Batman: The Jiro Kuwata Batmanga #23 Review

Written By: Jiro Kuwata
Art By: Jiro Kuwata
Cover Price: $1.99
Release Date: December 6, 2014

The Revenge of Clayface (Chapter 4 of 4)

At long last The Revenge of Clayface, the latest arc in the Batmanga series has hit its thrilling conclusion. I'm not going to lie: while I am glad to see that the identity of Clayface was revealed and the story tied up quite nicely, I felt this issue lacked the kick that the other chapters of this arc did. Still around is Clayface, Batman's shapeshifting foe and as per usual he's dodging the Dynamic Duo quite nicely.

While I appreciated that this issue served on the story side of things it did so at a sacrifice to the thrill of a Batman story. Each issue in this arc has had several battles with Clayface in various forms this issue only presented one, and it didn't get my heart going--partly because it was well past the threshold of where any mortal danger can really come to the Dynamic Duo.



Despite the lack of truly thrilling fights the art is still on point. But where Kuwata hit a home run with the art he made up for by dropping the ball with the writing.

Potential spoiler: Batman and Robin have a plan to defeat the evil Clayface and find out his true identity--an ice ray. Why is it, then, that when Batman and Robin are caught in the webs of a giant pseudo-Clayface spider, they pull out a fire pistol to save the day. It's possible this can be chalked up to a translation error or an oversight on the part of the writer--but that's a pretty big oversight.

Aside from those little gripes with the writing everything else appears to be in order, with the unmasking of Clayface running quite smooth when all is said and done.

Bits and Pieces 

Despite it's lack of a truly moving conclusion and more importantly, plot holes in the writing, The Jiro Kuwata Batmanga is still a unique take on a classic series and I am truly excited to see what issue #24 brings.

7.5/10