Let's see. Everything is a set up of the new status quo. Scarecrow is calling the shots with the guy who will make tomorrow. Harley tries to do good, but because she's nuts, she's hitting cops who surprise her with baseball bats.

The Gotham police are actually doing their job, so they don't appreciate Bats contaminating crime scenes, and Barb is setting up mini-Batsignals across Gotham. Why not just text. Seriously. If Bats is on the outs, why be so public with contact protocols?

Blind, new-old Friend of Bruce is doing - stuff? I don't know. The overall effect of the issue is just treading water. The new status quo could have been set up in three pages, and we could have had a kick-ass action scene. I can't say I'm a fan of what Tynion is doing, but why does it have to be done in such a slow, non-exciting way? What does it cost for an issue? $4? That's a lot of money for nothing happening.

And while the art has its charms, I really don't like the designs of the new characters. But that's me. I also don't get what they are setting up Harley to be. She is now guilty of assault with a deadly weapon on a cop. Her actions were seen by other cops. There's no way she is an anti-hero who is left alone, unless you want to show that "sane" Harley is as dangerous as "insane" Harley. But no matter how you slice it, it's back behind bars for her. That's the only way this works unless you want to have bad story-telling with plot requiring characters to act the way they do to drive plot and there won't be any logical story-telling consequences as a result.

Tynion wouldn't do that, he's known for his tight character work and iron-clad plotting.

Or I could be wrong. more

Once again, Tom King proves that he is not a good writer and should not be working for DC. The nice art can't save this one at all.

Artwork 10/10

story 5/10

Don’t know why King keeps pushing this relationship between Catwoman and joker. A lot of other issues with the story, pretty boring read. Would have gave this a much lower grade but Clay Mann has really put this mini series on his back.

Is this series over yet? Just end it, it goes on and on about nothing. Yeah, whatever pandering, I get it. NEXT!

I really don't care for the drama between Bruce and Selina. It shouldn't be a thing. The stuff in the future really doesn't do anything but mechanically inch the plot a little further. And the stuff with Phantasm is extremely boring. Easily the worst part of the miniseries.

I rate this so high (lol) for two reasons: Clay Mann's art which is as gorgeous as ever and the fact that for all his MANY faults, King did try to pay homage to Mask of the Phantasm and I enjoyed that. Now the bad stuff...oh boy, there's a lot to unpack there. Up until the last 6-7 pages the book was bearable, not good, just bearable. And then he went full Tom King. Those last pages were sooo dumb, The Room-level-dumb. But I'm sure King fanboys will extract something "deep" even from those retarded pages. :)) And of course he continues with the already classic King tropes, Batman being submissive and weak, the female is the strong character, "gOtHaM wAs aLwAyS hErS". Also the "relationship" between Catwoman and Joker is gross, it was never there to begin with and it makes Selina look really bad. more

I think King should read some real literature where real writers show him how to really flashback, Luis Spota, William Faulkner, Juan Rulfo or John Le Carré.

I don't know who told him that he knew how to write to this man. The only good thing was the art.

What can I say? King's weaknesses as a writer are out in full force in this issue.

We are now a third through this story line and we know virtually nothing. Andrea Beaumont, for all intents and purposes, is a new character and we know nothing about her, her relationship with Bruce and her relationship with Selina. There is the movie, but this is her comic's debut and it's been a long time since I saw the movie. King is absolutely wrong in having her back story explained in another medium that came out almost 30 years ago.

We have the new Batwoman, who is Selina and Bruce's daughter and we know nothing about her except that she's gay, like the old Batwoman I guess. Maybe that title comes with certain sexual preference requirements.

We know that Selina killed the Joker and that in the past she and the Joker had some sort of relationship that she didn't want Bruce to know about. We know the Joker killed Andrea's son (I hope to God that the son isn't a secret son of Bruce. How many of Bruce's sons and daughters does the Joker have to kill or cripple before DC gets it in their heads that they can't keep repeating the same beats over and over again. Especially in an era when they reprint the orginal stories over and over again. Even new fans are aware of the past. It's not like in the old days when it was difficult for fans who were new to the hobby to collect back issues going back 30 or 40 years, so they didn't have an acute awareness of Bats' history.)

We see Selina in the future being ruthless. But we saw that already when she killed the Joker.

And apparently Selina is kind of angry at Bruce for his mercy to villains. She said that Bruce didn't lock them up, he forgave them. Maybe King is going for some sort of "Selina feels that she shouldn't have been forgiven for her crimes" thing. And what she hates in what Bruce did is because secretly she feels he let her off the hook. I don't know, but it's actually something worth exploring, and should not be just a casual one-off line.

King seems to write Selina as inherently evil and only on the side of angels because of Bruce. Once he's gone, it's back to being a Bond villain. That's insulting is so many ways.

First Seline was never a killer. She was always a thief. From the beginning, she never went in for blood. I mean she and the Joker premiered in the same issue (Batman #1) and they crossed swords a couple of issues later in Batman #3. We actually see Catwoman willing to give up to Joker the jewels she stole if he spared Robin's life.

From the very beginning they establish a difference between her and the Joker. But King has Selina being pals with the Joker. Bad characterization.

Second, having a bad woman be good because a man "straightened" her out is just sexist writing in the highest degree. Again, bad writing.

Also, King has public domain poetry do the heavy lifting in the story telling. In this case the Christmas carol "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" do the heavy lifting. I maintain the carol is just a variation of theme.

Tom, words and dialog are a main component of comic books. Don't be so lazy. Embrace the story-telling tools you have at hand. For God's sake, stop hiding behind the words of other people. It's just cheap.

Finally, having a story take place in past, present and future becomes very confusing. I may not be a genius, but I am not stupid. If you can confuse a long time comics fan like me, then I have to say, you're doing something wrong.

King might think switching time periods gives the illusion of forward momentum, but he is blowing it. For once he has the chance to tell a story where we don't know here it's going. In the past, we know that Bruce doesn't end up with Andrea, he ends up with Selina. But the future is an undiscovered country, to steal from Chancellor Gorkon. We actually don't know how the story will end, but King kills momentum by constantly switching up time periods.

But the art was good. Can't say I love the new Batwoman costume. A little to cheese-cakey for my tastes. DC artists, you can draw women in an attractive way without resorting to Cinemax at night renditions of the female form. Who knows, you might actually attract some women readers.

Or I could be wrong.
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What to say? I get what the author is doing, but I reject the premise of the story. We see Batman and Clownkiller track down thieves using hovermachines to steal stuff and Bats tell Clown not to kill or maim, they're just thieves.

We see the latest villain saying Gotham is going to hell and why don't you, new mayor, buy my tech to save the city. It's the beginning of the Magistrate. The founder is a man called Mr. Saint and he grew up in Gotham before the Dark Times, before the (crime) Empire. He pitches that normal cops can't take don't abnormal crooks and that Gotham, once a shining beacon on a hill, is a national joke and no one wants to live there. (He has a point).

We see reporters hanging out at Bruce's brownstone and neighbors also speaking about how things used to be better in the old days.

We also see the new Batcave, where Bruce is training Clown boy. It doesn't look that bad. Again, I am not buying "he has to do more with less" bit because we really don't see the less. Bruce still has a lifestyle that 99 percent would envy.

Finally, we see Damian run home to Mommy. She points that out and says Damian no longer has resources and friends. Then brutes come out and say they're with the League of Lazurus and fight fight fight. A thug has a knife at Talia's throat. Damian hesitates to kill and the last shot in the book is a splash of blood in the air. We are supposed to think that thug slashed Talia's throat and the blood is hers. I bet the blood is the thug's because Talia didn't hesitate to kill.

What I liked - The art. Pretty good dudes, but again, my complaint of today's artists being good at individual panels but not great at showing action remains. Think of it as the difference between being a great still photographer and a great action movie director.

There is a of parallel action going on. Now Bruce and Damian no longer have "resources." Damian and Clown Boy are now being taught by mentors. Damian is being told to kill, Clown Boy is being told not to kill. Mr. Saint remembers the good old days and even mentions Thomas Wayne being a wealthy guy who served the city as a doctor. His solution is to build a fascist state. Bruce is Thomas' son, and his solution is to catch crooks and bring them back alive.

The art thieves used very expensive tech to steal a painting. Bats doesn't have the money to pay for expensive tech. Parallels and paradoxes abound. I also have to say that spending a fortune to steal a painting is not a great business plan. Thieves understand certain cost/benefit ratios.

Aside from Tynion pointing out that no one would want to live in a city with Gotham's body count, I don't agree with the premise he's setting up. But he is right, business and people would flee the city for safer ports. It happens in real life. Look at Newark or Cleveland.

DC can't just keep playing the same notes. The Dark Knight Returns came out 36 years ago. Back then New York was a hellscape, but the city turned around. Why not try that story and just have Batman go after the freaks, with Gotham being a place where people actually want to live.

The whole kid sidekick thing Tynion is doing has been played out before with Jason and Damian. This is just a repeat of what's been done. When you start taking something that is unreal (costumed crime fighters and colorful villains) and try to make it real, it gives people like me - knit-picking know-it-all – permission to knit pick. But when you say this is the world and here are the rules don't question it too much, I'll go along as long as it's fun and entertaining. I will admit that this is quite the needle to thread but when it works it's a lot of fun. But when you make it "real" and comment too much on real issues, it falls apart. At least that's my point of view. Your mileage may vary.

I also don't like it when Bruce just reveals his secret identity to just anyone. I am old school, when superheroes didn't even tell their wives they were superheroes. You can say that's unbelieveable, even in a world with flying aliens who look just like us, but that is a foundation I grew up with and like. If you don't, I get it. But if you're going to get real, then you have to play it out all the way. And they don't, except for the original Spider-Man - Green Goblin thing, and that ended in a woman being fridged. No one wants that these days.

Or I could be wrong. more

There wasn't anything to liek or dislike. I'm starting to get bored by this run.

At least when I was reading King's run, I felt something. Anger and disappointment yes, but it was something.

This is just eh.

This was kinda just slow and boring.

It's good that all that Future State stuff ended. I didn't like it. Tynion since he took Batman every time he feels like he is less Batman, it was not a story that really caught me, there some intrigue but it was not interesting enough.

Damian seems to be back in the game, I did not like his suit, rather he seems to have stolen it from some Aquaman character, it seems that he has gills and the cape looks as if he took it from some jester of some medieval court.

Good ingredients but poorly baked. I hope this improves in the next issue. more

Ahh now I get it. Cat was pushed to the side ( Still PO'd about that ) so Bat and Ghost can have a bro-mance. Bat-Go

The future state concept didn't really interest me so I can't say this issue was any better with it going back to how it began. At least that is the vibe that is being put out there about where this is all heading to. I got enough of this type of story over the years with Marvel and it's humans vs mutants crap. I'm really not interested in DC version of it.

Damian running home to his mother was a let down. I was hoping for a stronger Damien in the background doing what he does and figuring out who he wants to be without everyone else. Instead he just runs home to mommy. I can understand her disappointment in him. And I'm not a fan of Talia or her father.

I did like and find it funny that Harley is chasing after Bat-Go trying to be good and help them take down bad guys. Love the way she was drawn. The art was pretty well done in this book.
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The problem with the "New Batman" is that it doesn't tell us who these characters are. Granted the original Batman didn't get an origin until six months after the character was launched in 1939, but that two-page story told us what we needed to know - why a guy dresses up as a bat to fight crime.

Given that this was a comic book in 1939, and people put on costumes as a matter of course to sell 10 cent books to nine-year-olds, that was all we needed.

But it's 2021. Nine-year-olds don't read comics anymore. I suspect more people over the age of 15 read them than under the age of 15. That means you have to come up with good explanations as to why people dress as a bat to fight crime.

The New Batman really doesn't tell us why young Fox does what he does. We know the Fox family basically stole Bruce's fortune so we know why young Fox has the means, but there is no motive.

We certainly don't know how Gotham became a police state outside the jurisdiction of the U.S. Constitution. I know the reason behind the story - evil corrupt private police justify having a vigilante fight for justice. But the how of that situation really matters. As much as I hated No-Man's Land (Gotham is cut off from the U.S. and it's Mad Max time despite the fact that Green Lantern and Superman could have solved the problems in 10 minutes, meaning I didn't buy into the premise of the story, so I didn't buy the stories) the writers at least came up with a reason why Gotham was the way it was. Again, I didn't buy that but there was an explanation. I also didn't buy the whole "six months later, Gotham is restored and it's like No-Man's Land never happened, but that's a rant for another day.

I liked that we see Cass and Steph renew their vows of sisterhood, as it were. But again they left out the important part of them breaking up as it were. Being placed in the middle of the story means a lot of the hard work of world-building isn't done. So again, I don't buy into the basic premise of the story, so the stories don't work for me.

I am also sick of the dystopian future tropes. I have always liked the notion that this is our world, but with superheroes. I know that premise is problematic when you think about it for more than 10 seconds, but I started buying comics when you just had to accept idea, so I did. If you can't I can hardly blame you. But looking at the Marvel movies, seeing heroes in real places among ordinary people works if you do it right. Dystopian futures is just the Hunger Games with different characters. I truly believe something is lost, but that's me. Your mileage may vary, and fair enough.

The art was good, though.

But overall, I really just don't care about these characters. Their motivations for their actions aren't explained. Their worlds aren't built, so we don't know the rules. Say what you will about old comics, but the producers really did a great job of character motiviation and world-building. The first issues usually did a great job of doing that. The Spider-Man origin in Amazing Fantasy sets everything up beautifully, and it does it in like half an issue of a comic. Now that's efficient, smart story telling.

Or I could be wrong. more

This issue is just dumb. Nothing happens. Bao, I mean Clownhunter tries to kill Harley but can't because of the power of love. Harley says sure I killed a lot of people and destroyed your life, but oppsie and I absolutely deserve to walk free because I'm a victim, and you're a victim and those dozens of people you brutally killed using psychotic methods totally had it coming.

Shadowkiller or Ghostslaughter or whatever, maintains caring about people will get Bruce killed. He says it hasn't so far. But caring about people Bruce's way sure has gotten a lot of other people killed. I am talking about thousands. Thanks to DC's love of body counts, letting the Joker live means thousands of innoncent people die every year because of Batman. I don't think that's the message DC wants to give, but that's what they're doing.

The action is stupid. I mean just stupid. Clownkiller, who hasn't hestitated to kill nameless victims, has a sword over Harley's neck. He just holds it there giving Bruce time to literally break his bonds, grab a batarang from his belt that Ghoststabber left on his body while tying him up. Bruce is able to throw the batarang to Harley, she catches it and then gets into a defensive position and talks about the healing power of forgiveness. Clownpiethrower breaks down and everybody hugs and it's cake for everyone.

All this action has to take time, yet Clownboy just holds the the sword over Harley's neck.

Even Ghost boy says he did everything he did to prove a point to Bruce. Which is what the Joker did in The Dark Knight. Bruce says I need help, I am getting older and don't have billions and Alfred is gone and Catwoman left me and my pickup truck has a flat and my dog died. So I could use help just don't kill anyone. Apparently, torture and planting evidence and crippling people is OK, just don't kill.

This issue is bad for so many reasons. Pacing is SOOO SSLLOOWW. Characters act out of character. A kid who has KILLED dozens brutally just changes. That's not the way things work. Harley is not nuts. She just shrugs off stuff and is sane. That's not Harley. Ghostkisser really just wants something and agrees to work with Bruce. Bruce really lets mass murderers off the hook with a hug. He says he needs help despite the fact that he's got more allies than ever. What with Spoiler and Cass as Batgirls (an ideal I really like - see I can be positive and enthusiastic), a couple of Robins, Nightwing, Huntress, Oracle and maybe Catwoman and her crew.

Why does Bruce need one more ally. He talks about reduced resources, but I don't see it. He says he doesn't have allies in government, but the Commish is still his fried.

This issue is saying things that aren't true and I really dislike all these mass murderers getting left off the hook. I am for rehabilitation, but murder is something else. Prison is also for punishment and these killers have been left off the hook.

The art was nice, but the action was nothing.

Or I could be wrong. more

Well, this issue seemed like it suffered from all the problems a bi-weekly schedule can bring to a comic. First, hardly anything happens. We get more context as to who Ghost-Maker is, but it's nothing that really changes anything we don't already know about the character. It feels like pointless additions. Second, the art is just all over the place. There are four artists on this one issue, and none of them are particularly good. It's just so clear that Tynion had to stretch this arc out and I have no idea why that's even the case. This story is just that barebones. This is mediocrity in spades. more

Boring and trite story. The art though is the worst part of the issue. I don't get this whole idea about having multiple artist on one issue. If it was a special issue okay fine but this is just a regular issue so why????? And more importantly why such diverse artists? If you are going to have different artist work on a issue together why not get ones that work complements each others work rather then be so different from each other that it just leaves the book looking like a hot mess? This book was a mess. The art was terrible. The only thing I can honestly say about the issue that I liked was how Ghost Maker and Bruce's relationship played out. I have to say from the looks of it GM is the far better Batman. He gets things done. I think he would make for a great stand alone comic series. I would buy it. As for Clownhunter, he started out as a possibly interesting character but is quickly becoming annoying and too one sided of a character. He needs to either grow some depth as a character or just go period. more

This issue is the very definition of story-telling that treads water. All we learn is what we know - Ghostmaker is a former "schoolmate" of Batman and they had a deal that Ghostmaker is now breaking. The deal? They keep out of each other's way. Oh, and Bruce apparently misses his old friend. Well, politics will do that.

Clownkiller still wants to kill Harley, and We now know that Oracle is called Batgirl Prime and Steph and Cassie are "The Batgirls."

We do see that Ghostmaker is scaring the crooks into giving themselves up and returned Mr. Pyg to Arkham. He was free for eight months. That really does make him better than Bruce at fighting crime. Pyg is a dangerous mass murderer (and frankly, a boring "gimmick" villain who shocks only because of his body count. I maintain that's not a good character.) Will Bruce say he knew where Pyg was, but needed him free to stop someone from stealing the election or selling nukes to some hostile power? Because letting a monster like that roam is just a bridge too far. If he didn't know where Pyg was, then Ghostie is better.

The whole issue ends with Clownkiller about to kill a tied up Harley. We get the sense that she helped kill people he cared about, and that's the problem with Harley. Her body count is problematic when trying to make her a hero for the kids.

We are pretty much right where we were last issue, but $4 poorer. That's not good story telling. Not a fan of this issue.

Or I could be wrong. more

Because DC is making so many failed copies of Red Hood, first Damian, then Clownhunter and now this Ghost-Maker in those ridiculous pants that is going to fly off when he kicks it first.

Maybe later I will have enough willingness and energy in me to write a detailed and polished review. For now, let me just say this:

I'm SO sick of Harley Quinn in Batman run.

I do like the art. I like the costume Ghost-Maker has.

But I really do dislike him as a character. Nothing about him works. He is just average copycat of Red Hood, Nobody, etc. All who have been done better.

The idea of Clownhunter really doesn't work for me either. Just eh...

So the two antagonists we have here are either bad or meh. And since this issue mostly focuses on them, it really is as good as they are. more

We learn that everyone in Gotham thinks "Ghost-Maker" is a stupid name. They're not wrong, I'll say that. There is a lot of talk-fighting. That's when people have intricate conversations that require one's full concentration while fighting. A paragraph of dialog can take place in time it takes to throw one punch.

Ghost-Maker calls out Batman for sucking at his job. He says that he's, in 12 hours, brought down corrupt judges, arms dealers etc. We also learn that Bats and Ghostie knew each other back in their training days.

Meanwhile Clownkiller attacks Harley and she brushes him off easily, saying she looks toward the future, not the past where she has a body count that must be in the hundreds.

Ghost-Maker also calls out Bruce for letting a 17-year-old who has killed dozens walk around free. Bruce says he can't send the kid to Blackgate, the guards would help him. I assume that means help him kill criminals. I guess Bruce has never heard of protective custody and maximum security.

Here's the thing. Ghost-Maker is right. Bruce let the kid go after giving him a stern warning and the first thing he did was go after Harley. The fact that she will live is based more on the fact that she's agile. If she wasn't, that's another body on Bruce's fail pile.

Bats crashes through Harley's window and then says he knows about the corrupt judges, he was giving them line to real in their boss. Now that's not possible. He also says he knows about the arms deal, he sabotaged the weapons so they wouldn't work and he was waiting to see who they were going to be sold to. He mentions he had Cassandra Caine keeping an eye on some crooks. We see her in her Batgirl outfit, so cool.

Barb is tracking the fight and Bruce tells her to stay out of Ghostie's network, because it would crush her network. So that's clue.

In all shots, past and present, Ghostie's eyes are covered, so if he's blind, you read it here first folks.

The art is nice, but the main problem is that Tynion stretches out all the exposition and action at the same time. Instead of having a page of dialog explaining positions, and then the fight. It's all one thing and both detract from each other. Also, has two swords in him by the end of the fight. You know Tynion, Batman wore body armor back in Batman #1 in 1940. So I find the idea of him just wearing tights and not body armor to be weak sauce, especially since the Batman movie came out in 1989 -31 years ago - so armor has two historical precedents. Shrugging off killing or maiming wounds through "I am Batman" will power is just a bridge too far for me.

All in all, I just found the plot and the stolen elements from early stories to be uninteresting and wish they would move on. Bruce being "poor" actually doesn't affect this issue at all. So why take away his fortune if the stories aren't going to reflect his diminshed means?

Not a great issue. But I could be wrong. more

Tynion is doing exactly the same thing as Lobdell, great elements but he doesn't do anything with them and unlike Lobdel he's only compiling other writers.

Not interest in Nobody 3.0

It is not terrible. It is okay. But my biggest problem is with Ghost-Maker. This idea doesn't sound anything new to me. A part Arkham Knight, a part Nobody, you get the idea. He is currently just a rehash of old and done-to-death ideas and not done very well.

Who did Tynion rip off this time? First there is animated Batman with a fellow student of a mentor. There is himself, with more victims becoming villains themselves.

Unfortunately his ne2 villain makes compelling points. Bruce is letting a mass murderer loose. Gotham is incapable of locking up its criminals. Yet another villain who knows who Batman is.

Bruce yet again saying stay out of my city. When has that ever worked? I am not impressed. The art was nice.

Or I could be wrong. more

Once again we see nothing happen. We are told that Catwoman has to deal with her enemies, that Lucius has Bruce's money and Bruce will have it back if he wants, but eyes will be on him so he can't spend it.

Bruce never asks for the money back and says he'll move into a brownstone in the city that he didn't even know he owned. We're told that the city changed and all the Joker goons just took off their masks so no one knows who they are but apparently Clownkiller is tracking them down.

Again, that's not how money works. If Joker paid the goons, then there is a money trail. The Board pays off Bruce, but he owns the stock. Stock deals can be nullified when fraud is proven. Lucius says he has tens of billions of dollars in cash, but Bruce didn't have a Scrooge McDuck money bin. His assets were stock, real estate, etc. These aren't liquid assets. Converting them to cash would be impossible even if a whiff of fraud were suspected.

So what assets does Bruce have? We don't know. We are told that he can't spend what money he has without receiving attention, so if he breaks the batmobile, he'll have to fix it without using Wayne Enterprises resources. I don't think he ever did that because employees would have had to do the work and why would they keep their mouths shut?

Bruce living in the city. Already been done. This whole slimmed down Batman goes back to the VIP concept launched when Robin went to college. There is nothing new under the sun with Tynion. Keeping Catwoman and Batman apart is just annoying. We still really haven't dealt with Alfred's death.

All this is a rehash of stuff that's been done before and the fear of actually going forward with the character development that people actually like - Bat/Cat - built on a foundation of unbelievable financial structure. What will happen to all the charities Bruce supports? We don't know. He used his fortune to help a lot of people, is that money gone. The way foundations work doesn't even seem to have a play in this world.

I am not impressed, but I could be wrong. more

Is it just me? I see the "professional" reviews and for the most part, they loved the Joker War.

But all I saw was a bunch of nothing. It's another all-out Gotham war. But Tynion's plot makes no sense. He restores the status quo (we don't know how much money Bruce has, but we all know in the end, he'll be or become a billionaire again. We know Alfred is returning).

Punchline knows who Batman is. Instead of getting the last word and telling the world that, she plays "victim" to the Joker. Harley ties Joker up with a bomb and Bats walks away, but we're told the Joker escaped, not shown how he did it.

The Joker sits around a diner with his hoodie up and no notices him? He jokerizes a sap and tells him that his body will be found and taken as the Joker. Like anyone would buy that. We have fingerprints and DNA and dental x-rays and the ability to search for scars. Tynion, stop moving your plots forward by making everyone so dumb.

What we don't see is how the Bat family rallies around Bruce, how they love and respect him and each other, how they support him and his goals and how he has influenced them to make sacrifices with their lives. We haven't seen anyone mourn Alfred, not really. Instead we get another empty spectacle where no one acts human and the logical consequences of the plot are not played out or explored. Just more blather about how Gotham is different and Bats is a Joke from the Joker and "no, I'm not" from Bruce.

Hopefully, Fifth-gen or whatever DC has coming next will smooth the edges. Tynion has also introduced the next "Bats is an incompetent vigilante, I'll take over and show him how it's done" guy. Like we haven't seen that before with the Reaper, with Az-Bats. Just more retreads of old plots.

The art was nice.

Just echh. Or I could be wrong. more

From the start of this run I’ve been waiting for a Wow moment to happen. still waiting. This whole arc for me has been a mix of existing stories done worse(city of bane, endgame, a little batman R.I.P with
hallucinations)and attempts to make Wow moments but not delivering

Why does joker suddenly care so much about Gotham? Why is their rivalry based on who owns the city? That’s not what comic Joker is about, that’s Heath. You can’t change a character to fit your story without saying why they’re different and showing how they changed. The prelude before this run didn’t say why either

This arc has been a let down, funny moments didn’t land, Harley foreshadowing Joker’s death wasn’t deep. Joker wearing the batsuit was enough to stop me buying this after #100 which we all know will have some fight that’s supposed to make this run good. more

This entire arc up until now could've been done in 2 issues.
What's even more disappointing is the fact that the previous arc also led up to this.
Will be dropping this book after #100