While technically not a ‘Rebirth’ title, Detective Comics #934 is filled with its branding and with a reversion back to its original numbering and new statement of identity, you could say Detective Comics has been rebirthed. In the New 52, Detective Comics struggled for an identity beyond existing as a B-Side Batman book. Prior to the New 52, the book was something of an anthology title with leads changing arc to arc, often serving as a testing ground for characters like Batwoman Kate Kane. Now under the authorship James Tynion IV and the art team of Eddy Barrows, Eber Ferreira, and Adriano Lucas, Detective Comics gains a new identity as the Bat-Family team book.

Numerically it isn’t the first issue but #934 marks the start of “Rise of the Batmen” and that brings with it a lot of foundation laying. This isn’t the emotional foundation laid in Green Arrow: Rebirth but a plot one as Batman recruits Batwoman, Red Robin Tim Drake, Spoiler Stephanie Brown, Orphan Cassandra Cain, and Clayface Basil Karlo. Talking about plot is boring but there is a very functional economy to these introductions and recruitments. All but Batwoman’s lasts just 2 pages. It’s like any good recruitment montage from Seven Samurai or Ocean’s Eleven(2001), a characters team functionality and emotional dynamics are quickly established and it’s on to the next one.

The art team dose a fantastic job giving these pages’ real flow, from Batwoman’s splash page introduction to the final page on the roof. A common design element is to have an overriding large cell that establishes the environment with smaller cells for emotive character responses. Best seen in the recruitment of Basil Karlo, the most surprising member of the team. The art team works to render Clayface different than the rest of the team. He’s colored softer and kind of opaque, lacking not the strong lines that give a firmly corporeal feel to the Bat people. The midtown theater establishes the tragedy of C more

With Secret Wars and the creation of Battleworld by God Emperor Doom, the tie-ins for this event have been able to play on understood characters but often with a twist on genre. With its all female squad, matriarchal rule via Baroness She Hulk, and island setting, it is easy to draw some parallels between A-Force and DC Comics Themyscira, home of Wonder Woman and the Amazons. Wilson describes Arcadia as a “feminist paradise” (that sounds nice). On the official Battleworld map Arcadia is described as “the dominion of Battleworld’s mightiest heroines! Enter a land only populated by the women who have earned the title of protector, savior and Super Hero. “ Arcadia isn’t a solely female haven from the oppressive Mans World, men exist on the island. Luke Cage is shown wondering a market with Jessica Jones and child. Baroness She Hulk describes its inhabitants as “brothers and sisters in-arms”, it’s just mainly protected by Marvel’s female heroic pantheon.
Arcadia was only mentioned in Secret Wars #2; all of these tie-ins will need to build a strong sense of geography from the start. A-Force handles this via Bennet and Wilson’s omniscient narration via She-Hulk with the art team depicting the A-Force getting up before going out on patrol. This culminates in a spectacular splash page of the squads flying members heading out on patrol. With its lakeside setting and dominant early mid-twentieth century architecture, Arcadia evokes Koriko from Kiki’s Delivery Service.
A-Force features the naturalized absurdity of a Silver Age comic. This is the comic where Carol Danvers gets to punch a SHARK and America Chavez throws said Shark over the SHIELD. As a reader of course there is plenty of extra textual fuel for that absurdity. In the text itself though, the presence of A-Force allows for an already heightened sense of balance.
The reverberations of the Megalodon are what cause the issues drama, as it pertains to the absolute law and will of Doom. Amer more