BATMAN #692

Life After Death, Part 1:  The Awakening

Late December 2009

Written by Tony S. Daniel

Pencils by Tony S. Daniel

Inks by Sandu Florea

Cover by Tony S. Daniel

Synopsis

The gang of False Faces, people who have been brainwashed to work for Black Mask, usually don’t talk, but when Batman interrogates one, he gets a series of numbers that turn out to be coordinates for Devil’s Square.  There, he finds more False Faces, killed in an ambush, as well as a red pill and a Fedora.  Batman takes a mask of the False Face to learn more.  Two days later, Batman asks Selina Kyle (aka Catwoman) to help locate Black Mask.  She agrees, for a price.  Elsewhere, Dr. Strange, Fright, and Black Mask discuss the next step of their brainwashing plan.  Meanwhile, Catwoman points Batman to a large estate where she noticed men with guns and fedoras.  Batman investigates and discovers the place is occupied by Mario Falcone.  At Devil’s Square, Black Mask brainwashes Dr. Gruener (aka The Reaper).

Review by Binkley (e-mail)

This issue started rough and ended rough.  The middle was a little better, but it still was not the smoothest of reading experiences.  Essentially, as I was reading I just had this feeling that there was something I was missing.  I am willing to believe to believes some it may be due to the long time between reading this and Battle For The Cowl (plus I have fallen waaaay behind reading), but some of it has to do with Daniel’s choppy writing settle (which matches his choppy art).  To begin with, I had no idea who the False Faces were, what they were supposed to be doing, or why Batman was chasing them.  It felt like I was dropped into the middle of the story.  To his credit, Daniel somewhat clarifies the situation without the need for a “previously” part of the issue, but at the same time, I am still not sure what the False Faces are doing, other than being connected to Black Mask. After the opening section, the issue gets better with a nice conversation between Grayson and Gordon, with the latter’s “Batman never asks” comment showing he recognizes there is someone new, but also accepting the new Batman’s help.  Next, I am little put off by the Catwoman section, not so much the dialogue and interaction, in which I though Daniel handled their relationship well, but just the fact that Grayson needs to ask for help.  While it does show the difference between Bruce and Dick, it also shows Batman to be weak or at the very least unable to handled things alone.  But that may just be me.  The sequence with the villains was a (pardon the pun) strange reading experience because (again) Daniel doesn’t bother to try to explain what the hell is going on.  He dumps us into the story, which is fine providing you can use dialogue or pictures to provide exposition to explain what is going on, neither of which Daniel does well.  The last two sections are essentially exposition to explain the arrival of two old characters, Mario Falcone from the Long Halloween and the Reaper from Batman comics about 40 years ago.  The first worked for me because I have read that story so I knew what was happening; the second didn’t because I had no idea who the Reaper was or why his resurrection was so meaningful.  I had to be a broken record, but I felt like I was reading a story in which I missed parts.  What Daniel provided is pretty decent, but it would’ve been better if I had gotten the whole story.

As for Daniel’s art, I point you to page 15.  On the first panel we see Batman attacking four of Falcone’s men, with him knocking all of them down the ground.  The next panel we see a close-up of Mario.  Then we see Batman on the ground, hurt.  So, how did Dick get hurt?  Did one of the gunmen shoot him?  The smoke in that third panel comes from someone's cigarette, not the gun.  As I said earlier, choppy.  It always seems like Daniel’s art skips panels, showing one and three, but forgetting two.  Or (like on page 18) getting too close-up to make sense of the images.  What is the deal with the clock?  Is that where the money is being held.  Maybe, but we don’t see it.  We see Selina stop the clock, but the next panel shows a close-up of her followed by a picture inside the vault looking out.  It could be any vault, not necessarily one with a clock face.  Again, very choppy. 

Comic Connection

The pre-crisis Reaper (Dr. Gruener, a German Jew who is in a concentration camp) first appeared in Batman #237 (Dec. 1971). 

The post-crisis Reaper first appeared the “Batman: Year Two” story, in Detective Comics #575 (June 1987).  The events of Zero Hour wiped away the character. 

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