The Past Is Prologue
Release Date: August 10, 2021
Spinning out of the pages The Next Batman: Second Son we have Jace Fox in his own ongoing, exploring his past, his present, and his future as Batman. Let's jump into this issue and see what Jace will do now that he has found a secret armory in Foxtech, where his father, Lucius Fox used to design armor and weapons for Batman..... but if you've read the title...... or Future State, I'm pretty sure you already know what Jace will be up to going forward. Let's check it out as we explore more of Jace's past and his supporting characters.
This is a weird #0 issue since it picks up directly after the digital-first chapter 12 of The Next Batman: Second Son and does little to catch people up on that series before just throwing you into Jace's past where you'll see that Katana was one of the people who trained Jace Fox and was there when he decided to change his name from Tim to Jace but beyond that Jace continues his quest to take down his Second Son nemesis, Arkadine, who appears to be working behind the scenes, like so many others we've seen post-Future State, for Simon Saint to get Magistrate shit going full force sooner, rather than later.
It's not a bad way to get Jace Fox involved with what's going on with the rest of Gotham, especially since this connection felt out of nowhere, but in a good way..... that is, if you read the Digital First series that set all of this up. Really though, that's the biggest problem overall. This feels like a collected version of the end of Second Son with a first issue slapped on it and it doesn't play well as the start of a series but it works well with what I read before and I dig the continuation.
All in all, the art was so-so in this issue. I mean, it feels like Digital First art where if you're not looking at a closeup shot of a character everyone looks like they're missing facial features...... but even with that, I didn't mind what I was looking at and enjoyed the continuation of Second Son and the progression of Jace Fox becoming the Next Batman and seeing how his previous mission intersects with The Magistrate. It's just not a very good first issue to a series and I feel like people who pick this up because it is a #0 are going to feel very lost with what we're given here.
Bits and Pieces:
While this is a great continuation of Second Son...... and just actually feels like the rest of those chapters are thrown together for an issue, it's not a very good jumping-on-point for new readers who want to learn what's up with Jace Fox, The Next Batman. The art was so-so in my mind but not something that was too bad but like the story, the art just felt like the Digital First title too... I'm just thankful I liked what we had before and I liked what we have going on here....... a terrible first issue though.
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