DCU Comic Book Reviews

BIRDS OF PREY #103

Blood & Circuits:  Part Four.  Truth Or Dare

April 2007

Written by Gail Simone

Pencils by Nicola Scott

Inks by Doug Hazelwood

Cover by Stephane Roux

Synopsis

In Mexico, Kate Spencer (aka Manhunter) is doing her best to free the prisoners of Desanda Prison.  It seems the Mexican government has been kidnapping meta-humans and then suppressing their powers and selling them to foreign countries.  Manhunter used Oracles mission to free a Mafioso’s daughter for her own mission with the D.E.O.  Elsewhere, Huntress and the rest are trying to find a way out after escaping the clutches of Spy Smasher’s agents.  In the melee, Mafia leader “Shark” Brennan was killed, but his daughter Tabitha got away.  Huntress finds the girl and realizes Tabitha killed her own father so she could take over the Mafia in her dad’s place.  Later, Spy Smasher calls Oracle and tells Babs that she will arrest her father unless Babs agrees to do whatever Spy Smasher tells her.  Babs agrees.

Review by Binkley (e-mail)

In the current four-part story, there are three plots, all of which get resolved or concluded in some fashion.  Yet, I am hesitant, really, to call this the end.  It feels more like the beginning of an era in which Babs has to take orders from Katarina.  Even the freedom given to the meta-humans or Tabitha’s promotion feel like beginning for these characters, even though we won’t be seeing them anytime soon.  I like that.  The story and the characters feel organic to me, like there is more to the story than just the story.  Obviously, we will see more of the feud between Babs and Katarina, which is why it is more of a beginning than anything else. 

The ending to this issue surprised me.  I was not expecting Babs to lose the war.  I fully expected that it would be a stalemate with both of them backing away from each other, unwilling to throw the first punch, but fully expecting the other to throw it.  Even though it surprised me, after a few minutes I realized how interesting things are going to get in the next couple of minutes.  It would be easy to keep the battle a standstill.  With one get the upper hand on the other, the potential story ideas increase vastly.  Things are going to get interesting.  For the first time Babs is going to be at the mercy of someone else, forced to conduct missions that someone else choose, perhaps even against her will.  And, based on the preview, it looks as if Katrina will be tackling Babs’ computer set-up in a very literal sense.  I am hoping that Babs is backing down now to set up Katarina later, but we will see. 

Manhunter’s rogue assignment for the D.E.O. was handled well by Simone and I think was true to Kate’s character (and for Director Bones as well) from beginning to end.  The moment it was revealed that Kate was playing was Babs, I had to smile.  It was just so perfect and made sense.  Even the comment about the mask (going back to the Villains United Special that Simone) wrote was also a great dig at Oracle.  Kate takes nothing from anybody and this just proved it.

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