Birds of Prey 11 - Which Reason Know Not Of

[perletwo]

Really? Nobody's posted anything substantial from Birds of Prey 11 yet? Just the bits and pieces of continuity dovetailing with Batgirl?

Well. Let's fix that, shall we? 3 pages of Huntress and Catman doing some dovetailing of their own.

The setup: Huntress is chasing jewel thieves ("Of course there was a jewel heist. It's Gotham. And it's Thursday." ILU, Gail) who've shot a guard and taken a hostage - a severely asthmatic hostage with no inhaler who's a prime candidate for death by misadventure. She's slugging it out with one thug when Catman shows up, looking to revisit that, umm, whatever they had back in Birds of Prey v1 #106-107, I think? Hel maintains she's busy, so Catman agrees to help her hunt.

They find the second thug, and Catman loses points for hitting Rickie's pregnant girlfriend (in fairness, she was leaping at him claws-out at the time), but gains points for getting wounded while taking Rickie down and eliciting the name of a third thug; the fourth crew member, the client, none of them knew.





They track down the last of the thugs, and the hostage.



After a little bluffing, Catman admits it.



"And this one time is forever," text box continues. Deadshot chides Catman for setting up the elaborate caper instead of just candy and flowers, but Tom says he needed to hook Hel on his fight for redemption.


Thoughts?

Comments

[starwolf_oakley]

Helena Bartinelli may not be the World's Greatest Detective, but she's sharp. If you have a near-desperate drive to get Batman's approval, you have to be.

Thomas Blake thought this scenario would be a good idea to get Helena to help him. Jeez Louise. I think all my respect for this character just withered and died.

[wonderwomanhero]

HELENA. PLEEEEEEASE REGAIN PANTS.

[djt2445.livejournal.com]

I think you're misreading the ending.

Catman -knew- Helena would be always carrying a "What if".

He had to show her that he was -beyond- redemption in order to free her to love someone else.

He isn't trying to hook her on his redemption, he's trying to show her that he's -beyond- redemption so that she can move on. Hence why Deadshot called it a 'triple cross'. I think you missed out in not showing that page where Catman says "I had to show her. That I was beyond that. There's no room in her life for whatever lousy thing I am now."

[ebailey140]

"On one end is Captain Marvel, Superman, guys like that. On the other, the Joker. Luthor. We're both stuck in the big, stupid gray area in the middle."

Um, Helena, I'm pretty sure your fellow Birds and Bat Family don't consider you or themselves in the gray area. Sure, there's Selina and Jason, but the rest...

[mullon]

If I was Huntress, I would be very tempted to kick him in the face for that "I don't know where my soul is. Everything I see is black." line.

[swatkat]

I enjoyed the issue, but god Catman is a drama queen.

[whitesycamore]

So if it's all over between him and Helena, that leaves an opportunity for Floyd to move in on him, right? Although I guess Floyd's not very redemption-y.

[icon_uk]

"Of course there was a jewel heist. It's Gotham. And it's Thursday."

Actually, I'd kill for a Gotham where that was the case anymore, it's all murder-murder-murder these days. If there's no body count they don't even bother sending a cop.

[whitesycamore]

I didn't think this was a very good issue. I enjoyed the sexual tension between Huntress and Catman I guess, but the plot was dull and flimsy.

And does Gail Simone really need to work the threat of rape into every issue she writes ever? She's actually one of the worst writers for shoe-horning the possibility of sexual violence into pretty much any situation where a woman is in peril. Most of the time it just feels grimy and unnecessary.