Comics Reviews: Batman 426, Detective 593, Green Arrow 11

Batman #426 – “A Death in the Family” – Jim Starlin/Jim Aparo/Mike DeCarlo

This one starts with Batman and Robin observing some scumbags who are running a child porn ring. The Dynamic Du are supposed to wait for the cops to show up, but Robin gets impatient and jumps in ahead of schedule. After pounding all the punks, Batman gives Robin shit for acting rashly, but Robin shows no remorse, stating that life is just a game. Later, Bruce talks to Alfred, who tells him Jason has been moody lately, staring at a photo of his dead parents but refusing to talk about them. Bruce realizes he may have let Robin join him as an active partner too quickly, before he’d really had the chance to grieve for his dead parents. Bruce decides to keep Jason off the streets for now, something Jason isn’t too happy about. Later, Batman finds out Joker has escaped from Arkham Asylum, killing eight people in the process. Batman wants to get Joker because of what he did to Barbara (Batgirl) Gordon, shooting her and leaving her a paraplegic. We see Joker preparing to leave the country, complaining that the government has been seizing all his ill-gotten gains lately. But he has a plan to make some quick cash: sell a stolen cruise missile to some Middle Eastern terrorists. The missile “disappeared” from the military’s arsenal thanks to a crooked associate of Joker’s, and nobody’s even looking for it since he removed its existence from the official records. (Naturally, Joker thanked his generous pal by killing him.) Jason takes a walk in Crime Alley, where he used to live with his parents. He runs into an old neighbour who gives him a box of stuff she salvaged from his old apartment. Batman checks up on Joker’s known henchmen and finds many of them have disappeared. He finally catches up with one and finds a passport and a visa for Lebanon, which makes him think Joker might be leaving the country. At Wayne Manor, Jason goes through the box of old stuff, which is mostly papers and photos. He finds his birth certificate and realizes the woman he thought was his mother was really his stepmother; his real mother’s name is smudged but starts with “S”, so he goes through his father’s old address book, finding three women whose names start with “S”. A quick check on the Bat-Computer reveals that all three women are currently in the Middle East or Africa: Sharmin Rosen is in Israel, working for Mossad; Shiva Woosan, a possible mercenary, is in Lebanon; and Sheila Haywood is working on famine relief in Ethiopia. (I’m wondering if Shiva Woosan is supposed to be Lady Shiva, but I always thought her name was Sandra Woosan.) Jason uses some of Bruce’s credit cards to book a flight to Israel, not bothering to tell Bruce since he figures Bruce won’t care about reuniting him with his birth mom. Meanwhile, Joker has stolen a military plane to bring the dismantled cruise missile to the Middle East where he can sell it to some terrorists. In Gotham, Batman finds Joker’s hideout and puts the clues together, realizing Joker has stolen a nuke and plans to sell it to terrorists in Lebanon. Before he leaves, Batman is informed by Alfred that Jason took off for parts unknown, but Batman knows that Joker and his nuke take top priority. He heads over to Lebanon, tracking down the stolen military plane with help from the CIA. Alfred lets Batman know about Jason’s flight to Israel and Batman says he’ll check it out after he deals with Joker. In Israel, Jason breaks into Mossad headquarters to get info on Sharmin Rosen and finds out she’s on assignment in Beirut. Coincidentally, that’s where Batman is looking for Joker, pounding local thugs until he gets a line on someone trying to sell a stolen nuke, a guy named Peter Brando (who’s another of Joker’s “known associates”). While staking out the hotel where Brando may be hiding, Batman is startled to see Jason approaching and grabs him. They exchange stories and Jason reluctantly agrees that stopping Joker from selling a nuke is more important than finding his birth mom. But when they see Brando with Sharmin Rosen, they realize they’re basically on the same case and follow the duo into the desert where they’re meeting the terrorists. Joker is there too and he turns over the reassembled cruise missile to a terrorist named Jamal, who’s eager to wipe out Tel Aviv with it. Batman and Robin break up the meeting, taking out terrorists and Joker’s men little by little. Sharmin Rosen helps too, breaking her cover to kill a sniper who’s about to waste Batman. Brando grabs her, but before he can kill her, Robin distracts him. Batman’s too far away, but Sharmin stops Brando from killing Robin. In the meantime, Jamal tries to launch the missile, but it blows up. Apparently, Joker put it back to together wrong; luckily, the nuclear warhead didn’t detonate. Joker takes off into the desert, crying over losing his money (which burnt in the explosion), and Sharmin thanks Batman and Robin for their help. Robin asks if she ever had a baby in Gotham and she says no. (Actually, her exact words are “No. Not in Gotham City.” which suggests to me she could still be Jason’s mother if he was born somewhere else.) Robin says he wants to track down the other two women: Shiva Woosan, who’s right here in Beirut, and Sheila Haywood in Ethiopia and Batman agrees to help him. Elsewhere, we see a disguised Joker booking a flight to Ethiopia.

Detective #593 – “Diary of a Madman” – John Wagner, Alan Grant/Norm Breyfogle/Steve Mitchell

This one starts with maniac serial killer Cornelius Stirk tormenting the victim he grabbed last issue. Stirk seems to literally feed on people’s fear, absorbing it like food. He was released from Arkham Asylum because his medication supposedly cured him, but he stopped taking it and went back to his murderous ways. After scaring his latest victim to death, he takes the body out to dump it in a construction site. Batman tracks down Stirk’s hideout and breaks in, realizing he’s too late to save Stirk’s latest victim, but settling down to wait for the killer’s return. Stirk dumps the body but is accosted by a security guard. He uses his metamorphing ability (I think it’s actually just a type of hypnosis to make people think he looks different) to appear as a sexy blonde woman, luring the guard back to his place for some fun. When they get there and find Batman waiting, Stirk—still looking like a hot blonde—pretends the guard is the real Stirk and he’s just an innocent victim. Batman pounds the guard, but soon realizes he’s been duped when Stirk uses the guard’s gun to shoot him in the leg. He knocks Batman out and ties him up, hoping to harvest some fear from him. But Batman isn’t frightened by things most people are afraid of, so Stirk has to use his hypnosis to go deeper, to figure out what really scares Batman. He gets flashes of Batman’s parents being murdered and figures Batman’s greatest fear is seeing innocents die and not being able to stop it. Stirk threatens to kill the tied-up security guard, but isn’t of instilling fear in Batman it just pisses him off enough to bust loose. He decks Stirk, who’s sent back to Arkham for more therapy, which I’m sure will do wonders for him.

Green Arrow #11 – “Here There Be Dragons 3” – Mike Grell/Ed Hannigan/Dick Giordano, Frank McLaughlin

This one starts in Hawaii, with Shado practicing shooting arrows blindfolded. When an armed yakuza thug sneaks up to kill her, Oliver Queen gets up from his bed (where he’s recovering after being shot by Shado last issue) and throws a chair at the gunman. Shado kills him and helps Oliver back to bed, where he has fever dreams of talking to Dinah. She’s decided she doesn’t want children, since their lives are too dangerous, but apparently Oliver’s not 100% on board with that. He wakes up later and finds out he was out for a week from the original wound, plus three days after his heroics saving Shado from the gunman. Oliver wonders why he’s not dead, since Shado never misses, and she admits she recognized him at the last second and probably held off from a killing strike with the arrow. They exchange stories, Oliver filling her in on Agent Osborne’s blackmailing him into finding her to get the map that supposedly leads to buried gold in the Philippines. (Shado nether confirms nor denies that she has the map.) Shado tells Oliver how she’s been moving between empty vacation houses all over Hawaii, trying to stay ahead of the yakuza, who want her dead for killing their oyabun. She says she has to wipe out all the yakuza to keep them from killing her and wonders if Oliver will try to stop her, but he hasn’t decided yet. After recovering some more, Oliver does some bow practice and finds out Shado really is a much better shot than him. She introduces him to Alvaro, an old gardener who travels with her and helps her out (like by burying bodies). As Oliver and Shado spend time together, they get closer; I’m not sure if they’re actually banging or not, but there’s a definite vibe there. (And Oliver has always been a bit of a slut.) The yakuza show up and grab Alvaro, but Oliver and Shado take them down one by one. Alvaro dies of a heart attack and Shado wastes the yakuza. Their boat pilot tries to take off, but Shado puts an arrow through him, causing the boat to crash and explode. We’ll have to wait until next issue to see the end of Shado’s war with the yakuza.