Wednesday, January 1, 2020

Batman Beyond #39 Review



Blight Fight


Written By: Dan Jurgens
Art By: Inaki Miranda, Chris Sotomayor, Travis Lanham
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: January 1, 2020


The mystery of the Batwoman continues this issue as Terry McGinnis is still missing in the city, stricken with amnesia and running from the police, who believe that he's a murderer.  Yeah, things are crazy in Neo Gotham right now, but the big problem is that crazy doesn't always mean interesting because the main premise of this series recently is Terry on the streets not knowing who he is and Bruce Wayne and Matt McGinnis betting that they know who the Batwoman is, which means they'll just keep saying Barbara Gordon or Melanie Walker over and over again.  Let's jump into this issue and see if things change, especially since Blight has made his return to Neo Gotham.  Let's check it out.



For this issue we see the Batwoman fight Blight so that they have a reason to drop the exposition out on us so we know what Blight has been up to and what he knows about Terry McGinnis and what this new Batwoman knows about the Bat Family as a whole and what her connection to the cowl really is.  Really though, this part is here to let us know that Blight knows Batman's identity and so that he can talk about how he was the one to kill Terry's father, Warren McGinnis, which gives us a moment to realize that Matt McGinnis, watching the fight from the Batcave was never made aware of Blight's connection to his father's death.  This is a really nice moment for a second, but ultimately it's just there to recap the beginnings of the Batman Beyond show and then immediately goes back to Bruce and him talking about the identity of the Batwoman.


Alright so we have the original big bad of the Batman Beyond animated series and we have a new Batwoman fighting him......... this should be cool, but when Blight's return is tied completely to the one person who's been hanging out with homeless amnesia ridden Terry McGinnis, you realize how forced this entire story is.  Blight's been underwater this whole time since Terry and his original fight it seems, but he's back in the city because his body is dying and he needs a new one and the only person who can do the mind swap is the person who is dumpster diving with Terry at the moment...... not to mention she's someone who happens to hate Warren McGinnis as well....... thanks for bringing him up this issue.


All in all, I did enjoy the art in this issue a lot, but everything when it comes to the story feels ridiculously forced and makes the entire plot of this arc feel laughable.  Hey, there's a new character that happens to be hanging out with Terry....... Yeah, that's the one person who can save Blight if he ever came back.... oh, and she hates the McGinnis family..... Oh, what's that?  Blight is back out of nowhere and needs a new body?  Perfect.  Meanwhile, Bruce and Matt are just sitting in the cave and practicing their lack of detective skills.  Thank goodness for that art though.

Bits and Pieces:

The plot and circumstances to this story are laughable and we're no closer to figuring out the mystery of the Batwoman.  Thankfully, the art in this issue is great because it's the only thing that really kept me happy as I turned the pages of this book because everything that needed to happen in this issue was forced in with a narrative sledgehammer and nothing felt cleverly thought out.

5/10

1 comment:

  1. I don't like the idea that Blight knows who Terry is and why he became Batman, or that others hold the McGinnis family responsible for Powers's downfall. It's referencing events of the show but missing the point. Powers has killed so many people that Terry outright stating that Powers killed his father didn't help identify him at all. Likewise Warren McGinnis was just an employee, maybe respected enough to get called to Powers's office on occasion, but easily killed if Powers even suspected he knew something inconvenient. Basically Warren McGinnis and his son were nobodies in Powers's mind, and yet they ended up being his downfall without him ever realizing it.

    Bruce Wayne and Matt McGinnis betting that they know who the Batwoman is, which means they'll just keep saying Barbara Gordon or Melanie Walker over and over again

    At least they realized that just straight up asking who they suspect whether she's Batwoman and accepting her denial isn't ironclad proof that they were wrong? On the other hand, maybe they should be killing two or three birds with one stone by calling up Barbara and Melanie and asking them to go help out Batwoman and figuring that if they can't get in touch with one of them it's probably because she's Batwoman.

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