“How worse could it get?”

That’s what I said on Monday when this week’s books were published. You know what? Never say that in any circumstance, ever. Cause you never know just how worse it can get. Case in point this issue of Batman and Robin. Now the last issue wasn’t bad per say, it was just painfully average. Now wither a new artist to finish the arc I just have one thought in mind: ‘How long until September?’

The story was just so mind numbingly average with this issue it was annoying me. I still have yet to see why Winick is so ‘great’ with Jason Todd or Batman in general. All this issue shows is that, surprise surprise, Todd knows when someone is tricking him after training with Bruce. What a revelation! I would’ve never figured that out in any other circumstances! Then you have Winick’s take on Dick and Damien’s relationship and it feels nothing like I’ve read before. It’s like Winick read the first three issues of Morrison’s run and didn’t see how the two has grown to be like brothers. Sure Damien is still a tough S.O.B., but everything Winick wrote for Damien is just generic tough guy talk. Finally, with little to no explaination on these hybrid hitmen and a contradiction on a returning character from Morrison’s run this issue just left a bad taste in my mouth.

The taste couldn’t leave after looking at the hideous art that lays before me. Granted I’ve never seen an issue drawn by Greg Tocchini before, and maybe he had to rush to get this finished. But man everything looks too generic and sometimes uncomprehensible to look at. It might be fine when characters are standing around, but I can’t tell you what is going on when the fighting starts. Especially on one page where Todd seems to hit the female tiger chin (don’t ask) with his knee but instead it looks like he hit her boobs. Don’t get me started on the coloring either! The color palette is seriously ‘shit brown’ and it’s an ugly mess to look at. It also seems to smear the page a bit making the action look more confusing.

We only have two issues to go before the big reboot in September. It’s probably the only reason I see myself buying this series because it would be silly not for me to finish the run. Of course that’s a topic for another day. In general this is a pretty piss poor issue to read and I expected more from Winick. He’s done nothing to impress me once again in his superhero work and I think he should stick to what he’s normally good at which is non-superhero work. But don’t forgive the artist, Greg Tocchini, either cause his smeared pencils made it impossible to understand.