That One Time Superman Was The "Heavy" (noun) On The Birds Of Prey.

[superfangirl1]

Birds of prey #113

Comments

[shadowpsykie]

i forget... did they ever resolve what happened? there were indications that Charlie's power's were magic based (hence why black alice could borrow them) and that implied there might have been a way to undo it...

superman was kinda a jerk here...

was this a Gail issue?

[proteus_lives]

I've always thought that the main reason for Supeman's jerkiness is because it happened in Metropolis.

Projecting his guilt for not being there.

[superfangirl1]

The writer for this comic was Sean McKeever. :)

[shadowpsykie]

hmmm sadly i loved his other stuff... this scene was... yeah, though not all of the arc was bad.... did he also write Oracle vs Joker?

[ibmiller.livejournal.com]

No, that was Tony Bedard. I actually really liked McKeever's five issues - the resolution to the arc makes everything make sense to me.

..

[thepinkperil]

No they never resolved the Metropolis or Charlie's story. BoP ended with Babs shipping her off with Huntress then an off note in the new run about being in foster care. Her powers are part meta part magic based. She and Black Alice are also half sisters. The father was never named.

But with the reboot, Charlie and Lori are probably Limbo bound.

Also Superman is always kind of a dick.

Re: ..

[pyrotwilight]

"She and Black Alice are also half sisters. The father was never named."

Umm, I don't think we've ever definitively heard how the two are related aside from the fact that they are somehow.

Re: ..

[thepinkperil]

Sorry, I meant that as two different statements. My bad.

[stolisomancer]

Ah, yeah, that year or so where DC seemed to think superdickery.com was an instruction manual. That was fun to watch.

[golden_orange]

To be fair, from what I'm seeing they... kinda vapourised a whole city block of Metropolis there.

Not surprised he's kind of pissed at them.

[mrstatham]

Yeah, I don't get this. He's telling it to them straight - They were out of their league and they screwed up. And they did, frankly. That Oracle deployed Charlie, of all people, into a situation like that just didn't work at all, to me.

That said, McKeever seemed to be tapdancing on the 'who can be a bigger asshole' with this story arc. Superman verges on it here, but then Oracle's an ass later in the story, and then Charlie starts acting like a complete fucking child because of Lori.

[jlbarnett]

they weren't really out of their league were they? I mean they did stop the thing. All Misfit needed to do was toss the driver out of the thing and it's no longer a threat. I suppose if she can't open it she'd need to sit there and punch the driver every time she started to some to but that's not that big a deal.

[mrstatham]

They kind of are - And Oracle admits it right there in the follow up pages after the disaster; They thought they were chasing a gun runner delivering weapons to Metropolis, before said delivery turns into the bubblegum-pink Eva wannabe.

And from what I recall, it isn't as simple as getting the girl out - the machine is apparently sealed shut and already going into some sort of destructive mode before Misfit screws up and hit the button.

As others have said, it is simply set up to make the Birds look lousy, so this is really bad writing, but they are presented as being out of their league because Oracle made the false assumption about the mission and Misfit is made to look even more idiotic than usual - though that's in line with her characterisation anyway, IMO.

[starwolf_oakley]

Did Misfit actually push the button? I never got if she did or didn't. Either way, its awful to think a whole bunch of innocent people died because Misfit is an idiot.

[espanolbot]

I think that she did. On the basis that she's the kind of person who would.

[icon_uk]

Yeah, have to say that, as shown, Misfit actually DOES seem to be the one responsible for exacerbating the end result.

[mrstatham]

I don't think she's quite stupid enough to pull a Homer and hit a button based on eenie-meenie-minie-mo, but she is stupid enough to follow her gut and hit a button that 'looks good'. That's the kind of vibe I got from reading her character from Gail onwards.

[glprime]

To add to the "Gah, Supes, be more of a dick?" discussion:

Imagine you're the most powerful meta in the world, and you've trained for years to have the skills to wield your abilities to your fullest potential, and even YOU call in help for stuff beyond you (especially when civilians are involved).

And then a couple of norms and one untrained youth screws up something way over their power level and it costs dozens if not hundreds of lives.

You'd be rather pissed too.

Supes calls people out and lectures his peers from a self-appointed seat of authority because amongst the metahumans of the DCU, he's one of maybe five or so people that CAN. If he doesn't try and control the actions of the community, it can all spiral far out of their limited control.

[mrstatham]

Yeah, this. Barbara might be as experienced as Clark is, frankly, but she made a noob mistake in dispatching a complete idiot like Charlie in there who was stupid enough to disregard orders and actually push a fucking button when she was plainly told not to.

The others, I don't have any issue with because they all have experience in their own ways, but Charlie always, always stuck out like a sore thumb to me because of the way she was introduced and used on the team, first by Gail and then others. She never worked for me.

[okkult3000]

What sick man sends babies to fight Superman?!

[icon_uk]

Off the top of my head; Luthor (He wouldn't enjoy it, but wouldn't hesitate if he thought it worthwhile), Brainiac, Toyman, Sleez...

[okkult3000]

http://wiki.teamfortress.com/w/images/1/1a/Heavy_sandwichtaunt04.wav

[icon_uk]

Umm... well... ummm... that was.... random...

[okkult3000]

http://wiki.teamfortress.com/w/images/4/43/Pyro_autoonfire01.wav

[blackruzsa]

....
I gotta say, this is kind of Misfit's fault, isn't it? That is, if the explosion was a direct effect of her pressing the button.

[fifthie]

This story would be better if Barbara hadn't fucked up and gotten an unknown number of people killed, and then Superman hadn't been a huge douche about it.

[filkertom]

This.

[mrstatham]

I still don't think Superman's necessarily wrong. Barbara does fuck up here quite severely by dispatching her most inexperienced agent as part of this - But I don't see the issue with what Superman's saying. Barbara fucked up royally and needed to be called out on it. I know there's a certain element of cause and effect, there, but I don't see why Barbara should be presented as being infalliable - And for me, this instance works better than the number of screwups she had under Simone.

But as it is, I can't stand this story because of Misfit. She's the worst addition to the Birds under Simone, because she was never really presented as being likable or allowed to fail, just like Oracle. And here, she gets a number of people killed, whines about it for a few pages - and then it's pretty much forgotten about, while she gets to carry on and be a brat over Black Alice coming in. That said, I think McKeever's characterisation sucks in general, here, save for Superman, who frankly, should be stern when it's needed. That the Birds actually shut down and argue amongst each other and take sides after what goes on doesn't feel like them at all.

[baxter2814]

I think it's one of those Catch-22's of bad characterization: Superman is totally justified in being pissed, but he still gives off a jerkass vibe because, well, he's chewing out Barbara. And he usually doesn't chew out Barbara, because she's usually not this much of an idiot. So Babs' idiocy - legitimate excuse for idiocy - guilt for idiocy + Superman and Barbara's past relationship + Superman reacting logically to idiocy = weird situation that makes Supes look like a jerk.

So yeah, basically Barbara is OOC here, but Supes isn't, which causes dissonance, 'cause you want to sympathize with Barbara. This is why bad characterization is by far my biggest pet peeve out of all writing mistakes — it causes such a domino effect.

[fifthie]

I still don't think Superman's necessarily wrong.

I'm not so much saying Superman's wrong, just that he's a huge douche about it.

Like, look at his face in the first panel of the last scan. That is the face of someone who is being a colossal douche.

That is not the kind of face I ever want to see Superman make.

[fifthie]

Like if you have to have someone give a huge douchey lecture about how someone fucked up and they're terrible and their one fuckup erases all the good they've ever done, use Batman, that's what he's for.

Superman just like... shouldn't be about that, even when someone did legitimately fuck up really big.

[ibmiller.livejournal.com]

Well...I liked it. I thought Misfit's actions here and later towards Lori made sense, given how Barbara was treating her and her upbringing. And I thought Barbara's actions made sense given that Canary had just left and become part of another team.

Plus, Huntress and Zinda were awesome together.

But I'm very predisposed to like it - I really like McKeever (though he's not done anything since this I cared much about, and his Teen Titans kind of annoyed me - but I don't know anything about them, so possibly that's why), I really like Nicola Scott, and I really like Misfit.

The lack of resolution I chalked up to changing writers and typical comic book story structure - it had enough resolution for my happiness, with Babs admitting her failures and the team pulling together.

[jaybee3]

I know we're supposed to view Superman as engaging in Superdickery here but I think he had a right to be POed. Babs and her team were inept and in HIS city (where there ARE other heroes Barbara could have employed) and especially for even letting Misfit anywhere near this operation which led to innocent people not only getting killed but entirely vaporized. Also in-universe I can't help but think that in DCU time this takes place not long after Barbara, in one of those arrogant power-trips she never gets called out on, attempted to BLACKMAIL Lois Lane (aka this man's wife) in order to protect herself (Babs) even though she had no evidence Lois was going to do/reveal anything (and she knew Lois is close to Bruce and yet has never ratted him or the other Bat-Crew out). She threatened to reveal Clark Kent is Superman to the entire world which would have opened up every single person Clark cares about to danger or death - all so she could protect her Oracle persona (although if she had carried through with it the entire Superhero community including Bruce and Dinah would have disowned her). So with that back knowledge and then following this fiasco in Metropolis (even though one story was written by Simone and this one by McKeever) I think Superman has a right to give Babs the stink eye.

Not saying this story was great to begin with. I really like Spider Love Loves Mary Jane but I can't think of any of McKeever's DC work (and he was one of the writers of Countdown too) that I liked.

[fifthie]

Barbara, in one of those arrogant power-trips she never gets called out on, attempted to BLACKMAIL Lois Lane (aka this man's wife) in order to protect herself (Babs) even though she had no evidence Lois was going to do/reveal anything (and she knew Lois is close to Bruce and yet has never ratted him or the other Bat-Crew out). She threatened to reveal Clark Kent is Superman to the entire world which would have opened up every single person Clark cares about to danger or death - all so she could protect her Oracle persona (although if she had carried through with it the entire Superhero community including Bruce and Dinah would have disowned her).

Whoa

well

That all sounds pretty much fucking terrible

[jaybee3]

Yeah, I actually think it was the lowest point for the character that I've ever read and it was in the middle of a storyline (with the female Spy Smasher, I think) in which she kicked ass. It is one of those story point in Birds of Prey where I can see where Gail Simone was trying to do (to reveal the extent of Oracle's desperation and how awesome Lois Lane is) but in the execution Barbara came out looking horrible and not terribly intelligent for someone who's supposed to be a genius with years of experience in the super-heroing game (and short-sighted - as I said if she followed through with her threat to expose Superman the whole super-hero community would have turned out her and so would all her friends within it - what price Oracle, then?).

[icon_uk]

I think it's posted on here somewhere if you want to go looking for it.

[ruhig_knight]

....Dammn, Babs.

Also agree on McKeever's DC stuff. Some time after he left DC, I remember him stating in an interview that his DC stuff (mostly Teen Titans) was heavily editorially mandated and quit in protest to all the gore he had to write. He was also upset that one of his favorite characters (Eddie) was going to "stay dead," when McKeeve originally planned for Eddie to die and come back fully powered or something like that.

[keeva]

I think you mean Superman was being the "Heavy" (noun).

[superfangirl1]

You are right and thanks for the correction. ;)

[thanekos]

the more I see Misfit, the more I think death by Prometheus would've been so apt for her, somehow.

It'd certainly gel with " This is Batgirl. She died. Don't be Batgirl. "/" Fine, I won't BE Batgirl.. I'll be someone else! " in a way.

[eyz]

Oh I remember that time!
It's when in my eyes, the ol' BoP book jumped the shark without Simone and I started checkin' out Secret Six instead :P