Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #6 (March 1993)

Cover with sealed bag hawking all the goodies inside.

"All the goodies" basically means "a comic book with a pretty shitty 'poster' as well." I haven't scanned any of the posters because they haven't been anything special. It's not like they had moving pictures that looked more like Brundlefly teleportation accidents or were full of homoerotic imagery like the alternate cover of this issue.

Just imagine two men fucking and that's what this cover looks like when you pull the tab.

That technological cover is clear enough that you can see how Robin wants to stay and watch the two men fuck but The Huntress thinks he's too young and tries to drag him out. Even though she also wants to watch them fuck. She's horny but very responsible.

Last issue ended when Robin's dick decided that stopping the bad guys and saving The Huntress were less important than rescuing a girl who seemed like maybe she was sort of interested in putting her hand down his pants. If you didn't read last issue, you might be giving Robin the benefit of the doubt and giving me no benefits at all (which I don't deserve even if I'm going to tell you why you're wrong about giving those benefits to Robin and any Christian charity in the United States) and thinking, "Well, the girl must have been in immediate danger so of course, as a hero, he'd throw out the earlier plans to blow everything to shit." But this girl wasn't in any danger at all. He actually put her in more danger by trying to rescue her since stopping the bad guys and saving The Huntress would have resulted in the girl he wants to fuck being rescued as well. You might think I'm judging Robin here but I get it. When you're a hormonal teenager, you never think you're going to get laid and you do some really stupid fucking shit in the service of possibly getting laid, no matter how terrible the odds are. Sometimes you even miss out on getting laid because you don't quite understand "sunk costs" as a teenager and you continue to pursue the person you've put loads of time into trying to fuck when other people are sidling up to you and basically throwing their genitals in your face but you've gone genital blind pursuing the first person. That's a common problem, right? It wasn't just me acting like a professional soccer goalie deflecting tons of pussy from going into my net because I was so focused on one quite specific pussy? And by "pussy", I mean "person I was totally in love with", of course. I'm not a creep!

This issue begins with Tim getting caught trying to put the lady's hand on his junk.

Rookie mistake, Tim! You don't want to force an experience like that! What you want is surprise hand on your dick! Like that time I was at a party and this girl (I was still a boy! Actually we were late teens!) followed me into the bathroom and then embraced me to kiss. She slid her hands down the back of my pants and into my underwear and I was all, "Whoa! That's cool!" But then guess what she did?! She slid her hands around to the front and grabbed my pee pee! Then I was all, "Ultra whoa! This is way cooler!" But there wasn't a lock on the door to this bathroom at my friend Chris's house and I still really had to piss so I broke it off and later we went across the street to a local library where we didn't have any sex at all even when she pulled down my pants and exposed my weenie to the entire book-loving library world (it was like super late at night though so don't get all freaked out about some daycare kids seeing this smut!) and then I pulled her pants down and she was all, "Do you have a condom?" And guess what? I didn't! So I pulled our pants back up and we made out a bunch and I didn't think until much later that she probably wanted to at least give me a hand job! Still acting like a soccer player but this time I basically scored an own goal! Fucking idiot!

So anyway, as I was saying, Tim didn't get a hand job because some Russian mob guys interrupted. Was The Huntress off somewhere getting a hand job? I don't remember. Let's find out together!

Maybe? Is this how women react to hand jobs?

I'm saying "hand job" because that's much less violent sounding than "finger bang" and I'm no misogynist! Also I'm an American so I'm pro creating jobs. Oh, but if I'm American than I should be pro guns as well and I should be totally find with "finger bang"! Maybe I'm just confused and I just like thinking about a woman getting a hand job and then gasping and spitting out a bunch of saliva bubbles. What I don't like is some weird guy with a Guy Gardner haircut looking on.

Ariana seems confused by Robin saving her but not saving any of the other women being forced to package heroin. Also she's been drugged so she might not even realize all of this is actually happening.

So when G.I. Joe told me "knowing was half the battle," the other half of the battle was "getting laid"?

KGBeast hasn't immediately killed The Huntress because his boss wants to know who she's told about his counterfeiting operation. He's all, "You are being just a woman! Surely you have being told a man about what you are being up to being!" And The Huntress is all, "Get fucked. Men suck!" And he's all, "I am being a man! KGBeast! Being choking her until she being spitting bubbles!" That's when that panel I scanned earlier happens. She wasn't having an orgasm at all! She was nearly dying! These comic book artists seriously have a hard time drawing hot women in distress. It always looks like they're coming their brains out! Or is that just me? Insert a pic of David Mitchell in a Nazi uniform with the words underneath, "Am I the grossie?"

I haven't mentioned that I'm currently reading Infinite Jest yet this review so here's where I mention it. One thing I was really surprised by it was what it was about, having only known of the book as a lengthy thing full of endnotes written by a guy who eventually hung himself from his back deck. So I was pretty surprised when I realized the genre was "Sci-fi tennis." At first I kept thinking, "Are all of these characters mutants? Why does he keep mentioning their 'bigger arm'? And then I was all, 'Oh yeah! They're all training to be tennis pros and tennis pros basically just use the one arm while the other one atrophies!'" Also there's a league of wheelchair bound assassins! I bet you want to read it now!

I also just recently finished John Steinbeck's Cup of Gold, Stephen King's Night Shift, and Kurt Vonnegut's Jailbird. Two out of three of those were a re-read. The only thing I didn't accomplish since my last comic book review that makes me mighty ashamed to have not accomplished was shitting directly in Donald Trump's stupid fat mouth while J.D. Vance watches a cries from the corner of the room.

Now somebody's going to accuse me of having Trump Derangement Syndrome. But that's okay because the only reason people accuse other people of that is so that they don't have to try to rationalize all of Trump's stupidity into intelligence sounding nonsense. It's just an invented retort because they can't say, "You obviously see the rational truth of the situation but I have to continue to pretend to see a brilliant leader and intelligent person even though there's nothing but Fox News propaganda that I can point to to justify that belief. So instead, I'll accuse you of being mentally ill with a made-up mental illness. Ha ha! You idiot!" I sometimes feel so bad for these people who went all-in, lost everything, but now continue to sit penniless at the poker table pretending they're holding any cards. All these people apparently thought the little kid who said the Emperor was naked was the villain of the story. They're all out here wanting to be the people who saw the Emperor's wang but pretending it was covered by slacks. Y'all fuckin' stupid.

My word! *fans myself with a delicate lace-lined fan*

Before Russian Guy Gardner can carry out his, um, threat?, Robin kicks in the door and begins kicking ass. He distracts KGBesast with his face while The Huntress kicks the shit out of knock-off Gardner while hanging tied up from the rafters. She throws out some feminist quips while doing so but since this comic book is from 1993, it's not woke and those quips shouldn't exist. So I'll just pretend they don't for the sake of the dumb-ass morons who think they're being criticized anytime anybody mentions any sort of compassion, justice, or community awareness. As if superhero comic books haven't always been pretty much 100% that for their entire history!

Robin and The Huntress flee from KGBeast but do not leave the building because Tim's dick is all, "Wait! Wait! We still need to get laid!" So Tim is all, "We can't leave yet! We have to save the girl we thought was dead who isn't dead because she's here packaging heroin!" And The Huntress is all, "Look, if risking your life for getting laid is that important to you, I'll jerk you off when we get out of here." But Bruce Wayne didn't train Tim Drake to flee from a potential fuck possibility! They go back for the girl.

Meanwhile, the Ghost Dragons show up to murder basically everybody. They're a bit late. There's only 12 pages left in this six issue series!

He put too many skill points in "Care What Other People Think of You" and not enough in "Self-Preservation."

I don't know why people would put skill points in "Care What Other People Think of You" but I see it all the time so I guess people love to pump that skill. I think the majority of pedestrians who get struck by cars and killed in Portland at night during rain storms by drivers who were not being careless or drunk are examples of this Russian guy's imbalance of skill point distribution.

Should I explain myself better before I'm eaten alive by people who think I'm defending cars and not pedestrians? I'm just pointing out that there's way too many people who have really low scores in "Self-Preservation" and they tend to cross streets without a light or a crosswalk in the dark and the rain while expecting cars to stop for them because why wouldn't they? But they don't realize that we have far too many cars with the brightest fucking headlights in the world now who often blind cars driving in the opposite direction so that with being blinded, being dark, and having sheets of rain come down, it's much harder to see somebody in the street especially when it's a surprise person in the middle of the street because they're nearly impossible to see until it's too late. I'm not pro car! I'm pro people wanting to love being alive enough to take the proper care to keep themselves alive and not expect everybody else to keep them alive! Be careful out there, my fellow pedestrians! And bike riders! And car controllers too!

King Snake winds up battling KGBeast for the big climactic battle since we've seen KGBeast is simply too much for The Huntress and Robin. I kind of like that because we rarely see when the heroes have limits that they don't eventually, heroically, overcome them. But here, there's like eight pages left and The Huntress and Robin are fucking legging it. No way they'll wind up having to beat KGBeast, right?

The Huntress and Robin run into Ghost Dragon Lynx as they're escaping with Ariana. That's a big climactic fight that's more their experience level.

Hmm. That climactic battle was a bit anticlimactic. Maybe The Huntress will battle KGBeast!

King Snake defeats KGBeast just like he knew he could. I guess he was right about being the greatest assassin in the DC Universe (between him and KGBeast, of course. Later, I'm sure he'll be killed by Deathstork or Lobo as he tries to prove his title). The Huntress shows up with a flamethrower and threatens to burn all the counterfeit money if the Ghost Dragons don't let all of the Commie Tsar's prisoners go. He agrees not realizing that Robin fucked with the printing so that the bills will easily be flagged as counterfeit. The Huntress and Robin head home to get their lives back in order which means Robin only has two pages left to get his dad to not send him to Metropolis, get his counselor to not file paedo charges against Bruce Wayne, and get Batman to not fire him for disobeying him all week.

No wait. I was wrong. It's just one page!

Is Batman hiding in the bushes with his Bat Signal Flashlight? Fucking needy bastard.

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #6 Rating: B. I'm so glad 21 year old me purchased this series so that 53 year old me could read it again 32 years later and think, "Ho hum. Whatever." What a majestic life I'm leading!

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #5 (Late February 1993)

You know what? I think they figured out this stupid cover technology five issues in!

Maybe I spoke too soon. When I tried to view the other side, it was just as shoddy as before. I think the reason the cover looked so good on the first scan is that I never actually moved it after purchasing it thirty-two years ago. The first four were shit so why would I even bother with the fifth and sixth issues? It's not like Robin's clothes fell off when you pulled on the tab.

The alternate cover with Robin failing to crash through the skylight. Such an amateur.

I'm still reading John Steinbeck's Cup of Gold but I decided to take a short break to read one of Chuck Dixon's great Algeresque works of literature. It's going to take me a long while to get through Cup of Gold because I've already begun to do that thing that I began doing ever since I read Gravity's Rainbow where I basically read a book twice as I'm reading it. So I'm now most of the way through the first chapter of Cup of Gold for the second time. Not because I didn't understand it the first time! It's because Steinbeck's writing is so layered and complex and beautiful that I felt I wasn't giving it its due by reading it just once. Take the description of how Henry Morgan's mother tends the fire in their small house as an example of how Steinbeck's always writing about the thing he's writing about plus at least one other thing (although often as many as four other things). When he discusses how Mother Morgan stirs the fire so much while tending it that the flames go out leaving just the embers which she then must beat to try to get them lit again, Steinbeck's explaining the way she's dealt with her husband over the years. And like the way winter comes into the Welsh valley as weather, emotion, history, and time all in the same instance. But the best part is when Elizabeth stands in the doorway of her house backlit as she looks out into the dark and Henry basically sees the outline of her naked body through her thin nightgown. I don't mean the best part in how Steinbeck layers it with different meanings; I mean it's the best part in how many layers filled my pants.

This story begins in Amsterdam with a covert meeting between criminals!

Joke or not, I'm not even sure that's a proper answer to the question.

So that one joker is there to get some kind of counterfeit blanks from the guy with no sense of humor and then kill him. Oh, the guy who doesn't laugh doesn't know he's there to get murdered, of course. I'm sure some criminals would be all, "Oh, you want me to deliver this thing worth a ton of money to an absolute monster and then let him kill me? Sure. Why the fuck not?" But this guy was all, "You're not funny. OH MY GOD I'M DEAD! THIS SUCKS!" And the other guy was all, "Next time you'll laugh at my joke, you Dutch buffoon!"

Amsterdam is in Dutchonia, right?

Meanwhile, Tim whines and moans while Alfred dusts the Batcave and wishes Tim would go whine and moan somewhere else. Then Tim mentions he's been crimefighting with Huntress and Alfred is all, "Batman is going to kill you. So please tell me you're at least getting tossed off by her."

What the fuck is this judgmental look Alfred's throwing at Tim?

You might think it's sexist that I had Alfred suggest The Huntress would jerk off Tim just because she's a woman. But I can assure you, and I have thousands of pages of comic book reviews that will back me up, that I would have had Alfred suggest the same thing if Tim were going out at night with Azrael.

Tim's response to Batman possibly getting pissed off that Tim's running around with The Huntress is that it'll be the least of Batman's worries when Tim's school counselor sends the cops to arrest Bruce Wayne for pedophilia. At least Tim will be in boarding school in Metropolis when that shit hits the Batfan. He'll be much safer in Superman's city.

Tim grabs his gear to go meet up with The Huntress. She's currently busy teasing some teenage boys.

Is concern for some babe's well-being sexist?

At first I thought this gang was two old people and two young guys. Then I realized the young guys are trying to rob the old people. It's astute observations like that, where I check and double check my perceptions and assumptions, that make me the crack comic book reviewer nobody thinks I am.

Oh! Remember how earlier in this review I mentioned I was reading Steinbeck's Cup of Gold? Well because library holds on books are so fucking random and never actually take as long as you think they're going to take, I'm apparently reading David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest right now too! I'm only through the first chapter of that where the narrator, an amazing tennis player, Hulks out during his college interview because he ate some mold when he was like five. I don't know if that first twenty pages indicates the themes I should be looking for throughout the book but if so this might be a few of them: 1. Don't eat mold off basement walls. 2. Communication with other living beings is hard. 3. Being a super smart person in a body you can barely control or speak through will cause other people to think you're a monster. Although that third one I already learned from Steven C. Stewart and Crispin Glover's It Is Fine! Everything Is Fine.

During the beatdown (it's hardly a fight. Huntress tears the two teens five new buttholes in a non-sexy way), the reader might notice that The Huntress wears an armband with Superman's logo on it. I guess the old guy kicked it recently. And yet Tim's father still wants to send him to Metropolis?! It's so fucking dangerous there now!

Isn't The Huntress cold sitting in the snow in her little short-shorts?

When not swinging around the city on a rope attached to angel dong's (or whatever. I don't know how these fucking Batpeople swing around the Goddamned city), The Huntress drives a Lamborghini. It's a pretty shit looking Lambo but I think that's because Bob Smith, being paid an artist's wage from DC, had never actually seen one. He probably based his drawing off the same fucking Lamborghini Hot Wheel we all grew up crashing around dirt berms and into the side of that red double-decker bus. Helena and Tim, in full costume, drive around the city in her car looking for another printer that the Russians might be harassing into printing counterfeit cash for them.

While Tim and Helena scout print shops, the murderous joker (not that one!) returns from The Netherlands.

Ha ha ha! Made a killing!

This guy probably had a great line for if the customs official had said, "Do you have anything to declare?" but then the guy ruined it with the "Nothing to declare?" line. He probably would have been all, "I have a ten inch penis!" or something, um, funnier! I'm not the funny guy. He's the guy with all the good lines. Made a killing! With the fog! What a cut-up!

Oh man! I wished he'd killed the Dutch guy with a knife then my "cut-up" line would have been a good joke. But he shot him instead and there's no way you can make shooting a guy funny.

Robin and The Huntress discover the counterfeiting operation at the last place they investigate. Also staking out the Russian counterfeiting ring? The Ghost Dragons! Remember, they need to kill KGBeast so that King Snake can be the most dangerous dumbass in the DC Universe. But they also want to kill Robin and The Huntress for beating the shit out of them several issues ago. So they're pretty excited when they realize they're all in the same building at the same time.

Robin watches from the rafters as the Commie Tsar murders the two men responsible for the counterfeiting process (because they've already printed one billion scudoons). I guess if you're a criminal, bullets are a lot cheaper than cash. Being that they were criminals, Robin doesn't seem to give a shit that they were just murdered. He continues to keep an eye out to see the final few steps in the counterfeiting process. But that's when KGBeast appears dragging The Huntress behind him. He's all, "You are being cold in the shortest shorts, yes?" But even with The Huntress in danger, Tim still hesitates and waits for a better opportunity to do vigilante justice.

A mundane round of farts could drown out Def Leppard. "Standing by the trap door! Aware of me and you! The actor and the clown! They're waiting for their cue!"

Dammit! Now I actually want to hear that song! That backfired!

Tim drops down and begins knocking out thugs with his feet as soon as the machine's start back up. Then he fiddles with the printing press's controls to fuck up the counterfeiting operation before heading downstairs to find where they took The Huntress. Now, remember, Tim found this place by searching for local printers. The Russians, presumably, also had to find this place at the last minute since they killed Ariana's father who was supposed to print the money for them. So it's odd that when Tim goes downstairs in this print shop, he discovers the Russians' heroin operation as well. Why the fuck did they drag their heroin operation to the print shop? They really could have left it back at their Little Odessa headquarters, couldn't they?

Currently The Huntress is being killed by KGBeast and Ariana is not in immediate danger. So, um, yeah, save Ariana, I guess.

Tim throws the whole mission away by busting into the heroin packing plant and causing a bunch of chaos. He saves Ariana (as well as the other women forced into the drug business) but can't lead them out of the building before the ruckus he caused brings reinforcements.

Ha ha ha! Oh, that guy! He kills me!

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #5 Rating: B. I don't know if that bit about leading her to the grave was a joke but the guy is so funny I can't help laughing at nearly everything he says. I guess it's just the way he delivers his lines. One more issue remains and there's a lot to resolve yet. Tim's home life. Tim's school troubles. Tim disobeying Batman's rules. The Huntress captured by KGBeast. The Ghost Dragons vendetta against, I don't know, everything? Tim's sex life (real and imagined). And I guess the Russian drug and counterfeiting ring. I feel like some of these issues are going to get short shrift in the conclusion.

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #4 (Early February 1993)

This is like trying to watch scrambled porn on '80s cable.

This cover technology is so shit. But what's weird is that I just glanced at Issues #5 and #6 and their pictures read perfectly. Did they improve the concept five months into this little experiment? Or did I just never read Issues #5 and #6 so the cover hasn't shifted at all? It's basically impossible to keep the insert properly aligned so that you can see either picture perfectly without ghosts of the other picture coming through. Perhaps they figured out how to keep the insert aligned by Issue #5? We'll see when I finally unbag it! Anyway, here's the shitty alternate cover:

Weird. This one lined up pretty good totally on accident!

The alternate picture on the alternate cover shows King Snake and Lynx running along confidently before KGBeast sneaks up behind them and clocks King Snake in the head with a Russian tire iron (a potato stuck in a bit of concrete). I guess they were full of bluster and bravado when they mocked KGBeast when he wasn't in the room because they look terrified here (and slightly concussed).

The issue begins with Tim getting caught playing hooky from school by Alfred Pennyworth. "Getting caught" makes it seem like Alfred cares; it's more like Alfred, while putting away some Bat Towels, stumbles upon Tim who was too stupid to hide somewhere other than the Batcave. Alfred tries to help him out by offering to put make-up over the bruises on his face and Tim rips him a new asshole. It makes Alfred very sad.

"Dick used to love my help!"

Poor Alfred probably thought his days of getting shit on by Robin were over thanks to The Joker. But apparently Tim can be as angsty as Jason Todd when everything is going wrong in his life and the girl he though he was going to lose his virginity to has apparently been killed by Russian gang members and his school counselor's accusing Bruce Wayne of diddling him while she also dreams of fucking his dad. And he's been going out at night getting his ass kicked while sporting a huge boner because have you seen how much of The Huntress's ass hangs out of her costume? It was right on the cover! And getting your ass beat while you're sexually aroused will definitely cause psychological problems later in life that he's certainly not going to deal with being that his role model is the most anti-therapy asshat on the planet, Batman.

Alfred doesn't put up enough of a fight for the mood Tim's in so he goes home to try to guilt his wheelchair-bound father.

Normally I'd be on every other side that's against any father at all. But right now, Tim's just being a whiny shit.

If The Huntress really wanted to be a hero, she'd wank Tim off and get him to chill out. But even if she knew how Tim's life was falling apart from all the stress and anxiety he's under (which can be partially cured by an orgasm which is why I suggested the hand manipulation), how is Tim her responsibility? She hardly knows the kid. Bruce Wayne should wank Tim off! Not in a weird, sexual pervy molestation way! In a therapeutic way! For science!

Tim finishes his conversation with his dad in the tried and true teenage way where they scream "You don't me! You don't know anything about me at all!" and run out of the room crying. Tim's dad puts his head in his hands because either he feels like a failure or he's praying to God that his son dies. Probably a fifty-fifty chance he's thinking one of those two thoughts.

Tim's not sure whose life to ruin next so he breaks into The Huntress's apartment hoping that she's in the shower. But she's not home yet so he sits in the dark to wait for her while thinking how hot it would have been if she'd been in the shower.

Also she's on her way home to take a shower.

Chuck Dixon really fucked up the order of things in this story. If David Finch had been writing it, The Huntress would have gotten home and hopped in the shower before Robin arrived so that he could draw her coming out of the bathroom in the smallest towel she owns. It's really about the only good writing decision David Finch ever made with which I agreed. He was smart enough to script at least one woman in a towel scene every issue and while I wasn't a huge fan of his art and very much not a huge fan of his writing, I'd always stand up and applaud when some woman showed up in a towel. Really smart work! Super creative!

Helena isn't too surprised that Robin figured out her identity since he practically brags that he got the Robin gig by figuring out Batman's. But all Helena cares about is Batman and what he's like and does he have a girlfriend and is his ass really that tight or is that just the outfit? Tim ignores her questions while convincing Helena to show him where she found the counterfeit papers being used by the Russians who "killed" Ariana. Tim feels he needs to avenge her death since it seems like the only part of his life he can control at the moment. Also he probably just wants to hang out with a hot woman. I know I'd pretend to care about justice if I could swing around the city with a half-naked woman. And also I were wearing a red Speedo and green tights. I bet that would make my junk look huge! Or would it just make my junk look normal-sized but squashed all funny? I once wore tights in high school when I went to a Halloween party as a Playboy bunny and it was not flattering. Which is why I also wore a tight black knit skirt over my crotch. Nobody wanted to see my smashed junk all night. Except it was a high school party. I bet most of the girls there actually did want to see my squashed junk! Man, I was so stupid!

While Tim and Helena search the room where Huntress found the papers, they're surprised by the Russians who had the room wired for some reason.

The Huntress stole that soda from the mini-bar because she isn't beholden by man's laws! She fights for pure justice!

Tim subdues the Russians but before The Huntress can torture any information out of them, KGBeast crashes through the wall like a barely literate Kool-Aid Man.

"Oh to be yeahing!"

A scuffle ensues which ends in Bane hanging out the window twenty stories above the street while Robin and The Huntress try out Kama Sutra pose #53.

This position's called "So Much of The Farmer's Dick Deep-ends in a Red Wheelbarrow"

The next day at school, Tim avoids his counselor as best he can. I guess he can't skip school twice although he'd like to because now he'll have to explain the bruises on his face and his scratchy voice from being choked out by KGBeast. You know Ms. Hollingsworth will be all, "Why's your voice so gravelly, Tim? Does Bruce Wayne have a thick hog? It's really thick, right? Just massive? I can't help you unless you answer my questions about Bruce Wayne's dick, Tim." So instead of going through that, Tim flees her office through the window and runs home to do some research on the Russians. That's when his dad tells him that he's transferred Tim to an All Boys Private School in Metropolis. Oh no! What'll Tim do?! Superman doesn't need a sidekick! Also Superman has just died so, seriously, forget it, man.

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #4 Rating: B. King Snake and Lynx weren't even in this issue. Shows how fucking dangerous King Snake really is! What a pathetic jerk. Although KGBeast was in this and he didn't seem too dangerous either. He was beaten by a little boy and an exceedingly attractive woman. That wasn't meant to be patronizing! Those were just cold hard facts and also KGBeast called them exactly that before getting his ass kicked by them. So I don't think either character deserves to be thought of as the most dangerous assassin in the DC Universe. Besides, if Deathstork heard either of them claiming that, he'd have to stop fucking his underage lover and go murder them.

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #3 (Late January 1993)

I'm not sure what's supposed to happen when you pull this cover tab slowly but when I do it, The Huntress winds up with three tits. So pretty clever!

And here's the secret cover:

I didn't pull tab this one so I'm just assuming Lynx winds up with three tits too. Maybe four!

Even though this comic book cover looks as generic as possible, has the worst working gimmick I've ever seen, and says "ROBIN" right across the top, 21 year old me still purchased it. And it's not like I had $2.50 just lying around waiting to be wasted on bullshit like this! That would have been almost two full games of Cyberball! I probably purchased it because Huntress has three tits on the cover. I'm sure 21 year old me was all, "Oh! I wonder what this is about! This looks interesting!" And then I walked to the register while hiding my boner with this comic book. Then I probably bought some Magic the Gathering cards to distract from my obviously pornographic purchase only to later jerk off at home to the Earthbind card.

This issue begins with Tim's school counselor angrily demanding he answer her query about Bruce Wayne diddling him. Or, at least, beating on him. She has a really fat belt. That was a style choice at the time, was it? It's not quite "I won the World Wrestling Federation championship" big. But it's close.

There's only one bully in this school and her name is Ms. Hollingsworth. Lay off, lady!

To get Ms. Hollingsworth off his back, Tim is going to have to stop getting punched in the face. It might be hard because he's got such a stupid haircut. But with a little training from Batman, he might be able to accomplish it. Or Tim could try to distract her with his father's cock. She seemed really interested in his father's cock in the first issue. She was all, "I hear your father's cock is out of a coma. I'd like to try to put it back into one, if you know what I mean." Then Tim punched himself in the face to try to forget the image that entered his head. It worked but he also forgot that he punched himself in the face so now Batman is going to be arrested for child abuse and suspected pedophilia.

Now Tim has to figure out which senior to pin the bruises on. That's like a whole other subplot in a book that's already full of too many subplots. We've got the Russian girl and her father. We've got Tim wanting to fuck the Russian girl even though she just lost her father and was kidnapped by some other Russians. We've got a counterfeiting ring. There's The Huntress feeling sad that Batman doesn't talk about her. There's Tim's invalid father jealous of Batman. There's Batman trying to control Tim. There's Tim's school counselor being far too interested in Tim's life, especially the father's cock part of his life. There's the China Town gang that suddenly wants to kill Tim. There's KGBeast doing crimes. And now Tim has to frame a senior so Bruce Wayne doesn't get taken down for child endangerment!

Tim doesn't know who to talk to so he just blathers to Harold Allnut, Bruce's mute, autistic, live-in Bat-engineer.

This depiction of Harold feels offensive.

I don't remember: did Harold ever return in The New 52? He probably should have had his own series written by Ann Nocenti. God, sometimes I hunger so badly for another one of her train-wreck series!

Tim's father gets all up in his shit when he gets home because Ms. Hollingsworth called about Tim's troubles. Plus Tim got home late after hanging out in the Batcave so his father gets super jealous of Bruce Wayne again. Tim just yells at his dad like a proper teenager and goes upstairs without any explanation. But he's beginning to crack! He can't hide his Robin secret from his father much longer!

Meanwhile, the leader of the Ghost Dragons proves himself to be one of the most delusional characters in the DC Universe.

Your name is Edmund. Nobody will ever think you're the most dangerous. Alfred is scarier.

If the most knowledgeable and the least knowledgeable fans of the DC Universe can both name about two dozen more dangerous characters than you, you were never even in the running. Hell, the most knowledgeable fan probably wouldn't even remember this guy exists unless they were reminded. "Are you forgetting somebody? Big snake tattoo on his chest. No, not Kobra! His name is Edmund. He's Lynx's boss! Oh, come on! Leader of the Ghost Dragons!" Apparently I believe the most knowledgeable comic book fan is actually pretty stupid.

Robin and Huntress meet up again later that night to do some investigating. Luckily for Robin who was stuck dealing with personal problems all day, The Huntress spent some time in the library. She's got the whole thing figured out already!

The only thing she got wrong is that the leader's name is The Commie Tsar!

The Huntress has information but no leads. Until an old Russian man wanders up and tells her and her new sidekick everything they need to know. Names. Locations. Activities. I guess that's why Robin dresses in such bright colors. So that he stands out as a vigilante which allows people with information to approach him. This old guy's the only one not fearful of the Russian gang because he's so old he doesn't fear retaliation. He probably hopes for it! But he so hates the bad name these guys give Russians, he doesn't care if they kill him. He just loves Russia so much he's willing to die for it. This old guy loves Russia and his new home and his neighborhood friends. But most of all, he loves San Dimas.

Robin and The Huntress take this old fart's information and attack a bunch of people hanging out in front of the location the man gave them. That seems like solid police work in that police will beat up anybody they suspect of being a criminal no matter how little evidence there is of a crime. A policeman's number one weapon for battling crime is their gut instinct! Just like every other ignoramus in the world, they seem to think gut instincts should be listened to because there's something wise and supernatural about it as opposed to realizing gut instincts are just a dog whistle for systemic racism and cultural bias and prejudicial beliefs which obfuscate actual reality.

But being a comic book, and Huntress and Robin being heroes, I guess I have to assume that they were correct and the guys they just beat the shit out of really were Russian gang members and not a bunch of guys parking their cars to walk to the deli a few stores down the street.

They're about to beat the shit out of Groucho Marx and his security detail!

While Robin chokes out Groucho Marx, he thinks, "I don't recognize any of these guys. But from the way they dress, I know they're new in town." Well then! Case solved! They're obviously Russian gangsters! Maybe this is why Batman doesn't want you running around on the streets by yourself, you stupid piece of shit! Sorry! Sorry! Even though I just mentioned it, I already forgot I was reading a comic book again and not viewing a four-color window on real life! Obviously Tim, being like the smartest character in the DC Universe (until the focus is on somebody else and then they're the smartest character in the DC Universe), knows what he's doing and I should just trust his gut instincts! Plus The Huntress is super hot so who cares if they just killed Groucho Marx, right?

In 1993, I probably would have said this plan sounds gay. But being much more comfortable about the frayed, graying edges of my sexuality in my fifties, this plan sounds fucking hot.

I should also point out that The Huntress saying she's coming right down my throat obviously isn't gay at all but possibly the hottest thing she could say. But when Tim picks up her rallying cry and starts talking about coming right down people's throats, even Batman is going to start questioning his sidekicks enthusiasm for that battle cry. Did Chuck Dixon know Tim was bisexual here? Probably, although in a negative way because it was 1993. He was probably writing Tim and thinking, "Tim is so fucking queer! In the 1993 meaning of queer which, in most regions of the United States, still carried with it negative connotations arising from people's fear of the other and things outside their boring status quo worlds! Although Tim should have been embracing his sexuality and it shouldn't be his bisexuality which caused people to think less of him! It should have been his stupid hair and his smarmy personality. Unless those are common attributes of bisexuals and then maybe I shouldn't have even written this pretend dialogue by me, Chuck Dixon!"

The Huntress and Robin bust up the gambling den which, luckily, actually is a gambling den since they only had one loony old man's word for it.

The male population of Little Odessa is, apparently, 14.

The Huntress looks like she's moshing in the above panel. She's so adorable! Tim is not adorable but that's probably because I can't stand him. Maybe some people think he's adorable because some people like Tim Drake. Weirdos.

One of the Russians whacks Tim in the face with a pool cue and now Tim can't concentrate on the fight because he knows Ms. Hollingsworth is going to get all up in his shit about Bruce Wayne beating him for resisting the anal finger fucking. You know that's why she thinks Bruce is beating him! Let's not kid ourselves! All Ms. Hollingsworth can think about is anal finger fucking. She's a Ms.! She's for sure horny as hell. I bet by the end of the series, she's fucking Tim's dad.

The Huntress begins to annoy me as well during this fight and I find that too bad because I don't like to be horny and then to begin seeing evidence that my horn has been misplaced. I need more than just a half-naked hot body with luscious hair and a domino mask! I need somebody who doesn't make stupid statements while beating the shit out of people as well!

You kicked down the door to their gambling establishment and began busting heads! What the fuck do you expect?!

As you can see from the above panel, The Huntress really has perfected her police work. She's a cop in her civilian persona, isn't she?

Tim chases down a guy he recognizes as having helped kidnap Ariana. He smashes the guy's head into a file cabinet and then questions him about the Russian girl. The guy tells Tim that she's dead which Tim finds surprising for some reason. It's not like they watched them kill her father and then left her in the murderer's hands for 24 hours before trying to save her! Tim rushes off to go cry into his pillow at home while The Huntress just, I don't know, wanders off for the night having gotten her thrills beating up on a dozen men? I'm not assuming that's what happened. My supporting evidence is at least half a dozen comic book panels with The Huntress saying things like, "I'm really enjoying this!"

After the heroes leave the chaotic scene, Lynx shows up to get some information from the nearly dead Russians. Or she's just there to tell them that King Snake is more dangerous than KGBeast and that he should never forget that. That'll solve King Snake's most pressing problem of not being thought of as the most dangerous criminal in the DC Universe!

Tim wakes up the next morning for school only to realize he's got another huge bruise on his face that Ms. Hollingsworth won't be able to ignore. At some point, she's going to have to get the police involved. He's obviously being abused and/or sidekicking for a vigilante. Either one of those needs to be investigated.

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #3 Rating: B-. This comic book contains a little too much real world police work for me. What I mean by "real world police work" is "doing extreme violence to people you suspect are criminals." I'm not a fan of it. But I am a fan of The Huntress getting her rocks off while dressed scantily and beating up hard men. Is that why people think of comic books and their readers as juvenile and immature?! Probably! It's a good thing I'm just pretending to be a comic book fan like that and don't actually jerk off to every panel of The Huntress spread-eagled and beating the shit out of some Russian with a gun while yelling, "I'm coming down your throat, you big tough man!" Ha ha! I love pretending! Oh, and I also don't think Ariana is dead. That was just Tim who thinks that. I bet KGBeast kept her alive when he was supposed to kill her because he figured he could use her as some kind of insurance against the Commie Tsar who keeps treating him like cheese scraped out of the foreskin of a filthy gigolo.

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #2 (Early January 1993)

If you pull the tab quickly, they look like they're clubbing.

Heck, if you pull the tab slowly, it looks like they're jerking off their bo staves at a furious pace. The only way to make the image look somewhat normally animated is to pull the tab so slowly that I might as well just look at three panels side by side and let my brain fill in the movement. Perhaps that's why these covers never really took off. Plus they make the comic book awkward to read. Can you see the way the cover puckers in the scan? It's thick as shit! Hmm, maybe I should be more creative with my similes. It's as thick as your first cousin's son (which is also your son because you're both from West Virginia).

I don't know if West Virginia has a higher incidence of incest than any other state but if you've got to be known for something, why not incest? Better than being known for homophobia or xenophobia or whatever stupid shit Alabama has done this week. Probably made it illegal for men to pee while sitting down.

The other problem with these covers is that they just don't work. The insert has a lot of slack on the edges allowing the image to tilt as you pull it which means you see half of The Huntress and half of Robin and a title that reads, "Hunbin". So here's the second cover while not in the stupid sleeve.

Mostly because I couldn't get the stupid fucking thing back in the sleeve!

This might be the worst cover technology ever invented.

I'm so angry at the cover that it's going to hamper any possible joy I may have found in this story. Sure, it was only a small chance that I'd find joy in it anyway. But now? Zero chance!

When we last left Robin, his dick was just about to get him killed by a Russian dick with a tiny dick.

If you had a massive dick, you wouldn't need such a big gun replacing your castrated hand. Also his pants are as flat as Olive Oyl's ironing board.

Oh! Did Batman cause KGBeast to symbolically castrate himself when he trapped him in the desert by his arm? Was it a desert? Maybe it was a jungle.

The way KGBeast speaks, I'm wondering if Russian Bizarro isn't under that mask.

I just thought up a great insult to use on Chuck Dixon when he writes something really terrible! I hope it happens soon or I might forget it!

Should I clarify how Tim's dick was getting him killed? Well, he wouldn't be hear about to be murdered by KGBeast if he hadn't met the cutest little cutie in Little Odessa earlier that day. He was trying to spy on her through her bedroom window when the Russian mob attacked her father's print shop.

This is embarrassing but at least he didn't accidentally pop out the corkscrew attachment.

Do you think this panel was cooler in Dixon's script than it wound up being in the panel? "KGBeast looms over the new Robin (ask editorial what his name is; I keep writing "Jason Todd") with his massive gun where his hand should be. Robin pisses himself looking at the size of the bore on the barrel, realizing Batman will never recognize what's left of him. But then a surprising turn! A massive, razor sharp blade swings out of the side of the gun! It's a gun knife! Jason now shits himself too! A fucking knife in a gun! Maybe next issue, KGBeast will launch a shark with rabies out of the top of it! I'm so fucking turned on, Tom! Draw the shit out that, man!" And then Tom is all, "Does that look like a gun? That kind of looks like a gun hand, right? Now for the massive blade! Hmm. What does 'massive' mean? I could look it up or I could just assume it means stumpy and unimpressive!"

KGBeast misses with the knife, merely cutting Tim's bo staff in two. After that one failed swing, he seems to remember his knife is also a gun and decides maybe that's the better way to go.

No time to spare?! That's at least the fourth time you've threatened to end Tim. And Tim just continues standing around waiting for it to happen!

Being Russian technology, KGBeast's arm rifle is bolt action. Maybe KGBeast was trying to load a cartridge and he pulled the wrong lever earlier. So when the knife popped out, he was all, "Oh, um, I am being going to being cut you into pieces with the knife being popped out of my gun which I being meant to do!" But he didn't really want to stab Robin. He wanted to explode his head. So now he's getting back to that.

Before KGBeast can shoot Robin in the face, obliterating it, Robin's lady's dad shoots KGBeast in the back with his bolt action rifle. It's bolt action rifles all the way down in Little, Odessa. Semi-automatics are for lazy capitalists.

Maybe load another cartridge in the chamber instead of screaming at him, dude.

Since KGBeast currently has a bullet all ready to go, he shoots Papa in the dick and he spits up yellow ichor as he dies. Does that mean he's probably an alien or was it just a color separation issue? I'm hoping aliens and not because I love sci-fi stories. Remember, this story stars the Huntress and if there are aliens, there might be some anal probes!

The Russian goons throw Ariana, the cute Russian teen Tim's lusting for, into a car and drive away with her. Robin realizes that he's already disobeyed Batman, drugged his dad, and maybe possibly technically got Ariana's father killed. So he figures what the fuck. He's basically got nothing left to lose tonight.

So he fucks a car.

I don't know if the first thing I would have done is fuck a car if I suddenly felt like my life was swinging wildly out of control due to all the bad decisions I'd made lately. It just seems like another bad decision. But then I'm a long way off from being a horny teenager too. Hell, I probably would have fucked a car if everything in my life was going aces at fifteen!

Ariana probably felt a moment of comfort when she thought Tim was diving on the car to save her and then she heard the pounding and moaning and was all, "Wait. Is he fucking this car?" And, being a teenager, she was really into it. If she, being in her bathrobe and possibly nothing else, began to masturbate in the back of the car with two grown men beside her, could they be arrested for some kind of sex crime? If I were one of them, just to be on the safe side, I'd throw myself out of the car as soon as I realized what she was doing, screaming, "I didn't get a boner at all!" Although it might take me awhile to notice what she's doing because I have no idea how women pleasure themselves. I would be all, "She sure does itch down there!" Then I'd suddenly be all, "Oh my god! She's making counterclockwise motions around her belly button for sexual pleasure! I can't be a part of this! YAAARGH! I didn't get a boner at all!" Ha ha! If that isn't how women masturbate, I was only joking! Ha ha! Got you!

When Robin finishes all over the car hood, he grabs his semen and slaps it across the windshield so the driver has to quickly break lest he crash the car and kill them all!

Is this another color separation issue or does Tim have an infection in his prostate?

The car crashes into a street light and luckily doesn't kill Ariana. It also doesn't kill any of the Russians or KGBeast. KGBeast does get caught up in his seat belt though and has to cut off another arm. I also notice Ariana got dressed while she was being kidnapped. It's also possible that her top, looking so robe-like in one panel, made me think she was in a bathrobe but she never was. But it's also possible that she was in a bathrobe and after I turned the page, time Mandela'd out on me and I'm now in another dimension. Ha ha! I'm just kidding again! Imagine being both so clueless and narcissistic that you'd rather think the past was changed instead of believing that you made a mistake of perception or because you believed that some phrase that became shorthand for a line in a movie was actually the line in the movie and then heard the real line and were all, "Oh fuck! It's so fucking close to what I thought it was but barely different and I could understand that people were saying it the different way because it was more lyrical or easier to do but I'd rather believe that I've experienced a shift in the time continuum!" Ha ha! I would never be that pathetically stupid! Can you think of anybody who would be?!

The American youth are decadent because they fuck cars. In Russia, cars fu...no. No! Stop it, you moron. You're better than that!

KGBeast and the Russians carjack a Gotham bus. The passengers all flee but I'm not sure if they keep the driver. Tim gives up at this point because he's spent from fucking the car and just can't get it up for a whole bus. Plus he forgot he needs to spend a few pages fighting a Chinatown street gang named the Ghost Dragons. He gets his dick kicked off by them and needs to be rescued by another vigilante he doesn't recognize.

At least he didn't say, "A female." I would have said, "A wo-wo-wo-woman!"

For some reason, Batman hasn't told Robin about The Huntress. She's a little bit butthurt about it but she saves his butt anyway. For the first time ever, instead of just beating people up for no reason because one hero saw another hero beating people up, she asks Robin, "You have any special reason why you want to hang around here?" And he's all, "No." And she's all, "Hang on to me. We're out of here!" And he's all, "Oh no! I did another bloody orgasm in my underwear because I touched a woman for the first time!" And The Huntress is all, "What's that smell? Do you eight-day old Arby's in your pants?"

Anyway the Ghost Dragons are pissed that they didn't kill Robin immediately and now they have to wait for Robin IV: Cry of the Little Russian Girl. Ariana's crying because Tim ejaculates prematurely and she can't get any satisfaction and also it smells like rotting roast beef with horsey sauce. So she starts dating Lynx, the hot one-eyed member of the Ghost Dragons who is also a lady and who just kicked Robin's ass. That's the series where you get the famous panel of Batman thinking, "Where did I find this pathetic fucking loser?" while looking at Tim sitting in his crusty underwear and crying.

Robin and The Huntress realize their investigations are probably linked since Robin just watched KGBeast kill the owner of a printshop and The Huntress found some Russians with a briefcase full of blank paper. They're probably going to print up some Communist Manifestos! Ew! It makes me (and The Huntress!) so angry to think people might be distributing pamphlets full of free information! The two decide to meet up at midnight the next night. Robin heads home without once thinking, "Should I report the murder of Ariana's father and tell them exactly who's responsible and maybe be a witness and possibly help justice along?" He just thinks, "That Huntress smelled nice and felt soft!" Also, I guess they're not that worried about Ariana's safety?! Dude, Tim! Who cares if Batman's going to be mad at you! You need to tell him immediately about this kidnapping so he can save Ariana!

I bet Tim is less afraid at Batman punishing him for going out at night on his own and more afraid that Batman is going to kiss Ariana and maybe touch her butt a little bit.

Also, I guess the Ghost Dragons get to share this mini-series. Maybe that's why it's six issues! Lynx heads back to her boss, King Snake or Dragon Man or something, and tells him what's happening on the streets while he nurses his broken dick.

I'm assuming she was about to say, "The woman who broke your dick." What else could it have been?!

KGBeast returns to his boss, Commie Tsar, with news of his failure. Commie Tsar slaps him in the face in front of all the other men so that probably means he'll be dead in a few issues and KGBeast will be running the show. Until then, he's benched KGBeast while his other idiot henchmen run the counterfeiting ring. Now they have to find a new printer! Plus, Commie Tsar just tells them to kill the girl because he doesn't have any use for her. Oops!

The next day, Tim Drake falls asleep in the library and gets hauled off to talk with his counselor about all the time he's been spending with Bruce Wayne. She also points out that since he's been hanging out with Bruce, he's constantly covered in bruises, cuts, scrapes, and bloody jizz. He can't think of an excuse that wouldn't make Bruce look like a violent pedo which seems odd and slightly naïve. Explaining away Bruce's interest in Tim should have been the first thing Bruce and Tim came up with! I guess people were less suspicious of pedos in 1993. "Oh, yeah. That 40 year old guy at the end of the block where all the kids hang out? He's probably cool! At least he gives our kids free snacks, you know?" But not Miss Hollingsworth! She's a trained school counselor and she knows physical abuse when she sees it! She's going to get to the bottom of this and Bruce Wayne is going to get arrested and then all the real pedos in power in Gotham will make it look like a suicide in his jail cell!

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #2 Rating: B+. It was fine. But that cover. Man. That fucking cover! It's all stiff and gappy at the same time. It's puckered all over the place and it makes crinkly sounds while you're trying to read. And the worst part is that it barely does anything and it does it completely poorly too! I hope whoever came up with this idea accidentally fell in a septic tank.

Anyway. I've been rewatching every episode of 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown. During one intermission, they had the following teaser and I realized my blog name is sort of incomplete for my British readers!

So my blog name is an anagram for hesitate?!

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #1 (December 1992)

If you pull that tab slowly, Robin's cape flutters a teeny, tiny bit.

This was the Collector's Edition! On the back of the bag, there are instructions on how to pull the tab correctly so you see the image change. Like me, you might thinking, "What am I? The dumbest guy to ever buy a Super Special Edition Comic Book at inflated prices? Please. I know how to pull a fucking tab!" But then I had to apologize to the plastic bag when I got to the third instruction which read, "To change to second cover, pull out insert, turn over and place back into window." What?! A SECOND COVER! Oh man. I hope he's naked!

Holy shit! It's KGBeast after he merged with the Bat Signal in a teleporter malfunction! Cool!

Well, that technology certainly was worth the extra cost! They must have used this for so many covers in subsequent years. I can't wait to see how many of my 1994 comic books come with this tech!

Also, quit screaming "Pedophile!" you assholes so quick to judge somebody for daring to be facetious and whimsical on the Internet! I don't actually want to see Tim Drake's ding-a-ling! And even if I did, who cares?! He's a fictional, made-up, bisexual, super genius sidekick. He's not actually whatever stupid age he's supposed to be in this. I mean, if I thought he was anything other than a late teen, I never would have made that joke! I mean, pretending to want to see a fictional character's penis when they're only like eight or something? That's disgusting!

Ha ha. I don't actually mean that. I don't care if you're into fictional characters getting naked. I mean, my browser's cookie history is at least 50% Deviant Art files of Erin Esurance!

Double ha ha! Actually I do mean it. Stop looking at AI generated photos of minors, you pedophiles.

According to the special Collector's Edition bag that this comic book came enclosed in and which I cut open like a rabid barbarian, the set includes the comic book, the special moving cover which is part of the comic book, a second reversible cover which is part of the special moving cover which is part of the comic book, covers by Mike Zeck and Tom Lyle which are part of the reversible covers which are part of the special moving cover which is part of the comic book, and an exclusive poster. So basically, one extra thing. I got one extra poster for buying this. Awesome.

Dude, I understand that the regular priced comic didn't come with the moving cover! Get off my dick, you literal-minded jerk-off! I'm trying to be facetious on the Internet! Goddamn. You wouldn't think it was this hard to be silly on the Internet! But no, nowadays I have to do all this work making up Straw Men readers whom I can yell at!

Shockingly, the poster is still inside the comic book. I guess at 21 years of age, I'd gotten past putting comic book posters up on my wall. Especially when Robin was on them. But before that, in my old childhood bedroom, I had a Teen Titans poster (with Nightwing though, I think) and a poster of The Outsiders flying past the Hollywood sign. I think those were the only ones.

This chapter is titled "The Hammer" which is probably better than "The Crowbar" which is a different, and better, Robin story. Because it's a comedy where Jason Todd dies. Also it wasn't called that but you get what I was going for, right? Just another reminder of the awesome time Jason Todd was killed. I probably bought this series just in case it was another death of Robin story and I didn't want to miss out this time.

The story begins with Robin narrating about how crime has been out of control lately in Gotham. And then he describes the fight he and Batman are currently undertaking.

Suck it, you anti-woke cucks! Robin and Batman were stomping Nazi dick in 1992, you pieces of shit!

Oh no! Did my politics interfere with my comic book review?! Shouldn't I just stick to writing reviews and not telling anti-woke shitbags how fucking unlikable and stinky they are? Yeah, yeah! I probably should! I won't do it anymore. You don't have to worry about me calling you bleeding dog anuses from here on out, Nazis.

Ha ha! No, no. I might do it again. Probably, even.

Not long after Robin and Batman interrupt this meeting of august young free speech enthusiasts, a helicopter buzzes by the window and begins pumping bullets into everybody. Somehow all of the bullets miss Batman and Robin. It's probably because they're . . . no, no! I'm not making the joke. You make the joke.

Canonically, bat lube does exist.

I don't know why I mentioned Bat Lube. Probably because I was thinking, "Why does Bat Lube exist?", for no reason at all. It's not like Catwoman doesn't just flood the inside of her leather suit whenever she sees Batman. She gets so wet for him she squirts out of her cat SCUBA suit like a really horny thing shout out of a thing preventing the horny thing from getting fucked. I'm too tired to be clever so you get way too literal metaphors tonight.

You know what? I don't even know if Bat Lube exists canonically. Just seems like it probably does.

I had no idea rats in a maze get so frustrated that they tear each other's throats out! Time to experiment!

Rats are a bit too expensive for me to run this experiment. Plus I'd have to build a rat maze and I haven't done that since 6th Grade in Gifted and Talented. I wonder if Fuzzies and Pinkies are good enough? It's also possible that Batman doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about. Normally I wouldn't question it but Batman's being written by Chuck Dixon here so I've set aside a few grains of salt to keep me from swallowing any fact that comes out of his bat mouth.

Batman benches Tim Drake for the time being because it's suddenly become too dangerous taking a teenager out on the streets in a flashy red and yellow costume to fight violent criminals. Jeez! One little helicopter machine gun ambush massacre and Batman grounds Tim. So unfair!

Elsewhere in Gotham, the Huntress tries to look as '90s as possible.

How much of a character's face needs to be hidden by a mask before the reader's suspension of disbelief buckles and collapses? It must be more than this because I'm currently crawling out of the rubble of mine. If I ran into The Huntress on the street in her regular identity, am I supposed to be all, "You look like The Huntress! Although it's hard to tell because her cheek bones and jowls are always covered up!" Maybe this is why she eventually goes with the Belly Window outfit. So nobody ever looks right at her face. But for now, she's in her modest outfit (that means just a ton of cleavage). She's on the tail of some of Gotham's crime lords who are running drugs. She follows some of them back to their hotel in via rope and Lamborghini where she breaks in, gasses them all, and then goes through their drug briefcases to find a ton of blank paper. So LSD?

I mean counterfeiting! They're probably counterfeiting something! But I grew up in the Bay Area and Northern California so obviously everything reads "LSD" to me.

Since Tim has nothing to do now that Robin's been grounded, he winds up having no excuse to turn down some nerd's birthday party invite. The guy's throwing off some real Danny Chase But Taller vibes. I hate him already just because he made me remember Danny Chase! I hope the party gets rained out. By bullets! Ha ha!

We also get to meet one of Tim's teachers, Ms. Hollingsworth.

She wants to fuck him, right?

Oh gross! Get your minds out of the gutter! By "him", I meant Tim's dad. And maybe Tim. I don't know. Did Gerard Jones write this?

Wanna-be Danny Chase, whose name is Ives, celebrates his birthday party in Gotham's Little Odessa. Uh oh! Crime lords. Russians. Drug money. Nazis! It all adds up! Ives is a white supremacist and in the mafia!

At the party, Tim takes a shit. On his way back from the bathroom, he hears a commotion in the alley behind the kitchen. He rushes out to see some Russians beating up the owner of a print shop across the alley. He also sees the owner's daughter, Ariana, who is so cute that he decides to help her out and then hit on her while her father's bleeding all over the place. He may be Batman's sidekick but he's still a teenager with rampaging hormones. They part ways without kissing because the nosy old dying man makes it awkward. But Tim is Robin so he'll probably know all about her by morning. And Batman will be all, "Who used up so many of my Bat-AOL hours?!"

It takes a lot of planning to masturbate in the same house as The Batman.

The Russian thugs couldn't put enough of a beating on Ariana's father to get him to do what they want. Although they didn't give him much time to tell his side, what with all the gasping for air and spitting teeth and bleeding internally. Reporting back to their boss, they get screamed at for not doing the job correctly. So now this Russian, this Commissar (Commie Tsar? Ha ha!), must pay out of pocket to send some real muscle: KGBeast!

Apparently, Tim doesn't currently live in Wayne Mansion. I forgot he's not a tragic orphan. Too bad because it really helps move the plot along when a teenager doesn't have a stupid controlling dad to have to listen to. Not that I think he's too controlling. He's actually just jealous that Mr. Wayne gets to see his son constantly and his son won't even play a midnight game of chess with him.

"Fuck you, dad! I'm getting drunk!"

Squeaky clean Tim Drake doesn't drink four bottles of hundred year old wine down in the cellar. He's actually built a secret passage down there so he can sneak out. I guess since his dad's currently in a wheelchair, he can't follow him.

The important Robin business that can't wait is stalking Ariana. He rushes through his secret tunnel to the Bat Cave (does Bruce know about this tunnel?! It could be a security risk!) to grab his Robin uniform and stake himself on a roof across from Ariana's dad's shop. I hope he's not trying to get a glimpse of Ariana changing through a window or showering! Boy oh boy! I really, really hope he isn't that disgusting! But if he is, I hope Tom Lyle saved a full page for it!

Sure he won't do anything. Probably because Batman checks Robin's suit with a UV flashlight every morning.

While he's hoping for a light to go on in the bathroom on the second floor, a car full of Russian thugs pulls up. Did you read that, you stupid Comicsgaters? The bad guys so far in this 1992 comic book have been Nazis and Russians! Learn a lesson some time, you bleeding dog anuses. One of the Russians is KGBeast and another one has a flamethrower. Tim knows he promised Bruce to lay low for a few nights but he can't help it. He really wants to get laid. I mean he really wants to save this father and daughter. And he'll be happy with just saving the daughter if it comes to that.

The thugs bust up the place like Ariana's father is A. W. Merrick in Deadwood and he just printed a scathing essay insulting Putin's manliness. Robin tries to help and it's going about as well as it can go for a Robin beating up regular thugs. But then the boss thug steps in and Robin remembers why he's supposed to only get involved in shit like this with Batman.

How are there five more issues of this if Robin dies on page one of Issue #2?

Robin III: Cry of the Huntress #1 Rating: B. It's a comic book about Tim Drake's Robin! A B is pretty fucking good if you ask me because I'm biased. I don't like Robin and I really don't like Tim Drake. But this was entertaining and The Huntress was cute and Ariana was cute and oh shit I just remembered taller Danny Chase. Oh, that's okay. I won't adjust the rating just because I also fucking hate Danny Chase. Ives can't help that he looks like him somewhat! Plus, and I never, ever do this: the colorist smashed it on this one. I don't know why I even noticed it being that most comics on newsprint all look about the same (based on the era, of course). Maybe the palette was just so strikingly different from all the Justice League books I've been reading that caused it to really catch my eye. But I liked it! Hopefully we'll get at least one issue that's mostly just an awkward first date between Ariana and Tim. That's the only way I can see an issue getting an A!

Oh! I realized I didn't scan a picture of Ariana! Sorry about that. Just imagine she looks a lot like The Huntress without her mask. I'm not saying she's The Huntress because she isn't. But I think maybe Tom Lyle can only draw one really attractive female character.