BATMAN #702
What did the
iFanboy
community think?
Pulls
Art and cover by TONY DANIEL
Size: 32 pages
Price: 2.99
Okay I’m going to get this out of the way so I don’t get so hung up on it. I’m sorry that I don’t like filler stories the majority of the time in comics. While you can certainly do a filler issue well, and trust me I’ve read great filler over the years, sometimes you just don’t want that in your comics. You want a story to matter and not feel like it’s just padding for the next story. That’s my big problem with this two issue arc by Morrison, there seems to be no relevance to this story. It just feels like he’s stalling for time.
For me, I don’t want to see Bruce relive RIP and Final Crisis again. (For what, like the 2nd or 3rd time?) The only way I would want to see it if Morrison gives us some huge, and I mean HUGE, revelation about the time we missed. Sadly, that’s not at all what we get in this issue. Basically it feels like Morrison is just recapping to the readers about what exactly happened to Bruce before disappearing. Once again we relive him getting captured, once again we see him foiling Darkseid, once again we see him shooting Darkseid, so on and so on. Other then getting a better narration of the events by Bruce, Morrison brings absolutely nothing interesting to this issue. In general the writing feels stiff when Bruce talks, like when he talks about the God Bullet with Wally. That entire page felt really off and if it isn’t just rehashing word balloons from other stories then we get the same problems through out the issue.
But the biggest kick to the teeth is Tony Daniel’s artwork. Wow! Just what the hell happened to him in a few short years? I remember raving about the man when RIP first came out and I loved his style at the time. Now, it looks like Daniel has taking a time machine back to the 90s and studied with Rob Liefeld. There are so many problems with this issue it’s really hard to address all the complaints. Mainly the sketchy look is not a pleasant sight and some of the pages looks really unfinished. Maybe Daniel’s shouldn’t ink himself because the inking is also an issue and makes the sketchyness (word?) look worse. Gone are the bright, vibrant pages of Daniel of old; and in comes the muddy and static pages of today. It was really hard to get through this issue alone with the so-so writing, but Daniel’s choppy artwork really hit the nail in the coffin for me.
I don’t know what is up with Grant Morrison lately. Pile it on with the seriously awful ‘Return of Bruce Wayne #4’ from last month, and I’m starting to worry about the guy. Morrison doing anything Batman related should be golden and as of right now it feels like the Return of Bruce Wayne is starting to crash and burn. (Luckily ‘Batman and Robin’ is still fantastic) If anything this issue makes me realize that Grant Morrison is human and filler issues still bug me to death…..that and Tony Daniels is a shit artist now.
Art: 1 - Poor
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I wouldn’t say this issue is filler. In this issue we learn of the hyper-adapter.When he unleashes it it looks like the thing he fought in RoBW #2. My guess is that this creature is actually Doctor Hurt. A monster that follows bruce wayne through time making his life a living hell.
I suggest you go reread the issue, because it sounds like you really didn’t understand it. A lot of it is spelt out for you, so give it another whirl and you’ll like it.
@Magnus/djd: After reading those articles and the issue again; I am a bit more clear on what went down here. (Trust me I had a huge argument over it last night) But at the end of the day, even though I like how Morrison writes, this was written in a way where (I felt) it was too confusing to understand.
Maybe I understand the somewhat importance this issue brings…..But as a whole I just find it to be a bit of a mess.
Here’s the thing that makes this review kinda nonsensical: this isn’t filler. Just because something doesn’t move along a story doesn’t mean that it’s filler. It can be a many number of other things. It can be a character piece that gives said character more depth in terms of the story as a whole. That’s what this is. Yes, we have a good idea of what happend to Bruce in between RIP and Final Crisis, but that’s all we have: a good idea. It’s a story that’s full of holes, assumptions and ambiguity. Naturally, Morrison is a great storyteller, so he mentioned that he had always intended to fill in those holes, which is what this is.
Also, Bruce’s telling of the events from his POV gives us something that we haven’t had before in regards to this story: a nice and streamlined chain of events. Now, one who would want to read the Batman opus as a whole won’t have to cherry pick though Final Crisis, a story that didn’t revolve around a major plot point of the opus but instead just featured it. Readers who have no interest in Final Crisis can now just read these two issues that focus on Bruce in Final Crisis instead of the entire story that doesn’t necessarily focus on him.
You know the saying, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder". You think this is filler because you read FC. But if someone didn’t read it or doesn’t want to, these two issues are probably the most important things to them. That’s why these are the complete opposite of filler.