BLACKEST NIGHT: BATMAN #2 REVIEW

[Walt Kneeland]

Review by: Walt Kneeland (walt.kneeland@gmail.com )
Quick Rating: Very Good
Story Title: Who Burns Who part two

The Batman family faces an assault by Black Lanterns on the Gotham Police headquarters.

Story and Words: Peter J. Tomasi
Penciller: Adrian Syaf
Inker: Vicente Cifuentes
Colorist: Nei Ruffino
Letterer: John J. Hill
Editors: Adam Schlagman and Eddie Berganza
Cover: Andy Kubert and Alex Sinclair (variant by Bill Sienkiewicz)
Publisher: DC Comics

Maybe more than any other issue of Blackest Night so far, this issue seems to bring things home, so to speak. We see Batman, Robin, Deadman, Red Robin, Jim Gordon and Barbara dealing with a Black Lantern assault on the GCPD HQ. It's one thing to see super-powered characters dealing with the Black Lanterns...but on the whole, these characters are human...just humans trying to survive Black Lanterns...and we've already seen what the Black Lanterns have been able to do to those with powers and abilities BEYOND those of mortal men.

With Deadman's help scouting things, Batman and Robin arm themselves for battle--with a thin line found in the whole "we-don't-do-guns" issue. Much as the two do, it falls to Deadman to offer real hope to Gordon and Barbara, and the threat to these well-loved characters feels extremely real...something absolutely fantastic to me as a reader.

The story provides us with lots of "little moments" between characters--Batman and Robin, Gordon and Barbara, Dick and Barbara, the "Bat-family" as a whole with Red Robin back in the fold, and so on. This plays very well within the new/current Bat-status-quo, and though Tomasi is not writing one of the ongoing Bat-books, this fits just fine alongside them, giving us the existing status quo but within the bounds of this Blackest Night event.

The art's not bad, either...though there's some variance, in that some panels it seems that characters somehow don't look quite right...but in others, they couldn't look better. This may be a stylistic thing, the individual artist shining through. Whatever the case, the art's better more than it's not, and is quite well-suited to the story.

I don't know how these tie-ins will be collected...but with the minis being so short, and "only" $3...if you can snag the first issue, this is well worth getting as an entire mini. Second issue in...and only one issue to go. I doubt the ending's going to be all that satisfying (or really, all that much of an ending, really)...but so far, this is good stuff.

Recommended!


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