Batwoman #25

Dammit. I just realized I'm not going to get the end of the Batman/Batwoman battle. Stupid Zero Year.

When I was a young, lovesick pup, I would walk to Junior High with this refrain stuck in my head:

"Once upon a time I was falling in love, now I'm only falling apart.
Nothing I can do. Total eclipse of the heart.
Once upon a time there was light in my life, now there's only love in the dark.
Nothing I can say. Total eclipse of the heart."

It has nothing to do with love now, just life, but I feel this way again. I know, deep down, that I just don't care enough about my business to keep it from eventually falling apart. I'm not a business person. But I somehow have to find it within myself to make it work so that I can keep enjoying the amount of free time I currently have. I just don't know how I'm going to do that without any passion for business. It's all bullshit to me. Hell, I can barely even talk to people on the phone without feeling sick. Dealing with the world, interacting with people ... it's just way too fucking difficult. Society doesn't work for people who can barely come out of their head. If only I could do all of my interacting from behind this computer screen, I'd be fine. I could work with that. But dealing in reality? Fuck me, it's exhausting. It's draining. Eventually I'm going to lose everything. I hope my sanity goes first.

The worst part is people who can do it, people who enjoy socializing and meeting people and making small talk and interacting, they just don't understand how difficult it is for the rest of us. They don't understand how miraculous a thing like the internet and email and MUSHes have been to our kind. They encourage us to "get out there and live life!" They think we're wasting away in a dark room, hiding from the world. Well, sure, yes. We are hiding from the world because the world is an uncomfortable place where everybody demands you make eye contact and chitchat happily or else they get their fucking feelings hurt. They don't realize how hard it is. Because they want to get out amongst people and they feed off social interactions, they cannot comprehend how much effort it takes for us to just step outside the door. My work week is three days. Some weeks, work is the only time I even leave the house. Four days where I step outside simply to check the mail. Fuck you, world. Stop expecting things from me.

I only added the previous statement because I once promised that y'all would get to see me fall apart in middle age on this blog. So Happy Trainwrecking! It's beginning to look a lot like Crapmas!

Maybe a few dick jokes will cheer me up. Although I'm not sure how many opportunities I'll get for dick jokes in a Batwoman comic book.

Oh! But here's a chance for a poop joke!

At Jeffcon Four, the theme of the costume party was your favorite role-playing character. While it wasn't exactly my favorite and, I believe, may have only lasted for one night of gaming, I decided to dress up as my Cyberpunk character that was in a band. I didn't even remember the name of the character but I figured it would be fun. The single night that I remember playing that campaign was mostly spent sitting around the table writing songs for the band. My character was lead singer of a band called The Misogynists. Their first album was entitled "Duty. Honor. Count..." where the ellipsis were (was?) replaced by a hand in the middle of writing out the phrase "Duty. Honor. Country." on the cover of the album. At the party, I sang their hit song, "Five Fingered Angel." The only other song I remember the band writing that night was "Bitch Bitch Bitch." Here's a bit of Five Fingered Angel:

"Late at night when I'm laying in bed,
I've seen all the shows and my books are all read,
I sit back and think of...my one true love.

She's the only one that can comfort me.
Her gentle massage always sets me free.
She's a part of me...my one true love.

She's my five fingered angel!
She's the only one I trust.
She's my five fingered angel.
And I use her when I must.
She's a five fingered angel and she's mine."

You probably don't want to hear the lyrics to "Bitch Bitch Bitch."

What was I writing about? Oh! Batwoman! Her Uncle Dick has been killed by The Red Hood over in one of them Batmen comic books and now she's come back from West Point for the funeral. Bruce Wayne couldn't make it because he's rich enough to have a butler to send out into the world to do things for him while he luxuriates in his dark, humid batcave. Lucky bastard.

Kate Kane teaches her father the meaning of the term "pathetic fallacy" which has nothing to do with impotence like I thought. Although that might be a good title for the first album of my new band, The Misandrists: "Pathetic Fallac..." with the hand caught writing mid-phrase again! I think they could do a cover of "Bitch Bitch Bitch" but change it to "Prick Prick Prick." The other lyrics wouldn't have to be changed at all! Which I think makes some kind of statement or another about either sexism or The Misogynists not being very good at misogyny.

Meanwhile, Metropolis is shipping off some of their police officers to help out in Gotham during the blackout and super storm. One of those officers is Maggie Sawyer. Hmm. Six years ago? She might be pregnant right now!

At the wake (is that what you call the thing you go to after the viewing and the graveside thingy-thing?) in Wayne Manor, Kate Kane winds up out back in the family graveyard. She runs into Bruce there because where else would he be? In a hole in the ground in his yard? Ha ha! Preposterous! While speaking with Bruce, Kate goes from hauntingly beautiful to scruffily adorable in the space of one page!

I guess we're playing Tag-Team with the artists this issue.

Cousin Bette is also at the wake! As well as Alfred's Awesome German Chocolate Cake™.

Eventually something serious is going to happen. Not that Uncle Phil's death isn't serious! But that took place over in Batman's comic book, so it doesn't count here. I hope the plot revolves around somebody eating all of the cake! That's a Bat-mystery if ever I ever heard of one! For a second, I was going to blame Guy Gardner on stealing the cake that has yet to be stolen and then I realized that the guy I thought was Guy was actually Jacob!

After Bruce kicks everybody out of his house because he's got important Bat-things to do, Kate Kane dresses up in black clothing, covers her face in white and gray paint, and hits the streets to battle the hurricane. Or to teach looters an important lesson about not having the proper supplies at hand before a hurricane hits. Although I think a Plasma TV and a twelve back of Budweiser probably aren't essentials. Which means she'll have to be judge and jury when she picks the people she wants to beat up in the name of justice! Not real justice but her version of justice.

Oh! She should go after these guys because they've already worked it out in their own conversation that they're crossing a line!

One of these men works for a guy that's currently out of town. He's decided to rob his boss but he doesn't realize the guy's kid is at home! And the kid has some masking tape and he knows how to use it! To, you know, spell help on the window so that Kate Kane can see it and come to his rescue. Which she does! But then the burglars find her and the boy trying to leave! But they don't just let them leave for some reason! Instead, the burglar decides to stab Kate with his gun.

I guess he doesn't know that guns are projectile weapons and you're not supposed to get within disarming distance of your victim while holding one. Come to think of it, I don't think any comic book criminals know that.

Kate disarms the first guy and takes his gun and the jewels but the other burglars show up. She dives out the window and into the apartment complex's swimming pool where she takes a bullet to her shoulder while underwater. If she were Batman, she'd probably stay under water for ten minutes until the burglars thought she was dead and then she'd do a back-flip out of the pool to break all of their legs and ribs and jaws. But she's not Batman, so she just plays dead while floating on the water until they pull her out of the pool. Then she defeats them just in time for Maggie Sawyer to show up and fall in love.

Actually, Maggie and Kate don't really notice each other until they're all back at the precinct. Her father picks her up and chastises her for what she did until she falls asleep. And then once she's asleep, he's able to tell her how proud he is of her. Fucking fathers.

Batwoman #25 Rating: No change. No change because Kate was supposed to be kicking Batman's ass this month instead of eating finger sandwiches in a graveyard talking about how murderers need a special brand of justice! Although she did steal one of Bruce's motorcycles. That was nice.