Comics Reviews: Batman 442, Detective 609, Legends of the Dark Knight 2

Batman #442 – “Rebirth” – Marv Wolfman, George Perez/Jim Aparo/Mike DeCarlo

This is the fifth and final chapter of the Lonely Place of Dying storyline, but because of the way my reviews are set up I’m doing it before the fourth chapter (in New Titans 61). This one starts with Alfred and Tim Drake in the Batcave worrying because they haven’t heard from Batman or Nightwing (who left to track down Two-Face). Tim’s gut tells him they’re in trouble, so he takes the Robin costume and talks Alfred into driving him to the place where the Dynamic Duo deduced Two-Face was hiding. Alfred is reluctant but he’s worried too, and Tim explains how much Bruce and Dick have meant to him over the years. (He’s followed them so closely that he figured out their secret identities.) At Two-Face’s hideout, Batman and Nightwing are buried under rubble in the basement after falling for Two-Face’s booby trap. Two-Face flips his coin, which tells him to blow up the house with his greatest enemies still inside. Just as he detonates the explosives, Tim shows up dressed as Robin and jumps him. Tim’s no fighter, but his acrobatic training helps him stay out of Two-Face’s reach. Alfred tries to help and gets knocked down, giving Two-Face the chance to take off. Tim goes into the basement and digs Batman and Nightwing free. Batman is pissed off to see someone else wearing the Robin costume and insists he doesn’t need a partner, but Tim points out how moody and violent Batman has been lately and says he needs a steadying influence. Batman’s reluctant to take on another partner after what happened to Jason Todd, but Tim is very persuasive, poking holes in all Batman’s arguments and insisting that he’ll be able to hold his own in a fight if Batman trains him. Batman changes the subject, saying they have to find Two-Face and Tim impresses him some more by revealing he slapped a tracker on Two-Face while they were fighting. They track him to an auto-wrecking yard and Batman’s fears almost come true when Two-Face drops a bunch of smashed cars on the Batmobile. But Tim was smart enough to dive underneath, so the three of them track down Two-Face and Batman pounds him. Later, Bruce admits that Batman maybe needs a Robin to project the right image towards criminals, so he says he’s willing to give Tim a shot. Elsewhere, we find out that the voice Two-Face was hearing from his radio wasn’t just a facet of his fractured personality … it was the Joker, manipulating Two-Face into attacking Batman so Joker would be free to carry out his own schemes. It’s interesting that Two-Face seemed to assume Tim was the same Robin from before (i.e. Jason), but Joker knows that’s not the case, since he’s the one who killed Jason.

Detective #609 – “Facts About Bats” – Alan Grant/Norm Breyfogle/Steve Mitchell

This one starts with a ceremony for the building of a new bank. But the dedication plaque has been spray-painted with an anarchy symbol by a couple of homeless people. They’re pissed off that there’s a bank being built on the formerly- public land, instead of low income housing for people like them. Bruce Wayne is there wondering if Anarky might show up, since there was an angry letter about the new bank in the newspaper. He realizes the homeless guys aren’t Anarky, but they were certainly inspired by his crusade. Later we see Lonnie Mackin hanging out at school with some of his friends, while at the insurance office where he works, Lonnie’s father (Mike) is looking at a file on the computer speculating about Batman’s motives. The file is marked by a big anarchy symbol, which seems pretty damning but will turn out to be a red herring. Batman goes to see Commissioner Gordon, who tells him there are two possible places Anarky might strike. Gordon says the cops will cover one and asks Batman to watch over the Lux Hotel where a trade conference is taking place. But Anarky shows up at the building site, smashing through the fence to demolish the skeleton of the new building and whipping the homeless guys into a frenzy. Batman jumps Anarky and gets a shock when he pulls Anarky’s mask off to reveal a mannequin head. Anarky zaps him with the taser in his cane and takes off. The homeless guys jump Batman, who has to shake them off without hurting them. He follows Anarky to the insurance office, where he finds Mike Machin with the incriminating evidence on his computer. But thanks to his tussle with Anarky, Batman knows he was dealing with a kid and finds Lonnie hiding in a closet. Lonnie passes out from the earlier fight and they take him to hospital. Mike tells Batman he accidentally found Lonnie’s manifesto, but couldn’t bring himself to turn in his son. Later, Batman tells Gordon he kinda understands where Anarky was coming from, wanting to change the world for the better.

Legends of the Dark Knight #2 – “Shaman Book Two” – Dennis O’Neill/Edward Hannigan/John Beatty

This one takes place about six months after last issue, very early in Batman’s career (right after he adopted the Batman costume to frighten criminals) This story starts with a human sacrifice to someone called Chubala in the basement of a condemned building. A couple of off-duty cops hear screams and bust in, but the high priest is immune to their bullets and kills one of them. The other cop gets away, although he gets a knife in the back. The next day, Bruce Wayne happens by the crime scene and Captain Gordon tells him what happened. When he mentions the surviving officer saying something about Chubala, Bruce remembers the girl who stabbed herself at the sight of Batman, babbling something about Chubala just as she knifed herself. Bruce meets a street preacher named Tobias Micah, who lectures him and Gordon about sinners. Bruce attends a reception with a date (Theodora Hackley) and runs into Professor Spurlock, whose research expedition to Alaska Bruce funded. Bruce also meets Spurlock’s research assistant, Bennett Young, who Spurlock doesn’t seem to like much. After ditching Theodora, Batman goes to the hospital to check on the injured cop and runs into some punks who have come to finish him off. He pounds the punks, who prefer to die than go back and admit failure. But Batman captures them all and hands them over to the cops. He finds a lot of cash, some heroin, and an ID card in the name of Lukas Wilson (which is interesting, since the girl who stabbed herself was Tina Wilson). Bruce watches Spurlock on a TV interview where he tells the host a story about a shaman mask that he claims he heard from some Inuit in Alaska. Bruce knows he’s lying because Bruce is the one who told him the story of the mask, and Bruce is certain he’s the only non-Inuit to have heard it. Elsewhere, the high priest from the sacrifice (who may be Chubala) bails out the punks that Batman captured and kills one of them to motivate the others not to fail again. Bruce shows Alfred the bat-filled cave under the mansion and tells him he wants build a headquarters there. Bennett Young calls and says he has something to tell Bruce about Professor Spurlock. On the way to meet him, Bruce stops by police headquarters (disguised as a shoeshine guy) and asks Gordon about the punks he collared. Gordon says they were from a Caribbean island called Santa Prisca, the source of a lot of illegal drugs. Bruce goes to meet Bennett Young, but hears a scream and finds Young with a spear in his chest. Just before dying, Young manages to say one word … Batman.