Batman Eternal #42

Bluebird's identity is easier to figure out than Superman's.

Last issue was disgusting and we shan't talk about it any longer. Because it was full of semen! At least my issue was.

Harper Row has donned her sidekick costume because she needs to save all of the other sidekicks from The Mad Hatter's treachery! The exclamation point at the end of that sentence tells you how exciting last issue was and that if you missed it, you should feel empty inside. Now Harper is running across the rooftops like a Batkid. She's got what it takes to save the day! The skills (kind of)! The intelligence (her best attribute after her butt!)! The know-how!

Okay, maybe not the know-how. You're supposed to crash through that, stupid!

Harper has built a suit that repels nanobots. She's going to be rich! Every hero in the DC Universe except for Hawkman who currently wants to fuck a woman filled with nanobots will want to buy one! But instead of going on the Shark Tank to be scammed by multimillionaire scammers, she's going to use it herself and save the day. Or save the Batkids' day, anyway. I think there is too much day to be saved in Batman Eternal for a newly minted, wet behind the ears sidekick.

Meanwhile Spoiler wakes up in a strange room without her Spoiler costume. It took me literally eighteen years to figure out who she was without her costume on. And don't get excited thinking she was all tits and vagina swinging all over the room. She was wearing clothes but they weren't her Spoiler costume kind of clothes. Just a tank top and sweats.

Stephanie's mom sent Killshot to recover her and keep her safe before one of the other bounty hunters found her. Ha ha! Killshot! I bet Snyder and all the other guys writing this book had a good laugh about using him as the bounty hunter. What a stupid fucking name! The only way it could have been dumber is if they had used White Rabbit!

That's obviously a threat. From my experience, mothers are awful people! I hope my mother doesn't know about this blog!

Meanwhile Harper is completely fucking up her rescue attempt. She falls on her butt. Then she falls on her butt again. Then she gets the attention of The Mad Hatter. Then she shows her butt and it's definitely sidekick worthy.

See? Even Bowl Cut likes it.

By the way, the nanobots still look like semen flying all over the room. Everybody else's semen comes out in thick, glowing ropes, right?

Who else grew up in the 70s and had that Spider-man web making stuff? I know I seem to be a DC Man since I'm reading all the New 52 stuff but I grew up wanting to be Spider-man. I loved the cartoon and I had the Spider-Man Mego and some ship or something. Maybe I just used a ship from some other line of toys and called it the Spider-Ship? Anyway, the Spider-man web stuff came in a little tube that looked just like a crazy glue tube. And you'd squeeze a little out and stick it on a leaf and pull it along while squeezing the tube and stick it on another leaf and presto! Instant one strand of web that looked like a homeless guy just whipped out his half-erect cock and splashed pre-cum all over the bushes. Not that I realized that as a little tyke. But if you want proof that parents weren't uptight fucks in the 70s like they are today, that Spider-man web kit is proof. No parents ever tried to get it pulled off the market because it looked like their child was covered in semen. And they weren't fucking naive either like kids today like to think anybody born pre-1994 was. They probably just raised an eyebrow and looked at each other and laughed and finished off another box of wine. Nowadays, one fucking Playdoh dispenser looks like an erect cock and people go crazy!

Harper tricks The Mad Hatter into thinking she likes him and then she shouts, "Ha ha! Friend zoned!" and she kicks his hat off. Then The Mad Hatter falls down screaming, "I should have listened to the Meninists!"

Oh Harper Row. I would Friend Zone you so fucking hard!

If "Meninist" is a play on "Feminist," shouldn't it be "Menifist"? Or Men-I-Fist, amirite?!

Harper Row destroys The Mad Hatter's gigantic phallus with just a thought and it withers away into nothing. And all the children are free! Hooray! I guess. I kind of liked when they were all in one place and out of the way.

Batman arrives in time to feel like he helped stop Jervis. He discovers that Harper Row is a better detective than he is but only when she's investigating The Mystery of Her Brother's Stupid Butt. In Mad Hatter's pocket, Batman finds another one of the poorly printed invitations to the destruction of Gotham City. Those invitations really are boring. A monk must have designed them. Who does Batman know that's a monk and avoids all frills and bells and whistles and really cute fonts and possibly a little monkey drawn in the corner with a speech bubble saying, "Monkeys like butt secks!"

Harper tells Red Robin that it's been her lifelong dream to be a sidekick, ever since she saved Batman's life with a car battery. But Batman was always, "Blah blah blah!" Which was his long-winded way of saying "No." But now they all have to accept her because she solved the mystery and saved the children! Also, Batman said, "Hm." That's practically a guarantee of sidekickmanship! It wasn't like he said "-tt-"! That would have been bad!

And then Selina arrives at Stephanie's mom's house and captures her. The story is almost up to the preview story from a year ago!

Batman Eternal #42 Rating: No change. Doesn't this have to be over in ten weeks? Am I wrong about that? Shouldn't it only be a one year story?! I'm getting nervous! I've also figured out who the big bad villain is! It's Alfred! He probably printed up the invites on the shitty little dot matrix printer in his tiny little room in Arkham Manor because Alfred isn't allowed to use the Batcomputer for his own personal projects. Which might also be part of the motive for wanting to tear Batman down.

Detective Comics #37

Batman in The Case That Makes Him Look Like A Fascist Fearmonger!

This cover could have gone another way. Instead of "chaos" for Anarky, it could have said "Freedom." And instead of "order" for Batman, it could have said "Subjugation." Or maybe a shorter word that would fit on the cover better. Like maybe "control!" Rules are for people full of fear. They desperately need to know that other people are being told to behave. They have faith that everybody in society will follow the rules because they're all too fearful of the punishment of breaking the rules. Civilization is just a tottering Jenga tower of frightened children agreeing not to move too quickly because any sudden movement might cause the tower to topple. The problem with a civilization based on hugely thick law books is that it's all just illusion which restricts freedom. As we've seen anytime a sports team wins the big game (or loses the big game), chaos reigns supreme. At any moment, enough people can decide to stop following the rules, and your precious rules will no longer be there to keep you safe. I guess that's where Batman comes in!

Except we don't get Batman! What we really need is less faith and trust in laws, and more faith and trust in each other. That, my friends, is anarchy. And it's a lot more honest than people behaving correctly because they're afraid of being punished. Of course, in an anarchic environment, you might suddenly be severely punished by your neighbor's shotgun because they don't like the way you were masturbating in their garden. But at least nobody is constrained by lawmakers! Anarchy is worth it just to see all the lawyers lose their jobs! Although with lawyers out of work in a society where anything goes, they'll probably just become more dangerous than plague-ridden vermin.

So it's kind of a few dozen birds in one hand and a few dozen birds in the bush situation. But I have an answer that will satisfy both the people with a need for laws and me. Let me make the rules! Then we can all be happy. Or at least I can be happy. And that's the whole point, right? Everybody just wants the kind of freedom that allows them to feel safe and secure and feel free and happy. That's why so many assholes are currently defending torture.

Let me, in an example of anarchy, completely ditch the previous topic to talk about torture. Here's the problem with most people's arguments for torture. Their argument amounts to "If torture saves lives then we should torture." The problem is that word "if" because torture does not save lives. Torture results in people not wanting to feel any more pain telling the people causing the pain whatever they want to hear to get them to stop the pain. It's the reason the police get so many false confessions. Because extended interviews filled with psychological games is torture. But then, all those jerks that want order need to feel safe, so they convince themselves that torturing people reveals truth. Plus have you seen how well it works in television and movies?! The bad guy always tells the truth! And is always the bad guy! Because why would the good guy torture somebody who isn't the bad guy? That's ridiculous! That would never happen! America is God's country! Obviously they're not good if they're revealing things the torturer expected them to reveal. Why would a good person make up lies under those conditions? Torture works! Case closed!

This issue begins with Anarky sentencing Lester to death by immolation and/or a sudden landing after a long fall out of Wayne Tower. Whichever happens first.

Here's another reason why people love rules: to exploit and manipulate the masses! The people who make and enforce the laws generally think they're above those same sets of laws. As we've seen, every day for years and not just recently, as police officers constantly avoid indictment no matter how awful their behavior or what terrible atrocities they commit while in uniform. What District Attorney is going to ruin their career by pursing an indictment against law enforcement agents that the District Attorney needs to work with every single day? Remember, masses, the rules are there only to keep you in line. And we follow them even when we know that the politicians and the rich and the people within law enforcement and the judiciary shrug them off on a daily basis. Laws are not meant to protect us by creating a rich tapestry of order. They are meant to corral us and keep us complacent.

I don't know how you're supposed to follow instructions that tell you not to follow instructions. I'm confused!

The Mad Hatter gets his face kicked in by The Batman for threatening homeless people with a knife. It's interesting that Batman can threaten people for information but The Mad Hatter isn't allowed? Maybe it's because The Mad Hatter has a history of actually making good on his threats of death while Batman has never killed anybody*.

*At least nobody has ever died from the injuries inflicted on them by Batman while Batman was still in the vicinity of the victim. If they died later, it was either their own fault for not seeking adequate medical care, or the doctor's fault for not providing adequate medical care, or just the perp's own fault for engaging in activities that The Batman frowned upon. But Batman has never, technically, killed a person.

My guess is that The Mad Hatter is slightly outclassed here.

Batman throws The Mad Hatter into the frozen bay to remind The Mad Hatter of their last encounter when The Batman almost walked away from The Mad Hatter as he drowned. And even though Batman threw The Mad Hatter in the water that time, is it really Batman's fault if The Mad Hatter never learned to swim while unconscious? I don't think so. The Batman finds floating in the bay, or just disturbed by The Mad Hatter's flailing so they rise up before sinking again, or maybe they were on the ice and are now sinking in the panel that looks like they're floating, or perhaps they're just full of air, skulls! A new mystery has been discovered! Time to take off his Bat-Boots and put on his Detective-Shoes!

But first Alfred convinces him to put on his Billionaire-Slippers!

The problem with writers that want to tell gritty, action-oriented Batman stories is they often forget this part of Batman. Batman doesn't work without this stuff.

Meanwhile Bullock is working a non-case that involves the anarchy symbol being spray painted all over Gotham. He also has a "World's Greatest Detective" mug which is a special kind of awesome. Yip is hanging out with him because she's not sure if she's his partner or his friend or his future romantic disaster. She'd better be careful, though. I bet Harvey Bullock has a huge refrigerator.

What's with all the pissing references? I think they're made for each other!

The call comes in about Lester's Icarus impression (the myth! Not the drug! Well, maybe both!) so Bullock and Yip head out to investigate. At the scene, they find Batman investigating as well! They also find a computer loading some kind of program that, if you believe Batman (which Harvey doesn't), will cause Wayne Tower to blow up. Batman is pretty nonchalant about the whole thing because fuck Wayne Enterprises and their new government overlords, right?!

Before everybody can be evacuated or Batman can shut down the computer program, the building blows up. Okay, so it doesn't completely blow up. Parts of it blow up so that Wayne Tower turns into a gigantic scarlet letter.

I'm pretty sure this is the biggest clue Batman has ever found!

Detective Comics #37 Rating: +1 Ranking. Even if Manapul and Buccellato weren't writing an interesting story, the comic book would be worth reading for their art alone. My favorite thing about the current run of Detective Comics is that Francis and Brian are making Detective Bullock a central character. He could practically be the "chaos" figure on the front cover! The dichotomy between Bullock and Batman is just as interesting as the comparisons of Batman with all of his villains.

Nightwing #27

I thought about reprinting my first editorial essay for a 'zine my friends and I put out many years ago so that everybody could see how my writing style has evolved. But then I saw the date on the 'zine was November 1994 and I figured I could wait a few months for a the twenty year anniversary of The Galactic Hero Corps. I reread the essay and either I'd found my writing style around twenty years of age or else I've just never actually improved since then. Here's a teaser as I express my excitement at writing editorials in our new little magazine (and I swear I wrote it in November of 1994 when I was 23): "I have things other than the Galactic Hero Corps on my mind. Just think, a place where I can discuss all those existential ideas that people ponder every second of their lives. I can spread my wisdom to thousands of people I normally couldn't enlighten. Or hundreds. Or dozens. Or just a few, as the case may be."

Holy fuck. I've actually accomplished my dream of the nineties! Twenty years later and I'm doing exactly what I planned on doing! Or, looking at it another way, twenty years later and I'm still doing the same exact fucking shit I was doing in my early twenties! That was supposed to be negative but after typing it, it feels fucking positive to me!

Okay, enough about me. Time to tear Nightwing a new asshole. Not that there's anything wrong with his current one. I suspect. It would be a shame if he had huge hemorrhoids and gaping anal fissures all over that sweet, sweet heinie.

Who didn't prefer the March Hare over the Mad Hatter?! The March Hare was cute and cuddly and lovable and the March Hare was a scary ass madman (or woman. I really could never tell) with a huge fucking head.

This issue is called "Curiouser and Curiouser" because Gotham City can't control its Alice in Wonderland references. Now Nightwing finds himself mired in Lewis Carroll references all the way out here in Chicago.

Stupid Saturday Night Live. Whenever the word "Chicago" enters my brain, my brain has to repeat to itself, "What begins with 'C', ends in 'O', and has 'Hicag' in the middle?"

After Nightwing and Marionette defeat all of The Mad Hatter's mind-controlled thugs while The Mad Hatter gets away, Dick discovers that the thugs are being controlled by their cellphones. I told him that last issue but I don't think my voice can permeate the comic book page.

Wait a second. Ignore that last paragraph because I got ahead of myself. Nightwing and Marionette merely save Michael, Dick's Roommate, and Michael's cop friend before having to escape themselves. The Mad Hatter and his conscious thugs don't go anywhere. Maybe I should just delete that last paragraph. But then I'd have to delete this paragraph too because it mentions the last paragraph.

Nightwing and Marionette get a room later and sit around in their costumes talking about Marionette's time as Mad Hatter's favorite Alice.

Wait a second. Shouldn't her super villain name by Humpty Dumpty?

Nightwing, being a master of reading people's emotions on their stupid faces, notices the way The Marionette's bangs are dangling and realizes she's scared. Uh oh. My hair is dangling down my forehead too! What the fuck am I so afraid of?!

Dick heads back to his apartment where he once again finds his window shut and locked. Ha ha! Nightwing keeps getting locked out of his apartment. You know, I don't think he should be going into his window in full costume anyway. He really should have a place to hide out to change and then walk home. Unless he's rented the only building in Chicago without a line of sight from anywhere to his window. You figure someone at some point is going to look the right way at just the right moment and suddenly know where Nightwing lives. Or where he goes for his booty calls, anyway.

People that might also figure out who he is? His roommate's snoopy friend.

Unless she's her cousin. Or the kid she babysits. Why the fuck should I remember a minor character's relationship to an even more minor character?!

Is Nightwing ready for a sidekick?! I think Jen is going to be his sidekick! But he'll have to train her quickly before his comic book is cancelled so that she can go out on her own or join The Better Written Teen Titans in their next incarnation. I think her super hero name will be Hummingbird.

So Nightwing wants to try to get Mad Hatter to cure The Marionette of her "sliding personalities" and The Mad Hatter wants to get The Marionette back to be his favorite Alice. That probably means that there will be a confrontation and a battle. But The Marionette has plans of her own. I know it's hard to believe since she's the female character and should probably just be falling in love with Nightwing and touching his butt as often as possible. Her plan is to pretend to help Nightwing kidnap the Mad Hatter so she can be cured but in reality she's just going to steal as much Kanium as possible so that she can administer the drugs to herself without being trapped in a hospital. Although if she really needed to take Kanium, an element that was just discovered ten years ago, she'd need to live in a super-collider while holding Americium in her mouth while she's bombarded with Calcium atoms. That sounds worse than being stuck in a hospital bed eating jello. But since I've never been in either, I can't really know for sure. Super-colliders could be really comfortable.

Soylent Tea is Kanium! It's Kanium!

The Marionette gets away with enough tea to keep her sane until she's ready to make another appearance in the New 52. The Mad Hatter is arrested because he's found carrying Lysergic Acid Tea Leaves and Ketamine Tea Bags. I wish I knew The Mad Hatter in real life.

In the epilogue, or the come-downer-time, or the denouement, Dick is drawn really fucking poorly.

He's actually thinking about himself and his relationship with Joey, his roommate. But he could be talking about Batman and all that Death in the Family shit that went down.

Dick goes back home to apologize. That's when he meets Jen's parents. Jen's mother is a red-head! Look out, Mr. Jen's Father! Dick is getting some of that! Also, Jen now has a huge crush on Dick because she knows he's Nightwing. Also she's been busy drawing Nightwing's symbol so I bet she's going to come up with a costume of her own! Here comes Hummingbird!

Nightwing #27 Rating: +2 Ranking. It held my interest! Plus I want some Ketamine Tea now! Not the amount that Dexter liked to give people! Maybe the amount Jordan Prentice takes in In Bruges. Well, maybe three times that amount. Although his character really is a pretty big abuser of drugs, so the same dose that fucks him up will probably fuck me up pretty good even though I'm three times his weight or more. I need to get better at this review paragraph already! It's only been about 1300 commentaries and I still don't know how to say things like, "The plot was integral to the plot and the themes were theming all over the place. Also, the art was very artistic and the dialogue just dialogued right off the page."

Batman: The Dark Knight #23

I guess last month's one-shot was actually a two-shot! Stupid me and my ability to accept unresolved stories!

Last month's issue ended with Batman saving Commissioner Gordon from Clayface while Clayface looked on from the street in disguise. It's at that point that I declared that story over and that it was pretty decent for a one-shot. I guess I should have known that Batman wouldn't let it end at that! Especially since he's already put Clayface in Arkham about seven times so far in just The New 52 alone.

I might have been exaggerating when I said "seven times" but I don't think by much.

I have a huge--cataclysmically huge, if I may be so inaccurate and bold--problem with people labeling criminals like these as "smart."

First off, it doesn't make somebody smart if they can manipulate the financial system to make themselves lots and lots of money. It makes them a thief. It makes them an asshole. It makes them a cheater. But it doesn't make them smart. You are not a smart person if you get ahead in some kind of game by not following the rules. Not once did I ever play a game of Monopoly where it ended with somebody stealing all the money from the bank and everybody else giving that player a standing ovation, a chorus of "Bravo," and the Nobel Prize for Ingenuity. Beating people at something by manipulating the rules or playing by a different set of rules or by ignoring the rules altogether does not make you smarter than a person who has agreed to play by the rules. It makes you the asshole who doesn't merge until the very end when one lane has been closed. Yes. Bravo. You chose to be a dick. But it doesn't mean other people didn't see that fucking option. They just didn't want to fuck everybody else in the face for their own selfish needs and desires. So fuck everybody who calls a criminal "smart" when they're able to line their pockets at other people's expense. Unless smart is also a synonym for asshole and then, well, I'm okay with that.

I think I concentrated on the wrong part of the first page! I think I was supposed to notice the guy in the Scottish Golf Chauffeur Taxi Nerd Cap melting into a pile of earwax and sliding under the door. I wonder what that's about! I bet he's one of them smart criminals!

The man sliding under the door turns out to be Clayface for anybody not reading DC Comics for the last two hundred years. And if you've been reading Marvel, just imagine The Sandman but without the buzz cut and the nice striped shirt. Boy, I hope I'm correctly remembering what The Sandman looked like in the old Spiderman cartoons from when I was a kid! Those were the ones with the Spiderman theme song that everybody remembers although some people remember the lyrics as Spiderpig now.

Sandface distracts the guards with his "Old Man Trapped in a Closet" routine while Clayman's henchmen storm in and destroy the place. After that, they're all given their pay checks and sent home for the weekend.

Kidding! He kills them all!

I suppose, in comparison, I'd have to go with those other Wall Street criminals as being smart compared to fucking Gotham City Henchmen. Why don't they learn?! I suppose because they're dead. But why don't other Henchmen see that being a Henchman never fucking pays? If people are willing to put up with this kind of treatment to be a Henchman, I can't imagine what kind of horrors the employees at Gotham McDonalds are suffering through. "Hmm, McDonald's Drive Thru Cashier or Henchman for that psychotic madman, The Joker?"

It's right about this time that the Securities Exchange realizes they're going to have to call in the Gotham City Window Repair Union and pay their outrageous prices because Batman appears on the scene. And if Batman has ever walked through a door, I'll eat my cat. I first typed "gone through a door" and realized I was opening myself up to a major technicality since I'm certain he's crashed through a fair number of those as well as windows, walls, and skylights.

Batman saves a woman and the fight gets taken out to the street where cars and hydrants and lots and lots of pavement can be smashed. How can Clayface be so malleable and yet hard as an inmate's cock at the same time?! Hmm, I think I just answered my own question.

Batman has a gun that creates one of those hard plastic tubes that Batman caught Clayface inside of way back in an issue of Batman. I think it was an issue of Batman. It was the one where Clayface turned into Damian for a moment. Anyway, Batman can't quite lock him down because the tube keeps getting hung up on shit, allowing Clayface to throw it off of himself or slip out from under it.

Once again Clayface gets away. But now Batman needs to know how Clayface knows that Natalya had a connection with Batman. I think he may be beginning to panic that his secret identity could be slipping away! He doesn't know it yet but that's okay since Batwoman is going to figure it out next issue. And she'll probably sell it on eBay just for kicks.

Speaking of smart criminals who don't play by the rules, it's The Pen...hmm, I guess "not playing by the rules" is pretty much the definition of a criminal.

Not that I feel everybody needs to play by society's rules! But most people have decided that they're going to honor a certain contract by living in a community because that contract offers safety and peace for everybody. Some shit that thinks he's getting one over by breaking into cars hasn't thought up something that nobody else could have thought up. All that shit is doing is breaking the unspoken contract of community. Basically if you don't fuck with me, I won't fuck with you and we all fucking benefit from not being fucked with. Which is why I think that if you find some little shit breaking into a car, you should be allowed one good kick in their private area or a punch in the tits. Not having female body parts, I'm not sure which one would hurt more for a little female shit.

Later Batman goes to talk with Jim Gordon by using the Reverse Bat Signal Waste of Electricity Approach.

Nothing gets an old man's attention faster than a light having been left on!

Batman smacking Jim around was a nice touch too. Especially after Jim took a swing at him for corrupting Batgirl which ended up in his son "dying." He discusses his plan to capture Clayface which involves everybody dressing up like Batman and scaring Clayface. I think I've seen this in a movie before. Gone with the Wind, maybe? Didn't everybody dress up like General Sherman to scare the South into surrendering?

And it does work! Although y'all look fucking stupid.

Batman: The Dark Knight #23 Rating: +2 Ranking. I really did not expect to enjoy this issue as much as I did. Perhaps I've had a bit too much Clayface for now (and he gets a Villains Month Book! Yay?) lately. But there were some great moments in this thing. Most of which I scanned. So, you know, don't read any of the previous shit if you don't like spoilers.

Batman: The Dark Knight #21

Every lunatic in Gotham must harbor a secret desire to feel Batman rupture their spleen.

At times like these, you have to wonder how tempting it must be for Batman to kill The Mad Hatter. I know Batman doesn't kill not because he doesn't want to become like those he's against but because he knows how easy it will be to just keep killing after the first one. I totally get that but on a level that doesn't threaten the lives of anybody around me. I stopped drinking soda about two and a half years ago. I mainly drink water and tea, an occasional coffee drink, and about a bottle of Sake every few months. My business puts me in the vicinity of fountain drinks every night and I often see that Sierra Mist button sitting there wanting to be pressed. It just sounds so carbonated and refreshing and delicious! Hell, I barely even liked Sierra Mist when I did drink soda. But I know if I drink just one, it'll be way too easy to make another excuse later so that I can have another. The seal will be broken; the demons set free. So I continue to avoid soda and Batman continues to avoid killing. I hope Grant Morrison doesn't make him step over his own line to kill Bat-Thing even though that bastard killed Damian.

Although why can't he kill Bat-Thing? It's half whale, right? And Batman isn't Aquaman! Batman eats meat, right? It was that little murdering psychotic Damian that felt animals shouldn't be killed.

Last issue, Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum and The Mad Hatter murdered Batman's girlfriend Natalya. This issue, Batman puts them all in the hospital and pisses in their IVs.

I'm not sure I need to read this comic book because I'm pretty sure that's exactly what's going to happen!

See? He's so mad his cape is emoting.

Batman storms Mad Hatter's missile silo and does the Lobster Quadrille all over Tweedle Dee's (or Dum's) bald head. He then follows the White Rabbit through the Hall of Doors where he skips a few chapters and goes straight to The Mad Hatter's Psychedelic Freakout.

Dammit, Batman! I'm sensing a trend here. You need to start wearing a gas mask full time.

Batman's acting careless because his girlfriend was just murdered. But he's also acting careless because what kind of a fair fight would it be if Batman just stealthily invaded Hatter's hideout and knocked him out with one well-placed Batarang?

Once again, Batman begins to hallucinate a time before his parents were murdered and he became the forever sad little boy. The Mad Hatter is simply gleeful that he and The Batman now have a shared experience in the loss of a great love. But since Batman just went through this shit battling The Scarecrow, he's got the experience to shake off the hallucinations and just get straight to the ass-whooping.

Every fucking one of them is a masochist. This could be prevented, you moron! STOP. PISSING. OFF. BATMAN!

The Mad Hatter doesn't fare much better, even though he drank his Spinach Tea.

I think adult teeth grow back in comic books, so I wouldn't be too worried about those front ones, Hatter.

Batman knocks him into The Pool of Tears and is about to leave him to drown when Alfred says the thing I just said Batman doesn't actually believe. He tells him to save The Mad Hatter from drowning or he'll be no different than they are. This causes Batman to stop and rescue The Mad Hatter. So is that it, Batman? You just can't live with the shame of being a psychopath? Because, I think, even if you killed The Mad Hatter, you'd be better than The Mad Hatter. This guy just killed 2% of Gotham's population and your girlfriend! He killed a lot of innocent people. I may be a pacifist that doesn't believe in the death penalty or punching people's jaws off of their face, but I can still agree that there is a world of difference between The Mad Hatter murdering innocents and The Batman murdering a murderer.

Although I know Batman's real reason for not killing. Nobody wants to have to keep making up new villains for him to battle.

The last few pages don't show Batman giving The Mad Hatter mouth to mouth which is a shame. Instead it shows that the Gotham City Police Department are having some serious budget issues since they have to repair the Bat Signal by taping all the shattered glass back together instead of having a new one made. That's pretty fucking sad.

Batman: The Dark Knight #21 Rating: +1 Ranking. I feel like this was a mediocre ending to a strong story. Mostly just people getting punched in the face by Batman. But you know, that's what a Batman title needs every few months! I'm glad that at this point, Batman didn't have to nearly lose before winning. Sure, he was drugged. But it was nice to see him fight through it almost immediately, especially since he'd just gone through the same thing with The Scarecrow. I do always enjoy a super hero book where the super hero just walks in and wins the day without it seeming like an uphill battle.

Batman: The Dark Knight Annual #1

Scarecrow wants an article too!

I've often wondered if DC has standardized rules for whether or not any particular character should have "the" attached to their name. Does The Daily Planet have a style guide for this sort of thing? Is it Batman or The Batman? I don't think it's ever The Superman unless someone is trying to describe which super man they're talking about. "Superman, idiot! THE Superman!" In the case of this cover, I would have at least gone for consistency and said "the Scarecrow!" But that's why I think DC actually has some rules somewhere about the names! Why else would they ignore consistency if not for some mysterious set of rules for adding "the" to a character's name.

I think, if you want to be absolutely correct, the only time you add "the" to Batman's name is if "the" is followed by "Goddamned."

This Annual takes place on no particular Halloween. The Mad Hatter has received a missive from Oswald Cobblepot to meet him at The Mad Hatter's old condominium, the Arkham Detention Facility for Youth.

I guess someone else sent the notes. What the fuck is this? A romantic comedy?

I think The Great Pumpkin sent the notes because there are pumpkins on them. Or maybe The Headless Horseman. Is there a Headless Horseman in the DCU? Maybe they were sent from Jack Pumpkinhead from The Dreaming. That's it. I don't think it could be anybody else, so it better be one of those choices or my suspension of disbelief is going to be strained to its limits.

It turns out Scarecrow also received a note with a pumpkin stamp. Now that I think about it for a bit longer, I guess this story isn't necessarily taking place in the present because Halloween hasn't fallen in June for a very long time. So now I'm really hoping that Damian sent the notes!

Speaking of consistency....

Oh, oh! I know this poem:

"Once upon a midnight dreary, The Jabberwock could see me clearly,
Masturbating quite furiously over some hardcore gay porn,
With my rod out, quickly fapping, suddenly I needed crapping,
Urgently I stopped my slapping, flapping through my bathroom door.
'You're disgusting,' he gallumphed, 'grappling with your vorpal sword.'
Snicker snack and nothing more."

I forget the rest.

While this motley trio discuss who could have sent the notes, some lightning flashes and some bats flap about. Now they're all quite sure that The Batman has brought them together to torment them. You'd think they'd remember that there's another guy in town that goes by The Joker and this is all a big joke! Or a prank and there's that creep called The Prankster. This could also be considered a trick and it's Halloween, so maybe it's the Trickster! I'm beginning to suspect that my earlier belief that it could only be one of three distinct people was a bit off the mark.

Now The Penguin is finally thinking! I've already said (somewhere and many times!) that the richest people in Gotham are insurance salesmen, doctors, dentists, glass repair men, and drywallers.

They continue to discuss Batman's faults as the lightning and shadows and kreeeeeeks and darkness scare the tea and stuffing and pellets out of them. They decide their best course of action is to escape into the hedgerow maze because they're idiots. I think The Penguin's best course of action is to just walk out the front door. He's an upstanding citizen! Kind of! Well, at least he's not a psychopath. He's just a sociopath! But he's terrified because it's Halloween and Batman is scary.

After running into a Batman-shaped scarecrow, they retreat back into the house.

I don't see these guys ever teaming up ever again in all of The New 52's future stories.

Their bickering and ineptitude eventually leads to low self-esteem and drug use. Hopped up on the Scarecrow's fear toxin, they all begin to revel in their self-loathing. They all end up huddled and crying and sobbing and broken at the bottom of a staircase. Only when the sun comes up, do they gather up their things and make their escape.

I don't think these three really cross paths much anyway. Now they'll probably actively avoid each other.

In the end, it was, of course, The Goddamned Batman that played a Halloween prank on these idiots. Which is probably why they fucked with him so hard later in the year! Stop antagonizing psychos, Batman!

Batman: The Dark Knight Annual #1 Rating: Trick and Treaty!

Batman: The Dark Knight #20

Through the Looking Glass, bitch.

Last issue, Alfred Pennyworth was ecstatic to finally have some female company in the house without having to worry about accidentally blowing Bruce's secret super hero identity. That's because Bruce already blew it and told Natalya that he was Batman. Now The Mad Hatter is planning on kidnapping Natalya to use for his play, "The Day A Woman Seemed To Like Me But Was Just Being Nice." Also, Damian is still dead.

At the end of last issue, Batman was facing a river of corpses flowing out of the Gotham sewers. Now he and Jim Gordon have to figure out where they came from. I think Batman knows they're victims of The Mad Hatter because unless there has recently been a breakout at Arkham, he generally only has to deal with one madman's plot at a time.

It's about time they made this announcement! Even if they didn't know the exact way The Mad Hatter was distributing the hats, once Batman found out he was battling the Mad Hatter, they should have released the news to force your loved ones to stop wearing their stupid new hats twenty four hours a day.

Batman investigates the sewers and comes pretty close to finding the abandoned missile silo that The Mad Hatter is using as his base. But Alfred has to hack into some government files first which means Batman has a little downtime to contemplate his situation.

I guess the Bat Computer is doing all the hacking work since Alfred is busy giving Bat Therapy.

Meanwhile Natalya is busy being kidnapped. The Mad Hatter, parodying his literary self with the line "your hair wants growing," has thrown her in a cell to wait for her hair to grow out so that she'll look more like Alice. The Mad Hatter did not kidnap Natalya's dress with the Bat Tracer on it though, so Batman is going to have to wait until his Bat Computer is done hacking the government files to figure out where The Mad Hatter is keeping her. I bet the Court of Owls know about the abandoned missile silo! Batman is a terrible keeper of Gotham City.

After the Damian thing and now that Bruce seems to have found love with Natalya, he's actually beginning to think about a future where he gives up The Batman. He flies off to discuss it with Natalya. Too bad he's going to find her apartment filled with broken glass and her urine from when she was kidnapped. That might cause him to rethink the rethinking The Batman thing. It's just going to remind him that he can't get close to anybody ever. He'd probably ditch Alfred if Alfred would let him.

No, that's not true. Alfred is the only non-Nightwing person that Bruce can trust and confide in and doesn't have to really worry about because he can, mostly, take care of himself. He even dealt calmly with being The Joker's butler for a few days.

Back in Wonderland, The Mad Hatter figures out that Natalya isn't going to be a very convincing Alice when she scratches the shit out of his face. So it's time to find another lead actress. Well, almost time.

Doesn't he have a special Hypno-hat that would make her talk?

Batman shows up at the scene of Natalya's kidnapping where the police are already investigating. Batman ignored the Batsignal to head to Natalya's first. It turns out the Batsignal was to alert Batman to Natalya's disappearance. So now Jim Gordon has a few handy clues to figure out the identity of The Batman. You know, if he thinks about it for a few seconds. I'm pretty sure people know Bruce Wayne is dating Natalya the famous pianist.

As I supposed last issue to make any sense out of Batman seemingly acting stupid, his Bat Tracer he put on Natalya seems to have been a subdermal implant. Batman begins tracing her as Natalya is beaten by Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum in an effort to have her give up The Batman's identity.

Natalya's interrogation is happening on a helicopter and when The Mad Hatter finally realizes she either doesn't know or she's just not going to talk, he dumps her out. Once again, Batman is too late. How much more death can Alfred handle?

And thus Bruce Wayne never ever again thought about retiring The Batman.

Batman: The Dark Knight #20 Rating: +3 Ranking. This comic book needs to rise through the rankings faster than it has been, so I'm giving it a little boost. Since Gregg Hurwitz has taken over, it's become a great Batman title staking out it's own little corner of the Batman Universe. It really reminds me of Shadow of the Bat when that series first began.

Batman: The Dark Knight #19

Oh come on, DC! That's just rude.

Does DC expect me to NOT photoshop their covers when they give me such easy set ups? I got the feeling that DC changed the format on their Narration Boxes in Deathstroke simply to try to keep me from photoshopping horribly racist and misogynistic things in Deathstroke's voice. But then I have a gigantic ego and believe I am the sole causality of the universe. What's funny about that is everybody else has the same feeling! Even, or especially, people that believe in God. At least I don't believe some grand, omniscient creator has my back! Talk about an ego! I wish I knew one mortal person I could count on to carry me down the fucking beach.

So Batman is going to battle The Mad Hatter this issue but what I'm most concerned about is whether or not he actually revealed his secret identity to Natalya. He'd be a fool if he did! Because there's one sure way to know if somebody is a super villain and that's to think you can trust them enough to tell them your secret identity. But before I begin reading this comic book, I have one question: What the fuck happened to The White Rabbit?! Did David Finch cry "Dibs!" on that character? Or is the character just not interesting enough for other writers to pick up? I miss photoshopping her outfit to make it even skimpier than the way too skimpy Finch had already made it!

The Mad Hatter's entire operation is falling apart and while he's not too worried about the Gotham Police bringing his play to a halt, he is worried about that one guy.

Tweedle Dee has a point. Unless that's Tweedle Dum.

The comic dives right into a flashback as Jervis remembers the crazy days after he began his Testosterone treatments. The art this issue is really terrible compared to the previous issues by Ethan Van Sciver. I wonder what happened to him? He was part of the hype for this comic book turning around and he's already gone? Hopefully it's just one of those one off issue things but it's too bad it had to happen in the middle of a story arc. Now The Mad Hatter doesn't just look like a pathetic kid; he looks like a creepy child molester. As opposed to, you know, the uncreepy ones.

"If one pill at a time made me an unlikable mess, just think what six at a time will do! Bottoms up!"

Jervis became a raging monster that loved to kill bunnies, so he was abandoned in the Arkham Detention Facility for Youth. I wasn't aware Arkham had a loony bin for kids! Fuck the Li'l Gotham comic book! I want a Li'l Arkham comic book! Although I haven't read Li'l Gotham so maybe they actually have a Li'l Arkham section. I can't imagine they could pass that up. It would be like Muppet Babies with straight jackets and padded walls.

Back at the Batcave, Bruce is sitting around waiting for the Batsignal while Natalya hangs out with Alfred upstairs. So he really did go through with it! Now instead of sitting in front of the monitor waiting for crime to happen, he can sit around having sex waiting for crime to happen. And Natalya can sit around having sex waiting until she has to give another performance. They sit around having so much sex this night that Natalya almost misses her symphony. But Bruce drops her off in the Batplane and before anybody thinks Batman can trust anyone at all with his secret, he plants a bug on her so he can hunt her down and kill her as soon as she blabs his secret. Or else it is another tracer so he can find her if she ends up getting kidnapped by The Mad Hatter now that he's totally and completely in love.

One of the Mad Hatter's hatted spies notices Batman dropping off Natalya, so everything is already ruined! Batman giving a civilian (especially a love interest) his secret identity is tantamount to shoving that civilian into a refrigerator with his own hands. And now that The Mad Hatter knows Batman is involved with Natalya, it's either The Hatter or The Pianist! One of them has to die!

Leave her alone, Jervis! Alfred can't take any more death!

Batman sits at home watching the tracer beep away. But love has made him stupid!

You didn't plant the tracer under her skin, idiot. Does she sleep in her fancy dress? Zoom in a little, Bruce. I think you'll find the bleeping is coming from her closet. And she's long fucking gone.

The Mad Hatter has not kidnapped her yet, so Bruce is simply lucky. How can Bruce be the smartest guy in the DC Universe and yet still be so stupid? Perhaps I'm simply mistaken and the tracer was planted subdermally. Perhaps it was just a failure of the artist to get the message across in the image. I'd be more apt to believe that than to believe that Bruce Wayne is making this kind of a stupid mistake.

Now that Jervis has found the star of his play, he calls for a rehearsal. He summons all the players from Gotham and they all leave their families and friends to wander out to the abandoned underground silo. What's wrong with the families of these victims? Haven't any of them tried to get their loved ones to remove the fucking hat they've been obsessively wearing for weeks?! I'm pretty sure unless they're Ron Howard, wearing a hat 24/7 would be suspicious. Wearing it while sleeping? Strange. Wearing it in the shower? Fucking weird. Wearing it while wearing another hat? Someone call The Goddamned Batman because it's obviously a Mad Hatter problem!

The rehearsal doesn't go very well so Jervis fires all of the actors.

While Batman just sat and waited and played love games, dozens hundreds of Gothamites were murdered. Perhaps Batman should have run around Gotham yanking hats off of people all night long? That's a better plan than doing absolutely nothing.

Gordon lights up the signal later to let Batman know that hundreds of people went missing. As they're talking, he gets a call that the bodies have been found.

Just chilling. And I love the title.

Batman: The Dark Knight #19 Rating: +2 Ranking. I didn't care for the art in this issue but any writer that can get me to respect The Mad Hatter as a genuine psychotic threat is doing a fantastic job. I love the motivation for The Mad Hatter's murders in this book. He's actually involved in legitimate business practices (if selling drugged tea and hats that possess the wearer can be, this one time, thought of as legitimate) to make the money for his psychotic desires. And the people are simply props to fuel his fantasy. One reader mentioned another Mad Hatter book that was really well done but I hadn't read that one (and have forgotten what it was). But this is the first time I've really enjoyed reading this character.

Batman: The Dark Knight #18

Groovy.

Grunion Guy was supposed to finish up Chapter Three of his story, "Temperance Goes Down", but he couldn't make his deadline. Oh sure, he claims he finished! But do I have a copy of it? Fuck no.

Grunion Guy: "Did you realize Chapter Three was about Alice getting cock?"
Me: "I am not printing that story."
Grunion Guy: "Censorship! First Amendment! Freedom of Speech!"
Me: "You want freedom of speech? Fuck you."
Grunion Guy: "Wait, wait! This is my first paragraph: "The Gerbil's brother decided to tell a story because Alice had gotten so wet. But the duck just wanted to do it. And the Dildo was all about getting some cock."
Me: "Stop it. That's enough. I won't print your explicit Alice in Wonderland porn."
Grunion Guy: "It's not worse than that Alice in Wonderland comic book on the shelves at the comic book store where she's basically sitting on the Queen of Heart's face with her pendulous breasts sliding out the sides of her apron!"
Me: "Yeah? Well I don't publish that shit. Get out of here with your Alice porn. You're fired!"
Grunion Guy: "Oh yeah?! Well have you heard about the Second Amendment?!"
Me: "Is that a fucking threat?"
Grunion Guy: "Hunh? No, I was just wondering if the Second Amendment could help since you're shitting all over the First One that I think can help me somehow. Is the Second One about ghost writers?"
Me: "I don't have time for this. Turn in a less vulgar version of your story or get the hell out."
Grunion Guy: "What if Alice ends up on a floating city with a bunch of racists and crows?!"
Me: "Good day."

Anyway (fucking Grunion Guy), this issue begins with The Dark Knight investigating a night club run by Tweedle Dee and owned by The Mad Hatter's company, One Size, Inc. He tries to interrogate Tweedle Dee but Tweedle Dee has some truth to lay down on Bats.

It's like Gregg Hurwitz was birthed directly from my brain.

This is an excellent moment. I've bitched a number of times about how Batman beats people so severely that they can easily end up dying from their injuries and yet he still espouses a non-lethal ethic. It's easy to believe that he knows the limits of the kind of damage he can do to a person without actually killing the person because, well, he is the Goddamned Batman, after all. But you would think the amount of hit point damage he deals out on a nightly basis that somebody would eventually succumb to their wounds. I have a feeling that Batman feels fine about what he does as long as nobody dies on the scene. If they happen to expire in the hospital later, it's the fucking doctor's fault.

But no matter how nice this moment is with Tweedle Dee acting righteous, Batman's response is even better.

Batman's look in that first panel is classic. "Are you fucking kidding me? Is he havin' a laugh?"

Batman continues his investigation by swinging in through windows, booting people in the face, fracturing people's palates and sinus bones and orbital sockets, cracking skulls, and unhinging jaws. It's all very effective. Although I have to wonder who he's maiming since most of them are wearing hats which mean they're probably innocent bystanders being hatpnotically controlled. Batman's "investigation" turns up a robust tea trade. All the different kinds of teas give the Mad Hatter all kinds of different powers. That's exactly like The Virgin class in the Roller Playing Game, Places & Predators! Which must mean The Mad Hatter is a virgin!

Oh wait. That's not a big surprise. He's a tiny, snaggle-toothed, cross-eyed man. Although I'm sure he's not a virgin because of his looks! Nobody in this day and age would ever judge somebody by their looks! Everybody should be willing to fuck everybody while using all the correct pronouns and being as inoffensive as possible! I'm sure The Mad Hatter is a virgin because he's an angry, misanthropic asshole who constantly reblogs bigoted shit on Tumblr.

The Mad Hatter is currently checking out his tea distribution business and he must have been drinking from the tea that makes him super strong and super agile and unscented and super quiet and invisible because he gets the drop on Batman and cracks him over the head. The Mad Hatter gets away and Batman stumbles out to find Catwoman stealing the hubcaps off of the Batmobile.

If the other villains in Gotham learned that you could get away with anything as long as you have a fuck buddy history with Batman, this comic book is going to become X-Rated.

Batman drives off after The Mad Hatter missing a hubcap. Alfred is going to be pissed.

Meanwhile The Mad Hat[t]er's play is almost ready. They only need to cast the part of Alice and they'll be set to make all of Jervis Tetch's adolescent fantasies come true. I have a feeling Jervis's play is going to be more vulgar than Grunion Guy's story. Jervis also has a chance to reminisce. In a stunning twist, it turns out it could be an experimental drug that makes Jervis go crazy and not being bullied and brow-beaten by other children.

One pill makes you bigger; one pill makes you smaller. But the kind your doctor gives you turns you into a raving, homicidal lunatic.

Now, I don't know yet if he takes the pill or not. The side effects line up perfectly with the monster he becomes but it still could be his social life falling apart that puts him over the edge after he decides not to take it. Perhaps he'll decide not to take it, find that Alice won't dance with him at the dance, and then he'll rush home and eat all the pills at once. Or he might just take them and succumb to the side effects. I like that version because it's so tragic. His friends have all accepted him for who he is up until this point. He's the only one that can't accept himself. And in trying to change himself, he's going to turn into something that his friends won't like and he'll lose them that way. I hope that's what happens.

It looks like Gregg Hurwitz is going to give all of the crazy villains a sympathetic background. The reader can care more about them and understand why they've become the person they've become. But Batman doesn't give a shit about that kind of feel good garbage. His life was tragic and horrible as well and he didn't resort to killing and hurting other people. Oh wait. Yes he did! He just decided to hurt the kind of people the police don't mind getting hurt. But seriously, he decided to dedicate his life to justice and helping others. So Bats doesn't particularly care if these maniacs came from tragic backgrounds. He didn't let his tragedy turn him into a monster, so he understands they also had the choice not to become monsters. All Batman cares about is that choice they made. And once they make it, Batman can justify beating the living shit out of them!

Later at the dance, Jervis tries life without the pills, probably for the last time.

What a whore! Can't she see how much he likes her? Doesn't that mean she owes him a chance!? What is she going to do? Find somebody that likes her that she also likes? Ugh. How dare she! I mean, this is so tragic and sad!

Back in the present, Jervis pays a visit to Alice Kahla (née Dee). He finds her a sad, middle-aged woman with a bitter husband and a brood of children. But Jervis isn't big on reality.

I'm with The Mad Hatter. Fuck reality.

And then we get the Bruce Wayne mirroring Jervis Tetch's part of the story. Bruce apparently really loved Natalya the Penis. So like Jervis, he wants that love, that perfection back. But he doesn't simply want to relive the past. He wants to live in the present and change the future. I'm not sure if the next couple of pages are Bruce's fantasy or if Bruce is actually revealing his secret identity to Natalya to get her back. Also her name might not be Natalya.

Well, he does need a new Robin.

I really can't tell if Batman has just gone through with revealing his secret self to Natalya or he was fantasizing doing this as he looked at a photograph of her. I suspect he's really going through with it as she already hinted that she knew who he was just before they broke up. So Bruce kind of has to keep her close to him before she blabs his secret to every guy she gets close to. "You know, I was fucking The Batman!" I also think a grown ass woman would be a much more appropriate Robin than a young preadolescent boy. I also can't wait to see Catwoman's face when she first runs into the new Robin swinging about Gotham.

And then the issue ends with Jervis finally deciding whether or not to take his Testosterone Supplements.

Because The Batman's origin mirrors the bad guy's origin in The Dark Knight stories, this must mean Batman took steroids. I fucking knew it.

Batman: The Dark Knight #18 Rating: +2 Ranking. Gregg Hurwitz has come along and pulled a 540 on this title. A 180 wasn't enough to rid it of the David Finch writing stench that had been clinging to it for so long. So he had to spin it full around one extra time before turning it around and making it good. I also think The New 52 needed a Batman title like this. I want stories like this that sort of stand alone and aren't completely wrapped up in the current continuity. I'm sure they are but they lack any links or indicators that tie them directly to it. Notice The Dark Knight wasn't forced to do a Requiem issue? DC needs more comics that DON'T rely on the whole world building thing. Give me good stories with good characters. Surprise me. Make me feel something for the heroes and the villains! Hurwitz is doing these things. Thank you, Gregg Hurwitz!