When zombie butler’s make the most sense…
Creative Staff:
Story: Tom Taylor
Art: Daniel Sampere, Juan Albarran
Colors: Rex Lokus
Letterer: Wes Abbott
What They Say:
A resurrected Alfred challenges both Batman and Ra’s al Ghul. When a larger battle breaks out, Blue Beetle thinks he’s coming to save the day, but his inexperience leads instead to disaster…and death.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
With pretty much each of the Injustice series there have been critical moments that define why things play out as they do. The most obvious was the main catalyst that set Superman off ages ago and got everything rolling. With this incarnation we’ve had a lot of little things going on and the threat of something big but nothing that really made it feel like a critical moment had happened. Tom Taylor puts that into motion with this issue as Daniel Sampere returns to the art duties, giving us some big action sequences with solid impact that makes him a strong part of this project overall. There’s a lot to like with this issue in what it presents and the visual design for it keeps it flowing in an engaging way.
Bruce’s recovery of Alfred is the human moment of the issue as we get him glad to have him back while wary of what may have gone on. That Damian gets all up in there with his aggressive side is no surprise but it’s Alfred that just does what every father figure does in these kinds of things. Puts his foot down and chews both of them out but also gives Ra’s a good piece of his mind. And he does make it clear that if Bruce and Ra’s actually worked together they’d likely solve a slew of problems, something that we’ve always thought in reading comics for years, as well as a host of other storytelling mediums. But that’s not going to happen, though I’d thoroughly love to have a series that actively works such a story without having it all turn bad for some reason. I love stories like this but I’d also like to see the other side of the coin as well.
Of course, things are not going to go well here and we don’t even get to see if there might be a thaw between Ra’s and Bruce because, yo yo yo, here comes Blue Beetle. From his perspective he is trying to help, knowing that attacks are underway and unable to get in through where the rest of them started, but his arrival just turns the whole thing into a disaster that turns Vixen into a wild state, kills a slew of animals, wipes out a species, and sends everyone into a rage (and a little sadness, a most appropriate moment that comes from Harley). You know it had to go like this and that it had to go bad in the biggest way possible, but this just cements that things are about to get truly terrible and it’s depressing as hell.
In Summary:
Injustice 2 continues to deliver some good stuff but this is the issue where the pivotal moment happens that feels like the floodgates are going to open. Which is good because I want to see it step up into some real craziness again after a more restrained approach for most of the run so far. I’ve enjoyed the smaller moments, the positive pieces that came in, and the character fun, and while I’d love to see a series with Bruce and Ra’s working together to do good and achieve it, I’m looking forward to see just how batshit crazy things might get from here on out with a Ra’s unleashed and others pushed beyond reason.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: DC Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: September 12th, 2017
MSRP: $0.99
