Batman #145 – Chip Zdarsky, Writer; Jorge Jimenez, Michelle Bandini, Artists; Tomeu Morey, Alex Sinclair, Colorists
Ray – 9.5/10
Ray: After getting three issues back to back to back last month, we’re back to the present day—and things are not looking good for Batman. His two greatest mistakes, the Javert-esque robot hunter Failsafe and the deranged alter ego Zur, have now been combined, as Zur has given himself an immortal robot body and set out to police Gotham while the real Batman is locked up below—with Joker, who is taking great pleasure in this series of events. Zdarsky has created a fascinating connection between Joker and Batman in his run, having them both being trained by the same disturbed man, Daniel Capito—which gave them both the ability to create different parts of their mind and generate alter egos.
Meanwhile, on the surface, the “New Batman” is on the rampage, hunting criminals and meeting with Bruce’s proteges. Jason sees right through the facade and is ready to fight the impostor, but Zur is able to exploit Jason’s lingering psychological damage from the way Batman dosed him in Gotham War. Damian, meanwhile, sees a father who says all the right things but doesn’t have the weaknesses he always scorned in Bruce. As the Mayor’s office struggles to figure out what to do with an all-powerful, all-seeing Batman, Bruce starts to make his escape, finding out just how far Zur has already gone in his quest to end crime in Gotham—and finding a figure that neither he or us expected to see again.
And that ties into the backup, which focuses on Joker in the aftermath of the Joker: Year One storyline. The alliance between Joker and Capito has evolved into a new stage—with Joker having the advantage, and Capito being so fascinated with the monster he’s created to try to escape. We’re seeing the evolution of Joker from the confused criminal we saw in the last arc to the Batman-obsessed monster he became. I’m glad Zdarsky didn’t commit to a full origin for Joker, but this has been a fascinating lost chapter for the clown.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
