The scene ends with Tim welcoming Steph back to the Detective Squad and even that felt forced after what we've been getting for twelve months.

We then get to the good part of the book.  Killer Moth has called a meeting of the Rogue Gallery underlings to unveil his own Society.  It's a pretty cool setup that could have led to some fun, but it all ends too fast.  While this is going down, Tim and Kate are watching from the skyline, but are talking about other things...like Tim becoming Batman.  Yea, it seems that instead of listening to what the Tim of Tomorrow told him to do, he is going to try to change things by accepting them on his terms.  Of course, this is against what Steph thinks is going on and is bound to cause problems in the near future.  The meeting ends with a switcharoo and the victory of the Detective Squad once again.

The issue ends with Batman and the new Mayor butting heads about the Detective Squad and Lonnie joining forces with the Victim Syndicate.  Yea, the First Victim and his crew are reading to cause trouble once again.

This issue was okay.  We did get Tim and Steph back together, but it all felt like an odd info dump to setup the story going forward.  I was hoping for the feels, but instead, I was kind of bored with all this.  It's probably because the big bads, Anarchy and the Victim Syndicate, are hardly fan favorite villains in this run of Detective Comics.  I think this book needs to change things up a bit because it's getting a bit stale.  Joe Bennett's art is good, but it's not up to par with what we've been getting recently from Alvaro Martinez.

Bits and Pieces:

This issue has a moment that everyone's been waiting for, but it fell flat and I think this book needs a change.  The return of a very uninteresting set of villains doesn't help matters and overall, this issue was just boring.

6.0/10