Batgirl # 63

Archive

Reviewer: Kevin S. Mahoney
Story Title: Could’ve Been Part One: Nowadays

Written by: Andersen Gabrych
Penciled by: Alé Garza
Inked by: Jesse Delperdang & Andrew Pepoy
Colored by: Wildstorm FX
Lettered by: Pat Brosseau
Editor: Michael Wright
Publisher: DC Comics

Batgirl is a different sort of comic book. Where else can you find a non-powered teenage female at the center of her own book? What other comic features an illiterate teenage ninja master? As an added bonus, this book differs from the other two major non-Batman yet Bat-franchise books ( Nightwing, Robin) in significant ways. This book is currently set in Blüdhaven and Cassandra Cain’s father hasn’t been killed in the latest superfluous crossover event. Readers of those two other books will certainly concede the aforementioned strong points of this book. However, readers unfamiliar with the Bat-titles might be harder to woo to this series. It’s admittedly tough to relate to a lead character who speaks so rarely, and has trouble relating to normal people in anything but an emergency situation. Still, the action sequences might make up for it, if action is what the reader enjoys.

This issue features a rare foray into normal living for Cassandra “Batgirl” Cain (she goes to a party with teens her own age), which is spoiled by the arrival of Deathstroke the Terminator. Both scenarios contain their own type of merit. On the one hand, readers rarely get to see Cassandra learning about normal activities, let alone experimenting with or enjoying them. The battle in the story’s second half not only features some well-depicted action choreography, it furthers the reputation of both combatants through their spirited interplay. While Slade Wilson certainly doesn’t need the exposure or the spotlight (see: Villains United, Outsiders, Identity Crisis) Batgirl could use a battle or two with anyone that readers already know and respect. Her book is over five years old, and has lost a bit of buzz and steam in that time. This issue might mark that rarest of rare birds, the non-intrusive, well-written, and worthwhile crossover!

The art certainly adds punch to the tale. The manga-influenced pencils make the figures seem a bit more frenetic, a bit less tethered to humdrum activities. The detailed settings, weapons, and even bit player characters, create an ease in storytelling that no amount of careful layout could match. The colors are a bit more creative than necessary, but that adds to the cartoony format of the title and fails to distract the reader. Only the dropped-in onomatopoeias seem a bit off; the single shots of Wilson’s clearly automatic weapon should have used a different effect entirely. That seems like a minor quibble, but it’s the only artistic element working against an otherwise harmonious approach, which makes it all the more noticeable.

This installment begins and ends with reflections on the father-daughter dynamic. It’s an interesting hook for a series whose medium has historically been much more oriented towards fathers and sons. This reversal will get even more focus in current and upcoming issues as the search for Cassandra’s birth mother begins in issue sixty-five. A mother-daughter pairing hasn’t existed in any substantial way since the Black Canary stories of the late Silver Age. Future stories in that vein could add yet another layer of meaning to the already complicated character of Cassandra Cain. Then again, it might mean more buzz for this title and more interesting and unconventional stories.