Batman #105

[cyberghostface]

 

Comments

[donnblake]

Hmm. Some development for Bao, and a set-up for a rival vigilante that goes beyond "You're not killing enough criminals." I am intrigued and cautiously optimistic about this story.

[spider_man6]

Same. It's definitely interesting...

[lordultimus]

See, I'd respond much more positively if DC also hadn't published stuff like this just a year ago:



I just want actual consistency with the character, but given DC's intense desire to have it's cake and eat it too, I don't see it happening.

[lbd_nytetrayn]

I feel like if anyone could get away with it, it's Harley, if they were to lean into it more. A lot of people who lose their direction are confused about, don't know what they want to be, and Harley feels like she could be a more extreme version of that.

[lordultimus]

My point is that DC DOESN'T lean into it, and actively avoids doing so.

[dan_ingram]

I don't mind that Bat-Dick is no more, but I do wish we had a Batman who's reaction to mass murder isn't "Hey, wanna join?"

Clownhunter isn't too far gone.

Ghost-Maker killed a bunch of bad guys in a bar to make a point.

So yeah, he oughta have his ass thrown in jail.

[jaxjyls]

He regularly teams up Harley and Todd is now accepted into the family, so Batman pretty loose with his rules nowadays. I hate it.

[janegray]

I dunno, I rather like his newly pragmatic approach. To me, it's the closest thing to a semi-sensible outcome we can hope for.

Ideally, Batman would send Ghost Maker to jail, and he'd stay there.

But we all know for a fact that jail/Arkham can't hold the villains. It's been established too thoroughly for too long. There are countless stories over the decades where Bruce sends people to prison/Arkham, and they casually escape soon after, usually leaving a trail of dead guards on their way out. It sucks, but this is the context writers have to work with.

So a Batman who insists solely on sending people there when at this point he knows damn well how ineffective that is is... well. The definition of insanity.

Obviously, when there is no alternative, he's got to do it. It's at least marginally better than not arresting them at all. Occasionally Arkham manages to hold them in for a few months, better than nothing.

But if there is a reasonable chance that the villain might be talked into stopping doing crimes, it's much more pragmatic to let them skip punishment. It's unsatisfying, because they effectively get away scot free, but it's the only approach that could actually result in no more killings.

[beeyo]

Without thinking about it too hard, which I'm not going to do, I really liked this episode.

[janegray]

This is exactly what I wanted to see in the Bao-Harley confrontation. I'm extremely pleased with the outcome.