Scans_Daily

I don't necessarily mind stories about a hero coming to the brink of breaking his own rules and retreating at the last moment (although they are fairly cliche and overdone at this point). But you have to really earn that--you have to set up something that is so important to the hero that its loss makes the hero really want to cross that line.

This? Well, admittedly I've not been reading the series, so perhaps the relationship with Natalya was built up that well... but I rather doubt it. She was introduced in issue 10 (and from the synopsis I read, it sounds like she was just brought in as already in an established relationship with Bruce?), and killed last issue. So that's ten, eleven issues with her--and at least part of that they were broken up.

I don't buy that she's this important to Bruce (nor, for that matter, that Bruce is so important to her that she'd die rather than give him up). It feels more like the writer wanted to do a "Bruce aaa~lmost kills, but then he doesn't!" take, so he just whipped up a scenario (and person) to cram into the scenario to set that up.

I will say, though, that I rather like the artwork here. The scene of Batman beating up the Mad Hatter sells the simple brutality of it--no martial arts, no finesse, just Batman stomping up to Tetch, and then stomping him. (Although the panels with Tetch flying through the air like he were a doll are just baffling.) And the half-page of Batman stopping, slumping resignedly, then diving in to save the man he just tried to kill, is masterful in its silent expressiveness.