Wonder Woman vol. 6: Warkiller

Collects Wonder Woman (vol 3) issues 33-39.

Writer: Gail Simone
Artists: Aaron Lopresti, Matt Ryan, Bernard Chang

This collection has two story lines. The first is a two-part story “Birds of Paradise” where Diana finds out that Genocide isn’t dead but someone is hiding the body in Tokyo, in a metahuman fight club. She asks the Black Canary to show her the ropes and together they go to the fight club, undercover. In the second one, several story lines get a conclusion when Diana confronts Achilles and eventually Zeus.

The first two issues are campy fun. Diana and Dinah dress up as slutty wrestlers to hide their identity. Dinah says: “We look like high-end trashy hookers in a Tarantino nightmare… Perfect!” However, they don’t find Genocide. Instead, they find Dr. Psycho and Director Steel and the goddess of violence who wants revenge.

When Diana returns home, she has a talk with Tom. Earlier, she admitted that she doesn’t love Tom, but she wants to have children with him. So, Tom breaks up with her. Luckily, Diana can vent her frustration on Giganta but then she and Giganta have a bonding moment over their dissatisfaction of their love lives and they team up to take down Achilles’ peace party. Achilles threatens Hippolyta and Diana backs down. But then Diana realizes that she must confront him and heads to Themiscyra.

Zeus is going to retire the Amazons. In order to do that, he resurrected some of Greek mythology’s greatest heroes, including the Argonauts. He also created Achilles to be the king of the Argonauts and the Amazons. Zeus is apparently the only one to be surprised when the Amazon are very dissatisfied with that. Hippolyta agrees to step down because that’s the will of her gods. However, Alkyone, the villain from Simone’s first WW story, agrees to marry Achilles, legitimizing his rule. Alkyone was the captain of Hippolyta’s guard but she hated Diana so much that she (and her three loyal Amazons) tried to kill Diana when she was an infant. The four were imprisoned. Why Achilles would think that they somehow represent the Amazons, is beyond me. However, Alkyone is a great villain and her actions are understandable. Since this is a superhero comic, it all leads to a huge fight between Diana and Achilles, with the Argonauts and Amazon caught in the middle, choosing sides.

I’ve got mixed feelings about this collection. The first two issues were campy fun but didn’t really add to the story line much and the whole retrieving Genocide’s body was forgotten in the second issue. I loved the main villain in the second issue; Diana agreed to make amends to her and no doubt her choice will come back to haunt her. I’m happy to see Tom go but was baffled with Diana wanting to settle down and have kids. I guess that’s supposed to show her “human” side, make her more relateable. But I don’t remember anyone else taking this angle with Diana. And she seemed to have misled Tom a lot, which was very out of character for her. I liked most of the conflict Zeus created and the Argonauts ended up not so villainous, after all, which was a nice touch. I’m glad that Donna also got her chance to shine and that the conflict between her and Diana was resolved. A good, solid ending for Alkyone’s story that started in the Circle. She’s one of the best WW villains.

One more Simone collection to go. I must confess that I enjoyed Birds of Prey much more. Also, Simone’s collections aren’t stand alone. Definitely start with the Circle to get the most out of the stories.

 

Batgirl vol 2: Knightfall descends

Collects Batgirl issues 0, 7-13. It’s part of the New 52.

Writer: Gail Simone
Artists: Ardian Syaf, Vicente Cifuentes, Ed Benes, Alitha Martinez

The collection starts with a recap of Barbara’s life until now. It turns out that she was Batgirl for only one year before giving it up (the reason wasn’t given) for a while and then the Joker shot her. We also got to see her in action wearing the Bat-costume for the first time, which was very nice.

Then she battles villain after villain and deals with some personal problems while other problems are brewing.

First, she has a quick run-in with Grotesque who has energy powers and casually kills a man for a bottle of wine. Batgirl pursues him but finds out that one of his henchmen was with Joker when he shot her. She ends up letting him go which I found really strange at first but was nicely explained.

Then Babs confronts her mother who has come back after ten years and we find out that Babs has a young brother, James Jr., who’s apparently a serial killer. He’s supposed to be in Arkham but he’s out and seeing Bab’s new roommate.

Then we get a cross-over with the Batman’s Court of Owls storyline. I’ve only read the first collection, so I know a little bit of them but not much. The court wants to show Gotham that they’re the only salvation. So, they blackmail the commissioner into inaction by threatening Barbara while they assassinate the city’s leaders and send bombs to the city. Batgirl confronts one of the assassins, Talon. This was pretty well done. Even though the assassinations don’t play much part in Babs’ life, we get an interesting backstory for the Talon reaching back to 1944.

Next, the villain Knightfall and their cronies appear. While beating down car thieves, Babs wonders if it’s really the right thing to do, to protect rich people’s property from the poor. One of the thieves tries to get away and he steps into a bear trap. There’s a new vigilante group in Gotham and that’s the way they operate: Knightfall and the Disgraced want to kill (almost) every criminal in the city to get rid of crime, including young kids stealing cars. Babs, of course, fights them.

Knightfall is Babs’ new nemesis. Knightfall and the Disgraced all have tragic backstories; they aren’t in it just to get rich or to do evil. This sets them up as mirrors for Babs and I think we’re going to get a lot of debate and thinking about what is justified vigilantism. Batwoman also makes an appearance.

I liked this volume more than the previous one. Again, I loved Bab’s relationship with her dad. We don’t actually see them interact much but in the first story it’s clear who much dad means to Babs. I’m a bit dubious about the whole James Jr. and Babs’ mother storylines. Knightfall is a great adversary to Babs and I’m looking forward to their next match. The collection ends with a new rogues gallery for Batgirl which was great. However, the next collection is apparently another tie-in for Batman: Death of the family which (sigh) again stars the Joker. Hopefully, Babs gets to kick his ass once and for all, but I’m not really optimistic.

The art work is mostly very nice.

 

Birds of Prey vol. 5: Between Dark and Dawn

Collects Birds of Prey issues 69-75

Writer: Gail Simone
Artists: Ed Benes, Ron Adrian, Jim Fern, Eduardo Baretto, Eric Battle, Rob Lea, Steve Biro, Andrew Bepoy, Rodney Ramos

This collection has one main storyline and a couple of more stand-alone issues at the end.

Three teenagers have killed themselves wearing the costumes of dead superheroes and Oracle is convinced that they’ve actually been murdered. She sends Huntress to Oregon to a cult with a charismatic leader. His followers seem hate women and Huntress is almost immediately captured and brought to the cult’s farm. Meanwhile, Dinah questions the parents of the dead kids. Only one of them agrees to talk to her and it seems that the kid was a part of the cult and the cult had been blackmailing her parents. When they couldn’t pay any more, the cult persuaded the kid to kill herself.

Helena investigates the cult from the inside. She even has a supposed ally: Vixen. Unfortunately, the cult has brainwashed Vixen, too. At the same time, Barbara has to confront another sort of threat.

Meanwhile, Oracle is trying to rehabilitate Savant and his friend Creoto. She gives them an apartment on a run-down part of Gotham and orders him to fix it, without killing anyone.

In the next to last issue, Dinah confronts Savant. He did ambush her and break her legs, after all, so she has to do it. The final issue seems to be an aftermath to a Batman story. In it, Barbara had to blow up the clocktower which has been her headquarters and home for years. She takes the Birds of Prey out of Gotham and into a plane which is piloted by Lady Blackhawk. At the end, there’s a shorter story about Lady Blackhawk.

Once again, this is very entertaining stuff. Dinah and Barbara are very clearly good friends and they need that bond against a common enemy. Helena is more “rough around the edges” as Babs says. Her faith is questioned in this story and she gets to kick ass a lot. She’s clearly still the outsider in the team, though. But even Dinah is more accepting of her and they bond a little when they infiltrate a gathering of various supervillains’ minions.

The only bad point, really, is the cheesecake art with gratuitous butt shots on pretty much every page.