Tuesday, October 25, 2016

Batgirl and the Birds of Prey #3


I wish DC Comics had a Batgirl and the Birds of Prey Battling in Their Underwear Variant Cover.

My biggest laugh of the month so far was reading this headline from the sidebar of Facebook: "Undiscovered moons may lurk around Uranus." Holy shit. I'm still giggling about that. This anecdote brought to you by the number 69 and the letters "How fucking mature am I, right?"

Holy shit! I just remembered that I thought Supergirl was going to lose its charm by going to CW where they seem to think lying is the greatest sin anybody can commit except that everybody in their shows lie all of the time and only care about lying when they've caught another person lying to them and they can judge the other person because of it! But after that 3rd episode, I'm just as in love with the show as I was last season! Wonder Woman is president?! Come on! I mean, she's actually an alien so that was a misstep. Couldn't they have just kept hinting at the fact that she was Wonder Woman like they did with her "you should see my other jet" line?! And Mon-el?! And Maggie Sawyer?! I mean, I guessed who each of them were immediately but that's what's so cool about the show. Technically what it's doing is a low-rent virtual reality version of jerking off comic book nerds as they watch the show. I know I came in my pants upon the revelation of M'gann! It's so good that I'm hoping the writers of Arrow will take notice and think, "Maybe our show should be more like their show and we should give up this theme of 'Everybody Lies and It's Not All Right At All To Ever Lie' that Guggenheim came up with because of that terrible experience he had at the Junior High School Sadie Hawkins Dance where the girl who asked him out never showed because she asked a better looking guy out and went with him without telling Marc. I mean, probably because of that.

Anyway, I should probably get to the Birds of Prey before I begin whining about the changes in the timeline in Flash and Arrow and how Legends of Tomorrow has gone the nonsensical Voyagers! route of "saving history". Sure, I still like the show! I liked Voyagers! too! But I was less sophisticated about time travel when I was eleven so I didn't judge the show for how stupid the premise was. Now I sit and watch Legends of Tomorrow between fits of joy at seeing the Justice Society and fits of anger at how time must constantly be fixed! I can't wait until the Legends wind up in a moment in time that's so crucial to about twenty different timelines that they run into versions of themselves from nineteen other timelines who all insist that the changes they want to make are the correct changes!

The issue begins in the past when Tiny Dinah decided to run away from her Foster Parents because all Foster Parents are terrible people. Not that I've ever met any of them but I've seen all of the movies and television shows. Foster Parents are the worst! Like Mr. Drummond! What a fucking dick that guy was. And the football player who took in Emmanuel Lewis! Ugh! So awful! And the white guy on that The Brady Bunch back door pilot who took in the black kid and the Mexican kid and the Asian kid! What was up with the seventies and early eighties airing shows about white families taking care of minorities? What kind of imperialist propaganda was that shit?! Was the message that minorities needed white people to set them on the right path?! Although they also seemed to think white kids needed some kind of multicultural experience too which is why a lot of families had black maids.

The Birds are researching Fenice in the Clock Tower and they're looking quite realistic. No male gaze allowed here! They're drawn so realistically that I can smell the sweaty superhero funk that must be wafting out of their dank leather costumes. So gross. My male gaze never thought it wouldn't be interested in a Birds of Prey comic book!

The Birds of Prey find some information that leads them to a Mexican Restaurant where they believe Fenice's next hit will be dining. They should have read the final page of their last issue! Then they'd know where Fenice's snake gang really are.


Batgirl ignores the door of the poor, innocent, family restaurant. What the hell? Does she get a cut of every Wayne Window and Wall Repair job she creates?

Oracle texts Batgirl another Riddler Would Be So Fucking Embarrassed Clue as to where the Birds should really be focusing their attention. Oracle must be annoyed that the Birds are so terrible at figuring stuff out. Although shouldn't the bad guy be happy that the good guy got the wrong location?! I'm not sure I'll ever understand the self-destructive nature of bad guys in comic books. It's always, "My success wouldn't mean anything if the good guy didn't have a fair chance of stopping me!" Although they never have success because they constantly insist on playing fair so maybe they should rethink their methods?

Oracle really must want the Snake Gang to fail because Oracle had them wait for hours before attacking Gordon and Santo. So after Oracle texts Batgirl to make sure she knows where to go, Oracle sends the Snake People up from the cellar to kill Gordon and Santo.


When has a mudroom ever been an indicator of wealth?!

The Birds of Prey arrive just in time to save all of the lives. Not that Gordon was in any danger but Gordon did have a few Red Shirt cops hanging about who are lucky to still be alive. Now that the fighting has commenced, so can the Battle Non Sequiturs! After Asp calls in a bunch of snakes to attack, Batgirl says, "Too bad your backup doesn't have legs." That doesn't make any sense because they have fangs and poison! Although Batgirl is kicking Asp (hee hee) at the time, so I guess that's where the wit comes in. Then Lady Viper is all, "I like a woman not afraid to hit a lady." I don't know what that's supposed to mean although it does give Huntress the chance to say, "You're no lady." Well, she's half-lady! The other half is snake. The bottom half is snake. I bet if I dated a snake lady and we hit it off and went back to her place and began to get busy, I would completely embarrass myself by not being able to find her cloaca.

Dinah, not wanting to be left out on the horrible battle one-liners, says to Copperhead, "Not so fast. Guys usually buy me dinner before the hugging part." Black Canary is such a hug prostitute!

During the fight, Lady Viper, Asp, and Copperhead escape with Santo. But Huntress kills Cottonmouth to save Jim Gordon's life. Batgirl is all, "Why did you do that?!" And Commissioner Gordon is all, "Thanks a lot, Batgirl! I love you too!" And then Jim Gordon slaps handcuffs on Huntress and arrests her for murder. Just kidding! That added bit of stupid comic book drama actually doesn't happen this issue! What a relief!

Oh, that Little Dinah growing up on the mean streets of Gotham story has been going on in the background but I've been ignoring it. It turns out that she became an expert at some kind of martial arts by the time she was sixteen and, when she finally let the pain of abandonment go, she developed her Sonic Scream. So I guess she didn't get it from Team 7? Maybe they just enhanced it by making her fuck Kurt Lance who had Super Power Enhancing Semen.

The Huntress leaves because it's always better to spend way too many issues on building trust between teammates than to have them trust each other too quickly. That would be too unbelievable! It makes more sense to spend five or six issues having the characters hate each other before they hug at the end. Or in Dinah's case, before she gets dinner bought for her and she hugs at the end.

The issue ends with Santo finding out that Fenice is an old lover of his. Not old as in elderly! Just old as in from the past! I guess that's a good enough shocker to end the issue on although it's mostly a big yawn for nearly everybody who isn't Santo.

The Ranking!
0! That means it's average! Not great. Not terrible. Just a comic book that people will like if they want to like it. Nothing spectacular going on here!

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