Well, talk about a letdown. Just as Morrison’s Batman run was starting to make sense, and the issues becoming eagerly anticipated, we’re suddenly left with an unexplained delay of a few weeks for #675 – and when it does come out it turns out to be little more than a “bridge” issue between the mystery-unravelling single issues of late, and the upcoming “Batman RIP” storyline. The focus is shifted away from Batman and on to Bruce Wayne – perhaps in a foreshadowing of events to come – but sadly it makes for a pretty uninteresting issue.

The main problem, really, is the focus on Bruce’s current lover, Jezebel Jet. She’s clearly supposed to be an important part of the current run, but in truth has done little more than hover on the periphery, occasionally showing up without ever seeming particularly significant. I can see what Morrison is trying to do in terms of making her a stronger foil for Bruce, but you get the sense that almost all of the development of their relationship has happened off the page – and so it’s difficult to see from the evidence in front of us just why she’s supposed to be so compelling. Besides which, Paul Dini is doing such a good job of setting up a potential relationship with Zatanna over in Detective Comics that it’s hard to really care about Jet. As such, the revelation she encounters at the close of the issue (easy to see coming a mile off, too) lacks the power that perhaps it should.

The issue’s main plot, while it features some trademark Morrisonian villain use (revisiting an old Silver Age baddie he’d previously dug up for 52, thus tying the current arc further in to the weekly series), feels extremely lightweight, and indeed the sort of self-contained mini-story that you’d expect to find in Detective; and in addition, we catch up with Robin and Nightwing bouncing around rooftops, and Talia plotting against Jet. None of these peripheral scenes, though, feel hugely necessary – save perhaps, in the latter case, informing us that Talia and Damian survived the explosion that saw them disappear from view many months back (although this was guessable from Damian’s subsequent “future” appearance in #666). Indeed, Morrison seems to get the pacing and structure a bit “off” here, and none of the disparate threads really feel like they get a chance to settle.

Somewhat surprisingly, and despite all solicitation evidence to the contrary, Tony Daniel is absent from this issue, with fill-in art instead from Ryan Benjamin. And it’s one of the book’s weaker points, really – the style is reminiscent of ‘90s Bat-artist Bret Blevins (certain pages, largely involving Bruce out of costume, feel like they could have come straight out of a Grant/Blevins Detective issue), but there’s very little definition in the character design – something that’s a real problem when your lead character spends the entire issue without his mask on. Furthermore, Benjamin struggles to draw any kind of distinction between Tim and Dick, beyond having slightly different heights. It’s not hideous, and the storytelling is clear enough - but with Daniel having previously begun to settle into a groove as the series’ regular artist, this feels like a step in the wrong direction – and there’s been no explanation forthcoming for his absence, or the book’s delay.

It is perhaps worth remembering that this is far from the first issue of the run to feel distinctly underwhelming on a first read – and with the benefit of context, many of those earlier issues have made a lot more sense. But this does feel more distinctly like filler – there’s a big story coming up, and all this does is add slightly to the setup by changing the dynamic of one of the lead-in relationships. It has little purpose beyond that, and so after the wait we’ve had to endure for it, it’s desperately disappointing. Still, there are apparently only two weeks until the first part of “Batman RIP” – so hopefully this one can be glossed over pretty quickly…

Tags: batman, Grant Morrison, Ryan Benjamin
Publisher: DC