Nightwing 2024 Annual #1 – Travis Moore, Writer/Artist; Alex Guimaraes, Ivan Plascencia, Colorists
Ray – 8.5/10
Ray: The redemption of the character of Bea Bennett has been a fascinating subplot in Tom Taylor’s run for a while now—turning her from a supporting character and disposable love interest from a disliked run into a badass urban pirate queen with her own backstory. It’s a wholly unexpected development, and it reaches a turning point with this annual that turns her into the main character. Written and drawn by acclaimed DC creator Travis Moore (who has written a few shorts before), it turns her into a super-spy who has been intersecting with Nightwing’s title long before they met. Her origin reveals that she was the daughter of a woman who was about to start working for a powerful corporation—until a yacht explosion killed her and nearly killed her daughter. On the run rather than go into foster care, the young girl was soon taken in by the Pirate King of Bludhaven—but that’s just the beginning of the story.
Destiny, now Bea, can never quite forget her mother, and her determination for answers leads her to enter the underworld to chase the mysterious assassin who may have been behind the attack. That leads her to SPYRAL, where she has her first encounter with Dick Grayson—and the big twist in this issue is that her initial role in that run now casts her as a deep-cover spy, keeping tabs on Nightwing for them as he recovers from his brain injury. It’s a big twist, retconning several runs—and maybe goes a little too far in making Bea some massive overarching figure for the run. But as she picks up new allies and new enemies, there are some fantastic action segments that feel like they’re pulled out of a globe-trotting spy thriller. Travis Moore’s writing is fine, perfectly acceptable, but his art as always is the star. At the very least, we can say that no one is going to think of Bea as irrelevant anymore.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
