Birds of Prey #18 – Kelly Thompson, Writer; Juann Cabal, Artist; Adriano Lucas, Colorist
Ray – 9.5/10
Ray: After a tense previous arc that saw Cass deep undercover in a shadow meditech company experimenting on Amazons, it’s time for some downtime for the Birds. Training! Video games! Rest and relaxation! Or not. As Sin and Black Canary test their skills in the ring and Big Barda finds that Cass’ skill at body language extends to the virtual realm, Oracle quickly picks up some disturbing news from surveillance – someone has figured out where Sin and her hanger-on God are hiding out, and they want her back. It’s determined that the best way to get ahead of this is to set a trap for the villains and stop them in their tracks, so Dinah and Sin are deputized to a small lake house for what’s ostensibly a camping trip. This leaves Barda and Cass behind, as their skills don’t lie in subtlety, but they wind up with their own mission – and it involves extracting John Constantine from a predictably disturbing fix.
This actually goes back to the second issue, when the heroes were raiding the supernatural realm to get what they needed to invade Themyscira. Constantine has been wrangling a demon in the strange supernatural market we previously saw – and he needs some help to banish it, as he’s currently possessed to ensure the demon doesn’t escape into the human realm. New artist Juann Cabal is probably the closest fit to Leo Romero’s original style on this title, and while the title changes artists maybe a little too often for my tastes, it’s maintained its very unique look from arc to arc. The stakes are very high as we exit this issue, with the assassins closing in on Dinah and Sin, and it’s fun to see this undercover mission between the two sisters. Overall, it looks like this arc will be sticking to the core team for now, and that’s a welcome surprise. This is a great group of characters.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
