Bryan Hill and Dexter Soy deliver a treasure of a book, and if you give Batman & the Outsiders a chance, I sincerely believe you'll find that this is the type of comic you hope every comic you pick up will be. There's action, emotion, depth, adventure, humor, and heart. The ability of these two men to craft such an incredible and engaging story that continues to develop and grow is inspiring. Batman & the Outsiders is what modern comics should look like. Read Full Review

Dexter Soy brings some beautiful visuals to the issue and the art has an understated feel which matches the plot. The art focuses more on character than action as most of the story consists of conversations and the characters look amazing. Read Full Review

While Batman and the Outsiders #9 is a great book filled with intriguing character drama, it's time for this series to kick things up a notch. Plain and simple. Read Full Review

Jefferson Pierce is drifting towards the dark side after a horrible attack leaves what he loves devastated. It is up to Batman and the Outsiders to bring Jefferson back from the brink and keep him from doing something he can't take back. Will Ra's Al Ghul's plan to drive Batman's Outsiders to the darkness succeed? Read Full Review

Batman and the Outsiders #9 makes it clear that there's a rocky future ahead for the team. Even if they vanquish Ra's al Ghul, they are unlikely to emerge from the conflict unscathed. And the damage to the team's unity might never be fully healed. Read Full Review

While this book is in danger of heading back to the overly slow burn that frustrated me in the earlier parts of the run, Bryan Hill sets up some really cool things (not all good for our heroes, mind you) that I can't wait to see play out.  The art by Dexter Soy is great and really, this is just a solid book that can be enjoyed by anyone who wants a little more character work in their capes and cowls stories. Read Full Review

This series started rough with issues too focused on original villains, but it's found its footing since as one of the better books in the Bat-line. Read Full Review

This is sophisticated storytelling, and I'm hooked. Read Full Review

Final Thoughts: We know that Ra's isn't going to, permanently or otherwise, turn Jefferson. Shiva isn't going to turn Jefferson or Cassandra. We're nine issues into the series, there just isn't any believability in threatening the loyalty of the team yet, unless it's new 52 Birds of Prey and one of them is a bad guy. So, like a recent arc of Teen Titans, this story seems deadlocked in a behavioral standstill. Either it follows protocol and keeps its heroes pure and unwavering, or they turn for shock value and the readers lose a fan favorite. There are more avenues outside of that binary, but the story isn't being written as flexible to imply that there are. Read Full Review

Prelude:
So far Batman and the Outsiders has been of passable quality but only just. Let's see how Hill goes with this issue.

The Good:
I do like the aspects of the story concerning our characters.

Dexter Soy's art is great here.

The Bad:
Progression is a bit slow.

Characters are very heated but especially Bruce.

Conclusion:
Like the series, it's passable with highlights such as the varying aspects that our characters are struggling with and Soy's great art but the problems of slow progression and heated characters has been consistent throughout the series.

It just seems like this series is plodding along. The group is constantly moping around or getting mad at each other. Black Lightning's reaction to someone he cares for being murdered was very understated. It just seems this series borders between good and average.

I’m just really not feeling it, honestly, the characters are just kind of annoying.

This issue, much like this series, is fine. I don't find it very compelling.