Batman: The Dark Knight #7

I hope this is the real final final battle with Bane. I know Bats won't kill him, but maybe he'll overdose on his Venom.

David Finch is back to being a co-plotter which I suspect was the case for the last issue as well. I don't think Paul Jenkins has really been taking part much in this thing. I think he's just adding his name to get a bump in his salary.

Batman was getting his ass handed to him by Bane last issue but this issue opens with Batman pulling a disappearing act on the gigantic idiot. Bane thinks he smashes Batman with a rock but what probably happens is that Batman is pushed out of the way by the rock displacing the water and Batman is washed up on shore away from Bane. Probably since it really just looks like Batman was smashed and then disappears.

Batman quickly assesses the situation.

Infinitely stronger? I think that's infinitely improbable! And smarter than the Batman? Because of the drug? He's just a big dumb oaf to begin with! How could Batman make this assessment of Bane's intelligence this quickly? Batman outsmarted him by getting away, right? Batman is stupider than Bane! Oh wait....

Batman searches the one building in the area not destroyed by his fight with Superman and discovers Bane has a prisoner.

Oh, there were clues! I forgot about those. Forget whatever I said about Poison Ivy being a dead end.

Poison Ivy was kidnapped because Bane may have needed her to help make the formula but he definitely needed her to procure the rare flower used in the making of the new Venom. I'm surprised Batman is willing to just let her go. I'm not quite as surprised that he knows about her involvement with the Birds of Prey or that he knows about the Birds of Prey operating in his city. But why allow it? Doesn't he usually frown on other vigilantes that aren't part of his Bat-Family and thus under his thumb a little bit?

Again I missed something though. The Virgin Star Cactus, the rare plant Ivy gave Bane access to, was used to create an antidote for the new Venom. It's what was waiting for him on the Batplane. It needs to be ingested to work, so Batman is going to figure out how to get Bane to open wide. It would be easy if it were Catwoman who needed to ingest the antidote! Or Robin.

Batman and Bane call each other chicken and resort, once again, to fisticuffs. Meanwhile, The Flash outruns the Venom by running too hard. Or something. Who fucking cares? It's all Comic Book Magic anyway! After he outruns the poison, he zips back toward Gotham to help Batman. Superman just stands around in a cornfield in Kansas because the comic book would probably end too quickly if he headed back to help Batman as well.

Back in Gotham, Bane is still going on and on and on about fear. Geez. This entire story did nothing to actually show Batman afraid of anything. Not once was there any emotion involved in the revelations of the things Batman might actually fear. And now he's admitting to himself that he fears Bane. But he fears failure more.

This entire story might have had something interesting to say about Batman and fear but the execution was atrocious. I should go back through and read the story without reading the Narration Boxes just to see if it makes any sense. Because a good comic about revealing Batman's fears would do it without constantly telling the reader about fear over and over and over. And every fucking enemy Batman met in this story harped on fear like they were all in on it together instead of just all randomly out on sprees while cracked out on Venom.

So, where did I leave Bane and Batman?

Oh yeah.

The Flash arrives just in time to catch the vial of antidote. After which, Batman punches Bane in the throat and throws the antidote into Bane's mouth. Yeah, I didn't skip anything. The Flash never gives the antidote back to Batman to toss in Bane's mouth.

I know The Flash could have quickly given it back to Batman. But that's just making excuses for the poor storyboarding.

Batman shoves Bane off the cliff where he just stands at the top with The Flash and they watch Bane, unconscious with his Venom about to wear off, slip into the water and disappear. Batman casually says, "He'll be back." Yeah? Or he's going to drown. For someone who refuses to kill, it seems awfully irresponsible to just let an unconscious man disappear under the water. And why let him go anyway? The Flash could easily run down and drag him off to whatever prison can hold this beast. It seems a huge failure on Batman's part to let Bane go, only to cause more destruction and loss of life. Especially when Batman fears failure. This ending is stupidly duped.

And then there's the epilogue which is probably meant to be a twist (which is why I call this comic "The Dark Knight Shyamalan."

Okay. Raise your hands whoever called it that Jai was the White Rabbit? Everyone!? Well, la de fucking da!

Batman: The Dark Knight #7 Rating: -1 Ranking. That negative one reflects my feelings on the overall storyline. A concept that maybe (MAYBE) could have been interesting but was just put together terribly. Snyder's Batman deals with Batman's fears so much better than this one. SO MUCH BETTER!