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

[superfangirl1]

Birds of prey #113

Comments

[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.