Batman Beyond #40 – Dan Jurgens, Writer; Sean Chen, Penciller; Sean Parsons, Inker; Chris Sotomayor, Colorist
Ratings:
Ray – 8/10
Ray: Batman Beyond has picked up a lot of steam in recent months, bringing back the most iconic villain from the original animated series and introducing a new masked Batwoman with Terry McGinnis out of commission. While Terry is living out a strange parallel to Ric Grayson’s journey in Jurgens’ other title, he’s fallen in with a mysterious woman with ties to Derek Powers. She’s brought him to her boss in Batman Beyond #40, who knows who he is far better than Terry does. Blight intends to transfer his mind into Terry’s body, a plot Terry is unaware of enough to take a job for Powers.
At the same time as this, Blight is stepping up his campaign against Wayne Enterprises by targeting buildings with Devourers, powerful plasma devices that create miniature black holes. Batwoman enters the fray, saving a woman from being sucked in, but the attacks are coming too fast and furious for her to stop Blight’s attacks on her own.
Batwoman has previously been portrayed as a tough-as-nails vigilante, but this issue exposes some of the weak spots in her armor – in some cases, literally. She’s bold and can handle herself well, but when up against an A-list villain like Blight she quickly finds herself overwhelmed by his coordinated attacks.
Bruce and Matt try to expose her identity by bringing their top suspects back to the Manor for another interrogation, but the arrival of a surprising guest star brings everything into focus and makes clear who it is shortly before she eventually takes off the mask. The character hasn’t been seen in a while, so I’m not surprised she wasn’t a popular pick, but her ties to another major player means this is a reveal with a lot of potential. The best part of this story so far has been its high stakes and fast pace, and with all the players in place, we should be heading to a strong finale.
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Disclaimer: GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
