Drown your bats away......
I have to hand it to Snyder. His run on Batman has been near perfect upto now and he's reinventing the Bat for a whole new generation. Morrison and Miller had their takes on the man who dresses up like a Bat and Snyder seems to be combining them both.
While he's doing a complete reinvention of the Batman mythology (like Miller did), he's still being respectful to every other interpretation that's come before him (like Morrison). And Zero Year has been the highlight of that vision.
This issue continues to delight and ties together some threads very well. And what would Snyder be without Capullo? Greg is amazing with his work here.
SPOILERS FOLLOW...............
One of the greatest things about Zero Year has been the ability to carve out a big cohesive mystery that ties together everything happening to Bruce and his now and future allies.
We last found Bruce being the shooting range target of Loeb and his GCPD cronies. Well, we cut away to close to 70 years ago as a group of soldiers enjoy a night in Tokyo. Snyder teases us that there's something of importance here but before we can dig deeper, he drags us by the scruff of the neck back to present times.
Bruce is seriously hurt. And we get a competent GCPD as they secure each exit and cripple Batman's escape plans. They even shoot him in the head! Bruce here is not the predator of Year One's SWAT encounter, he's being hunted and badly beaten up.
And who should rescue him but old Jimbo? A full circle is drawn as Jim comes in a boat to the unlikely damsel-in-distress.
We get a Year One homage again as Jim makes him take of his corroding hood in exchange for being temporarily blind so that he can't see Bruce's face. As Batman guides Gordon's boat to the shore, Jim tells him what we all knew and he came to understand - Gotham is cruel and corrupted.
We go back to the night Gordon picked up Bruce from the movies. Bruce's look of hope made him dig deeper than he wanted to and he found what he didn't want to - dogfights and horrible cops. When he threatened to tell the press, they put the dogs on him and betted. And when he managed to get up again, he was warned that he better shut up for his children's sake.
And he walked down Park Row and heard two bullets that made a boy an orphan. And now the coat, which he thought he got because of the goodness of the badge, is a reminder of everything that ails this city. Though Gordon comes off as naive, we see the phase when Gordon realizes what Gotham really is.
Making sure Gordon can't follow him back, Batman goes back to the cave and it's Alfred's time to ruminate on Bruce's actions, which seem to be based on Nolan's version very much yet offers an unique twist to it. Alfred theorizes that Batman is an ever-vigilant aspect, an absolute that will always be there to protect and punish not only the wrong-doers, but also the people who failed to protect others like Alfred and Gordon failed to protect the Waynes. Knight of Vengeance takes on an altogether different meaning here.
As Bruce leaves Alfred, we get a homage to the Dark Knight Returns as Batman watches in through a window as Barbara plays with her dog (gifted to her as a reminder of Gordon's silence). Then he makes his way to the catacombs, one of the best hideouts during a blackout.Delving deeper, he find a room with a smoky cannister, a bullet ridden helmet (Tokyo Moon! Callback to the army part) and blueprints.
Gazing over the blueprints, Bruce realizes the real monster, the one behind Helfern aka Doctor Death - Edward Nygma.
As Nygma floods the catacombs, we get glimpses of his elaborate plans (and this is a homage to the Arkham games). Batman's purple gloved hand reaches out from the watery depths.
SPOILERS END.................
Snyder is able to continue building the people while continuing the plot and that is a credible thing. But there does come a point when the book becomes too wordy, though when the words are so good, it hardly matters.
Capullo continues to show us why he's the one Snyder picked to draw Batman's world as he alternates from faces to places without loosing a beat.
So, I give it 9.0 out of 10
+Some great character work
+The artwork is great
+Snyder is able to keep the plot on track
+Some well placed homages
-Too wordy
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