Batgirl #24

Don't worry, Jim. No jury of fathers in America will convict you.

I didn't realize until just now that Batgirl has been living a stereotypical junior high school girl's life. She's been mallratting with her best friend forever. She's got a gang of mean girls giving her trouble. She's been acting super crushy over a boy. And her father has been trying to ground her for fighting with her brother. And now her father just came through on a father's favorite threat and shot her boyfriend. Next her father will probably find the fake diary she keeps hidden in plain sight just to piss him off if he ever gets snoopy.

Dear Diary,
I'm not a virgin anymore. A guy totally put his penis into my vagina and it felt so much like the way sex feels. Oh yeah. It was totally the way sex feels. And more! When I pulled his pants down, his thingy was all thingy shaped and springy. Then we got the vagina funnel out and maneuvered our parts into the position they should be in when babies are made. You know the one, Diary? Where the man is on top? I think? If that's how it's done, that's what we did. I'm a woman now! And it was incredible! Or melancholy. Maybe it was both. If it sounds like I got some stuff wrong about the sexual act of sexing, it's because it was so incredible that I've forgotten the details. But I'm totally not a virgin anymore, dad. What a great day! I mean night. We totally did it at night.

Sorry, Ginger Ninja. But Commissioner Gordon has to think about all the families. And in this case, he was mostly concerned about his own and how Ricky was trying to defile it with his penis. Also I think Ricky was threatening to kill some one and Gordon is probably trained to stop that from happening.

When did the term "ginger" become the de rigueur term for redheads? It seemed to me that it was an insult for about 5% of its use before it was accepted by the ginger community and its insulting power taken away. At least in America. Maybe it has harsher connotations in England where it probably has more potential to be abused as a marker of ethnicity. When I first became aware of the term (I'm horrible with time so I can't put any kind of date on it), it seemed to be specifically about a lighter shade of red, almost an orange or a color between blond and red. So I learned it as a descriptor to help specify shade rather than an insult. Now people seem to, more and more, use it for any red head as I did here and in my previous commentary simply because the name "Ginger Ninja" just sounds too sweet to my ears. Anyway, ginger has lost its power as a derogatory term so whenever I meet any of the devil's spawns wandering the streets flaunting their freedom in the face of God's almighty will, I will usually call them "tomato goblins." But not out loud! I don't want to suffer one of their various curses!

Back to the comic book, Harvey Bullock backs up Gordon's shooting because that's what cops do. You don't go against one of your own! Gordon may very well have been justified in the shooting but it's not like he'd ever be investigated like a civilian would. But that's the civilian's own fault anyway! If you want to be able to shoot people and not worry about going to jail, you should have joined the police force! Or the marines!

Good thing Babs decided not to wear the Batgirl suit tonight. It'll just look like she was trying to stop her boyfriend from doing something stupid.

Instead of just allowing herself to be unmasked, Barbara begins to kick cop ass. I guess she's more afraid of what her father might say than getting a dozen bullets lodged in her torso. She takes down three cops and not one of the dozen or more officers on the scene begins shooting. These guys have a lot of self-control! Barbara takes down a few more while making plans for later that week. She's really good at multi-tasking! Remember that issue where she was thinking about her shopping list while being drowned by an assailant? Her powers of concentration are amazing!

So Barbara's plans are to take down Knightfall once and for all since she believes Knightfall is behind all of this. Her evidence is that Tyrell had an expensive laser gun. Right! The police often need less evidence than that to determine which suspect to hound until they confess, so Babs is already a better detective than her father. She did train under the World's Darkest Knight! Who is also a master detective!

Oh yeah. That's the last half of her plan. Hopefully she can accomplish it all before a cop shoots her.

Barbara Gordon flees the scene screaming, "I hate you, Daddy! I hate you hate you hate you!" But she doesn't get very far before Detective McKenna (who doesn't have a debilitating neck injury after all) stops her and freely hands over all of her information on Knightfall. That must be Barbara's Oracle skills coming out. The best retriever of information in the business, computer or no computer. And then McKenna, suspecting the Ginger Ninja might actually be a Batgirl alias, lets her go to hunt down Knightfall. McKenna was desperate to bring down Charise Carnes but the police just don't have enough evidence to identify her as Knightfall. So McKenna's best bet is probably to let the Bats take care of it.

Also, Ricky isn't dead yet. He's clinging to life. So maybe Babs can forgive him later, and maybe Jim can forgive Batgirl later, and maybe some hugs will be distributed.

Babs feels like her life is falling apart and she's blaming her father for more and more of the chaos. But it's not like Jim's life is full of roses and candy bars.

This panel makes me feel so sad for Commissioner Gordon. And then I remember it was his choice to drive his wife away, shoot his daughter's boyfriend, and give birth to a serial killer. Maybe he should have thought of the consequences of his actions!

You know that Sesame Street song that goes, "These are the people in my neighborhood! In my neighborhood! In my neigh-bor-hoo-ood!"? Am I the only one that walks around my neighborhood singing, "I am the people in my neighborhood! In my neighborhood! In my neigh-bor-hoo-ood!"?

Jim keeps trying to get in contact with Babs but she's avoiding his calls. Until she decides she needs to speak with him to help Ricky's mom be able to see her son who is in a coma in the hospital. On the night she finally heads over to dad's place to keep lying to him about her life, Commissioner Gordon is attacked by The Mirror. Oh no. Not that idiot! I hope he's come up with a new schtick other than "Look in a mirror! See your true self! Ah ha ha!" Meanwhile his victim just goes, "Hmm, I didn't realize I was getting a zit on my chin."

Turns out The Mirror isn't the only one there. Knightfall's entire Team B is there. She calls them the Disgraced because they were all beaten by Batgirl: Mirror, Gretel, Grotesque. Maybe her Team A is also part of the Disgraced since Bleak Michael is standing guard and Bonebreaker is inside. They all got their asses handed to them too although Batgirl had Batwoman's help that time. And obviously Katharsis isn't going to be there. But you know who is going to be there?!

Good thing her van doubles as the Batgirl Cave.

Batgirl #24 Rating: +1 Ranking. My favorite part of this storyline is when Barbara is dealing with her family problems. Hopefully when the third part finally comes out in December, half of the issue will be Barbara kicking The Disgraced's asses and the other half will be her and her father forgiving each other. I really wouldn't mind if she told him that she was Batgirl. I think the main reason she's kept the secret is because of the need to keep Batman's identity safe. But now that he's shown that he hardly cares about keeping everybody's identities safe with his Joker secrets and tying Bruce Wayne so closely to Batman with Batman Incorporated, she might as well go for it!