Nothing goes to plan – unless you’re Catwoman.
Creative Staff:
Story: Collin Kelly, Jackson Lanzing
Art: Aneke
Colors: Kelly Fitzpatrick
Letterer: Wes Abbott
What They Say:
The duplicitous Catwoman begins the greatest heist of her career, with Dick Grayson and Kara Gordon caught in her crossfire!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The nature of the digital-first series when it comes to artists, pacing, and overall quality of work is just as variable as regular print books but there’s always that feeling that they could be better. I’ve been enjoying this series with what Kelly and Lanzing are doing while wishing for a bit more world building exposition to flesh things out more but that’s not in the cards at this point. What I am getting is a good bit of fun and that was made a whole lot better this time around once again thanks to Aneke’s work. I continue to really enjoy what she does with layouts and line work but also because there’s some good detail and thought to the settings that go beyond the bare minimum. It also doesn’t hurt that I think Fitzpatrick does some of her best color work with Aneke’s artwork.
With a lot of things having gone down so far I rather like that we get a little downtime at the Garage where Dick Grayson is telling tales to Kara. The visual for him is great with the full chest tattoo and cockiness of it all, especially since he’s trying to impress Kara only to have Selina come by and reduce him by calling him Robin – even as she needs him for a mission. The setup is straightforward enough in going after a Lex facility called Amazo to deal with where the Gardners are built and Kara wants all in on that to further her involvement even just as a potential member. It’s fun seeing this odd group come together and how Selina has to spend a decent part of her time trying to keep the other two both on target with what they’re doing. Aneke’s layouts as they make their way into the facility are great since there’s a lot of packed in material here and just the nature of the movement is fun to watch.
The mission here is definitely interesting, though we see Selina is using the pair for her own real mission behind all of it, as they discover that Amazo is more than just the Gardners facility. A lot of familiar names of intelligent heroes and villains are kept in cryo here with their brains actively working on things and we see there’s an actual Amazo robot as well that ends up creating a lot of chaos and action by going after everyone. I’d be disappointed if it was a mobile Amazo, after all. The look into the facility shows some neat things about what Lex has taken in to achieve his goals and mixing that with the bits of dialogue from the characters, such as the nod that Dick worked with Batman before, definitely gives us a “lived-in” feeling for the world that hasn’t quite come through yet.
In Summary:
Gotham City Garage has been a somewhat uneven book for me so far and I know part of that is based on the strength of the artists involved as a title like this really is defined more so than others in that area. This issue with Aneke continuing to do the art definitely appeals to me in the character design department and I love her layouts that keeps things busy and well filled with little nods and bits that stop you from just burning through it as a quick read. Kelly and Lanzing’s story is opening up more as to what the world is about and I like the addition of Dick here as Nightwing to bring a bit of bravado and cockiness that’s different from some of the more outgoing female characters so far, especially since he’s trying his best to impress Kara. It has some interesting areas to go from here and I’m definitely still very on board with this title.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: DC Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: October 18th, 2017
MSRP: $0.99
