I wanted to think the same, but since this story takes place 20 years in the future, I am still worried about how King will handle Wonder Woman

Funny to me how a low score isnt valid, or objective but a high score? That's acceptable and objective amirite?

oh, no, don't get me wrong, I don't mean to criticize the fact that there are bad grades, everyone is free to comment, but there is also no denying the fact that an important part of the spiderman fandom is quite toxic and sometimes they have somewhat strange, repetitive, or bad opinions or arguments

Honestly, I'm glad you enjoyed it @justonemore. I dont think we should ostracize or really criticize people for liking issues we dont like and vice versa

It was prolly me just making a snap judgement then. I'm simply sick of everyone claiming something is "review bombed" when lots of ppl express dislike for something, but ignore that the perfect scores things get are review bombing in the opposite direction. It happens on games and movies too, just something that grinds my gears. I apologize if I took it wrong.

there is always going to be toxic reactions (you could say both good and bad even) - the way to combat it is just to give your honest opinion and give reasons in your reviews of why you like or dislike something. Most toxic responses are vague, over-the-top statements with lots of exclamation points

I have felt this for a while. Dick Grayson is my favorite character, but he needs to struggle a bit and the overall story needs to get some forward momentum

Look at you!

I’m a big boy now!

put on your big boy reviewing pants

I don't know what it is about Taylor but I find his books awfully predictable and boring, I suppose his humor not connecting with me plays a part into it as well

I think the hero line is that Bruce would want dick to keep a low profile when he isn’t in costume as it goes with this situation. And, I fully expect that Alfred left the money to Dick because of what was going on in the Bat-Family the last year, (he updates the will each year he says), knowing that Dick would distribute it out to everyone when appropriate

Yeah, the humor is super cringe and he insists with it, he doesn't let up.

And that was another Alfred mistake, as if being Dick was fair enough to watch for others besides Damian and Barbara. PLEASE

I'll be honest, if they hadn't overrated this number so much, I would have completely passed it by. Although it was going to be great. But is not.

Bruce managed to make a fool of himself before while not in costume whenever the situation needed him to act. In a Clark Kent-stumbling-on-to-save-people kind of way. So the whole line would make sense if Bruce would be the type of hero who cares so much about his identity that he would turn a blind eye to injustice. But that's not who Bruce Wayne is, regardless of Taylor trying to send that message because he's obsessed with hating billionaires.

And as a Jason fan I know for a fact that Alfred would never leave him like that. He always understood Jason maybe more than anyone else, I don't buy the whole leaving everything to Dick and leaving Jason in the wind, even if Dick would take care of him. He wouldn't be that impersonal with someone who was like a son to him. There's a pattern here already, Taylor tries to diminish the well constructed Batfamily relationships between other characters just to make us feel like Nightwing in special.

The bat family has been a mess for years! Well constructed? Damian is a killer again, Batman almost beat Jason to death for what he did to the Penguin, They thought Tim Drake was dead and he came back and split! Even Barbara called them all out in that awful Castelucci Batman #50! In the last couple of weeks even - Damian is back with Talia and Jason looks like he killed a man! Give the book a chance! It’s one issue and you are writing it off as Tom Taylor destroying the Bat Family!

As an aside, we have no idea what he left the rest of the family either

The relationships are well constructed, yes. Damian was never a saint to begin with, honestly I think he's been too restrained for a long time, even though I liked most of what Tomasi's done with him and I didn't like the direction DC took him in these last years, it's really not a huge stretch for a kid who's been indoctrinated that the world is his to rule. Batman didn't beat Jason to death, yeah he gave him a rough fight, but it's not like that's the first time that happened.

I can see you're a Taylor fan because you're way too defensive for this book. I should say, I loved his Injustice, he basically got me back into comics with his Injustice but ever since then his writing has gotten worse and worse to the point I'm wondering why I'm even trying. Cringey humor, endless rants about billionaires and capitalism, doesn't give one shit about previous character relationships in a very Bendis-like kind of way, way too many cheesy moments.

He does write action pretty well, I'll give him that. Btw, are you the guy from Weird Science DC Comics?

So you think that since rebirth, the barn family has been strong? And I said ALMOST beat him to death... and now he’s killed a Joker and a guy last week! Batman won’t even work or talk with Jason because he said he’s a killer!

That was Bat Family obviously

He will work and talk with him in the next issues, he always does eventually, regardless of their ideological differences. He hates that Jason throws in his face all his shortcomings and stand for a lot of things Bruce despises but at the end of the day he's still his son, the son he failed and he'll always try to make up for it in the end.

I think that overall the Batfamily has some strong relationships forged in time. The relationship between Alfred and Jason is a solid one, it was before Rebirth and it's the same after. I think that Taylor dismissed that with this thing.

I know he will, but that’s the Bat Family right now. Since Tom King barely acknowledged them, Ric Grayson couldn’t remember them, etc, they ave been in disarray and hopefully, they come together in all the books. Maybe this is Alfred’s move to get Dock to bring them together like he does. I don’t know. Again, it’s one issue and we don’t know what the rest got... I asked Tom Taylor and we’ll see what he says

After 2 years of ric grayson, I was happy to get this issue as a reset of all that shit and now Dick can move forward

Wooow stop, did I kill a Joker in canon? does that influence Urban Legends? because I didn't see that mentioned. Can you be kind enough to explain please @WeirdScienceJim

Jokingly though, Dick deserves it because he is the best Robin and my favorite character in comics

sorry Jason kill Joker?

That I understand, especially of you're a huge Grayson fan, these last few years have been torture. Still, in the process of trying to uplift fans like you, Taylor diminished the relationship between Alfred and the Batfamily and he diminished Bruce's character. And I pretty much hated that. I didn't particularly enjoyed the rest of the issue either. You've rated this with 10, I can see you're a fan, cool. I'm not, I'm sorry to say. Other than the art I didn't enjoy anything out of it.

hahaha and I'll tell you something @WeirdScienceJim is valid, it's your tastes. What is not valid are the neurotics who complain and insult that you do not have the same tastes. There are many of those.

@Winterisnear I suspected the same, nobody has clarified if the Bats know that it was a blank shot, it was not even an actual assassination attempt. Jason didn't deserve such treatment, but it was a good drama without a doubt.

I think that it was supposed to be an actual assassination attempt but DC wouldn't want to lose one of the best villains they have and so Lobdell had to come with that crappy and convoluted "explanation" with rubber bullets or whatever. I think that at the time Jason was angru enough to kill Penguin then and there but the again, that's a DC problem, they don't have the guts to kill major villains.

We already know how DC takes care of its villains, that is why the Joker is untouchable. So they as he does not have the slightest idea of how to carry the continuity. That is why I am not going to give this book or another undeserving book a chance, with the obvious exception of what involves Jason Todd. It would take a good story for me to invest in that DC comic, they really disappointed me.

Jason didn't kill the Penguin - Batman called him a Killer in urban legends and i don't think he means from before since they worked a lot of that out since

Tom Taylor did say the whole family recieved the same amount at the will reading, including Julia. Who knows if that's actually true or if we will ever see that at all!

@Winterisnear they already dealt with what he did with the Penguin and Oswald didn't die. The reason I said it's the Joker is Batman let Jason back into Gotham (with rubber bulllet rule), but now won't work or talk to him because he is a "killer". The timeline is still a bit wonly but it seems like it can only be the Joker. Zdarsky's Urban Legends story feels like a side-sequal to Three Jokers the way Babs is talking to him too. Who knows with Infinite Frontier timeline stuff though

to find out, maybe Chip will clear it up in his penultimate issue, we'll have to wait. It's great that Chip asked the story of Hood, I think after Lost Days (I love it) and Three Jokers is the best thing that has been written about Red Hood, obviously it is not perfect but it is very good, there are many repetitions in the dynamics Buce and Jason, you know some Remake.

yep - I would like a lot of things cleared up going forward with an open timeline, there may be some changes

Woow friend, you got going the polemic, what an interesting post you do.

It wasn't on purpose, I'm just tired of people who praise everything Taylor writes when in reality he really isn't that good.

I feel the same about Tom, but the one with the last name King!

Kind of agree with you there. There are a lot of King books that people just love and I find them very, very underrated. Including some that are pretty much universally acclaimed, like Mr. Miracle, which I for one didn't find that good. Still, every once in a while he manages to surprise me so I have to give him some credit. But one thing I like about King and I don't about Taylor is that he seems to try to elevate comics to another level while Taylor just revels in cringy internet humor level.

IMO, King tries to elevate HIMSELF to another lever and at this point, his books are all following a tired formula of mysteries without clues that end in ambiguous endings. It's actually funny because I like Tom Taylor because he writes comics to write comics while guys like King (IMO again) end up being embarased to just write a fun comic. Like they want to prove they are above the medium when they are at fancy dinner parties

But he has a ton of fans!

Agree again, he is very infatuated with himself and has a pretentious style that most of the times, if you strip it of his tired artifices, the essence of his writing is pretty thin. And yes, the payoff for a lot of his mysteries is rarely worthy. He's trying to be the next Alan Moore and in his mind he probably he thinks he is but that's not going to happen. And yes, his fans are very aggressive and condescending because he makes them feel smart even though most of the times they're not lol.

But that's something I think King and Taylor fans have in common. If you look at the reviews here, there's a guy who thinks he "triggers the Lobdell fans" and there's another one that joins him in his disturbed fantasy. And it's not my first dance with Taylor fans, something I've noticed it happens with King fans too. After all, the two Toms are pretty good friends at least on social media, why should their fans not be annoyingly similar?

Present company excluded of course, it doesn't matter that you obviously loved this and I hated it from the bottom of my heart, I have no problem with someone having different tastes than mine, as long as he has his arguments and he's not being insufferable about it.

Lol, I just noticed I said King's books are underrated, obviously I meant overrated. :))

For me I can stomach Tatlor better than I can Kings self applauding style. He succeeded in keeping me from buying nearly 85 issues of my favourite character. That's some seriously bad storytelling. Taylor's at least has something of a feel for Dick Grayson.

I still maintain that despite their financial woes DC can get quality writers on the flagship books and get readers excited again. But you must start thinking vision and stories not gimmicks and constant resets.

Having said that I've read some previews of what Marvel is planning with Reborn 2 and they may be about to step on a rake themselves.

@merlyn LOL! erase that whole conversation then - We Agree!

gimmicks are the worst, but resets can work--- if you don't keep messing up and needing to reset over and over! DC keeps messing up, so I have my fingers crossed

@merlyn you are do right that King tries to be Alan Moore but comes out as Alan Less!

@Weird Science Jim - HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Yeah! MUCH less!

I was hoping that would get a chuckle!

@Weird Science Jim - more than just a chuckle, good sir. ...that earned a well deserved Belly Laugh!! 😂😂😂

Nice review! I agree so much with the idea of wanting the writer to play fair. It happened in Heroes in Crisis as well...King doesn't let you play along and then just drops info in your lap and when you go back expecting the Sixth Sense moments that you missed, they just aren't there! Plus, i may have to "borrow" that subtext line, so funny!!!

Just be sure to give me credit. It’s hard to think up original snarks. I am very proud of that one.

Also hit the like button. It does wonders for my vanity.

i can't say i blame Romita or Janson. it must have been agonizingly painful to illustrate this cancer incarnate trash fire of a script.

I think the art is still the best in this.

May as well be. But personally I think it's still anything but good. Absolutely awful comic.

King has wasted every opportunity to explore the interesting characters in his run. He thinks it is deep to reiterate that Batman and Catwoman are soulmates. Gotham Girl? Not explored. Thomas Wayne Batman from a different universe? Not explained. Bane? Glossed over.

Yeah, absolutely. Shame, since he set up Gotham Girl as a key figure in the run, and then she appeared pretty much only in a terrible crossover with Flash, made out of literal scraps and leftovers. What a waste. Thomas, Bane and Selina as well weren't explored at all. Seems like bloody Kite Man has more depth than all of them combined at this point.

all excellent points Superheroes for Hire. i'm pretty sure Tom King had no idea what he was doing when he was put on Batman. he just rode the wave of hype and praise and let it go to his head. DC being the fools they are stuck him on the book another 50 issues. a decision that would bite them in the ass. at least someone was smart enough to cut this mess short. pity they couldn't do it sooner and save us this current arc. the series should have just ended with Batman kicking a tree.

I am not surprised Kite Man is better written, since Kite Man is a D villain therefore not explored much. King however didn’t know anything about Bruce, Selina, Bane etc.

Imo, the extreme praise he got when the Bat/Cat stuff hit changed the overall direction and then became a crutch when things went bad and then the downfall when the wedding didn't happen. If this issue doesn't show there was never an overall story plan, i don't know what does. Worst part, most of the stuff people hate were always there, it was just new and we were not used to it or annoyed by it yet.

He writes in such an ambiguous, let the reader fill in the blanks way that it's silly to think most of these things were a plan. It would be nice if any of yhese things were something you would go back and see clues that we just didn't recognize at the time, but sadly, that's not the case

i don't know how people praised this run so much in the beginning. i thought it was terrible after the very first issue. ... "i'M gOnNa HaVe To DiE iN oRdEr To SaVe EvErYoNe On ThE pLaNe. wOuLd MoThEr AnD FaThEr Be PrOuD?"

Weird Science Jim - it's so true that he used the Bat/Cat thing as a crutch after his run started nosediving. he's such a boob that he couldn't even get that right though. it's only fitting that this run end in such a disaster.

Lol...look back atvyhe first issue snd when Gotham Girl and Gotham save the plane, Batman says "Clark?" Even though Superman was dead at that point! I liked the first arc, actually, but have you ever seen a writer be so careless with their own character (Gotham Girl) or actuall seem to write them OOC? She is one of the few original things he did and has just messes her up!!!

Forgive my phone typing skills!

no worries. my typing skills are bollocks, and i'm using a keyboard. - Now that you mention it, that always did strike me as weird that Batman said "Clark?" even though NewFiftyTwoperman had just died. - he really is so inconsistent with his writing. he can't even decide if he wants Batman to be a blubbering depressed crybaby, or an omniscient OP badass. King still never even gave a proper explanation as to Gotham Girl & Bro's powers, or Bane's motivation for going after Batman the way he is.

*Tom King's Bane* - "I WILL BREAK THE BATMAN!!!" . . . *Fans* - "Why is that, exactly?" . . . *Tom King's Bane* - "BECAUSE CHUCK DIXON'S KNIGHTFALL IS VERY POPULAR!!"

Lol basically myconius King really made me hate Bane. I am sick of him.

Darkseid24 - i know. i'm pretty Bane'd out myself. but just remember, Just like Tom King's Batman, this is not really Bane. ALL of these characters that King has been writing are just weird twisted & perverted versions of them. i say in all honesty that Tom King is the WORST Batman writer i have ever read. even WORSE than Neal Adams. and that's really saying something.

Agreed, but he is still not the worst for me. Nothing beats Darkseid War in crappy writing for me ( And hopefully never will). I hope Tynion is doing a little better. Didnt like his Detective Comics& B&RE also sucked.

Detective Comics has been going down lately as well, I'd say it's okay, but not much more. I didn't even feel like reviewing its last issue or two.

Nihilist - Agreed! I that damn bi-weekly deadline is burning Tomasi out. the quality is not consistant, and we've been getting a series of "good arc, bad arc..." and the overall quality has been steadily dwindling. I'm hard pressed to keep buying it, but my respect for Tomasi as a creator and as a person are the only reasons I really stay with this series.

*I THINK that damn bi-weekly deadline is burning Tomasi out.

Like I said Tomasi can be very mediocre. Happened before in Arkham War& in the Arkham Knight comics. Wouldnt blame the bi-weekly schedule, since other writers still deliver. DC overall just currently has only mediocre writers.

as far as i'm concerned, every writer that has been on the bi-weekly has been turning in S#%T stories. even the runs that started out good eventually turned into crap. ...but i do think that DC has been filling their ranks with more and more crap writers. Bendis, King... it's getting to the point where i just want to re-read back-issues.

Yeah, I agree. It's just big names they care about, not really paying attention to what they write. Look at DC Black Label - it' been a disaster, with most of the material being plain terrible, but hey, DC's gotta release something, anything, because they've created a mature brand, so it needs to be kept alive. And then the bi-weekly series, so the flagship properties are monetized, even if it hurts their reputation and quality in the long run...

Nihilist - excellent points made on all topics!

I like majority of Black Label titles, but apart from the cursing nothing is in it, that justifies Black Label. Doug Moench wrote good stories& he wrote Detective Comics& Batman both for a while. So I think writers can, if they actually are talented enough.

I guess DC needs to hire Chip Kelly to push Tom out for a bit!

It may help his pacing Jim:)

You've been gone a while.

Missed You Buddy!

You know... life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, and all that. Yes egon244 I ya e been gone awhile. I’ll be in and out. I can explain all that later over virtual coffee! Thanks Weird Science Jim! Nice to hear from you too!!

It could be that, or it could be because this series really sucks. Like bad. No one is in character and we’re over half way through and still seem no closer to knowing what the ell is going on.

People dont spend money on things they hate. And we do have a clue about what is going on. Its in the book.

Hear me out, not everyone has the same experiences/interests that you do. Plus there’s the whole free-will thing that allows people to an opinion. I think this series is awful, but I’m reading it because unfortunately it effects my favourite characters and I want to know what happens to them.

Or they just don’t agree with you. I don’t think this issue is that bad as most reviews make it sound, but it’s far away from a 10 for me either. The bad dialogue ruins it.

What have Batman and the Flash investigates? How has this dealt with any mental health? Harley, Batgirl, Booster, Blue Beetle, Superman, everyone is written out of character. This series is just bad man. I’m glad you’re willing to overlook all of the flaws and enjoy it but it’s bad.

The story doesn’t have to deal with mental health, I don’t know why people are constantly saying that. Would be kind of boring if we just hear the heroes whining over nothing.

Tom King has said many times that mental health is at the centre of the series. Sometimes it’s nice to see representation of mental health to know that your negative experiences are shared and you’re not alone. Imagine how beneficial it could be for someone with severe depression to know that their favourite hero experiences something similar. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a positive mental health message (which you won’t find with this series anyway).

The writer said it’s about mental health. It’s not like we’re making this up. It’s the premise that the writer gave us. He just has no idea how to handle it.

there are some sites and people who review something whether they like it or not because...they are reviewers not fanboys. They want to tell people if they think something is good or bad or in-between. Yea, sometimes it sucks doing it when you aren't enjoying something, but you still read and review it hoping the next issue is better. Now, someone who thinks over half the books they read are perfect (10/10)... You don't fool me!

I didn't expect that a book about flying beings would portray mental health accurately. I don't see it as a problem. They worry that they didn't save this star system or that moon blew up, not that they don't have the will to get out of bed in the morning.

As for characters being "out of character". I personally hate that argument. I think that every fan or writer will view a character in a different way. So each fan will like something different about hero or villain and each writer will portray them differently.

the issue there egon is everything leading up to the book from DC and Tom King pushed the mental health angle and it is the idea that they can't get out of bed in the morning, or why would they go to the Sanctuary to relive awful moments and talk about times they died. The confessionals haven't been about moons blowing up, they have been moments Tom King has tried to mine for emotional impact because of the mental health angle.

it is very over the top and forced imo and instead of seeing the healing POV, we are just getting the forced emotions from it in a murder mystery...but even the murder mystery angle is forced with little to no clues to let the reader play along

Seems like the marketing did much more harm than good.

Ah ok, well maybe the mental health part comes later& whoever is the murderer( I suspect one) did it because he/ she went crazy. I hate when characters are out of character. If you know them, then you don’t write them out if character. If Batman talked like an idiot& did some stupid jokes all the time, he of course would be out of character.

i wonder if it was Tom King's idea to exploit mental illness? or if the idea came down from DC Editorial?

From the interviews I saw, King came up with it and DC added in the murder mystery part. Maybe in a more capable writers hands it could have been down but King just doesn’t have the talent.

Haven't read this issue yet, but I follow enough people here to have this thread thrown in my face. Just chiming in to say almost all of Tom King's work has dealt with mental health. And I think this one might be the most lacking in that regard.

If he only dealt with mental health in a more intelligent way. This can be interesting, but it always appears pseudo intellectual like someone already stated.

one of my problems is the book seems stuck between which mystery it wants to look at...the who did vs the why they did it. It's been treading water and we now have 4 issues left BUT 2 are the added in issues that are not story issues as much as they are flashback Sanctuary issues to give us more of an idea of what Sanctuary is

issues #6 and #9 are the ones added afterwards

I wish we could get a Secret Empire release schedule for this. Two to three issues a month. Then it'd be over quicker!

You know some people buy this series not because they love it,but because it affects their favourite characters,right?

That’s true. I mainly read it because it affects so many characters.

Hang in there! You are not the only one that is upset about it.

Your review made me sad. Tom King has gone from "the new Alan Moore" to "a total douchebag".

I don’t take these stories so personal, but I also don’t think King was disrespectful towards mental ill people. All he did was showing, that heroes also have issues. Happened before, Jason also went psycho, because he couldn’t deal with his trauma.

Darkseid24 I face the same problem on Facebook, every time I try to talk about MY experience and how I feel for a book, people try to nullify my opinion and experience. I've supported everything from Tom King. This book, I feel it's disrespectful towards people suffering from mental disorders. Being one I feel it was disrespectful towards me. It's very simple and very clear.

Sorry to hear that, but how is it disrespectful? Nothing happened apart from characters getting killed off& heroes talking about their problems.

I sniffed out this series before it began and only bought issue 1 to sample. Even the most supportive fans have acknowledged odd characterization, non-traditional methods, and sour tone of this series. I've said it before, but I think this series is more about Tom King sharing his PTSD than presenting characters dealing with PTSD. I just don't think mainstream comic books should be about characters suffering from depression and PTSD. Superhero comics should be aspirational.

I keep reading it, because it affects so many characters. Could be true, but isn’t PTSD reliving trauma through flashbacks? I don’t think that was shown in any issue. As a fan of the villains& I’m reading comics just because of them, I don’t think they need to be aspirational, but that’s only my opinion. I understand if people have other expectations than me.

"I've battled with my thoughts, battled with my sexuality, I want both depicted correctly." How can King possibly depict your exact experiences?