Writer: Joshua Williamson
Artist: Simone Di Meo
Letterer: Steve Wands
Cover Artist: Simone Di Meo
Publisher: DC Comics
Reviewer: StoryBabbler
Batman and Robin have been following the trail of crimes and kidnappings committed by animal-themed criminals, some of whom are familiar villains led by the new villainess Shush, modeled after Hush. After one of their members, White Rabbit, gets captured, Batman and Robin went to Blackgate Prison to interrogate her, only to find Shush there waiting and ready to kill her. Now it’s a race to capture the rabbit in Batman and Robin #3 as the dynamic duo try to keep White Rabbit alive and in one piece.
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Review:
Okay, we have our heroes, Batman and Robin, and we have our villains, Shush and the Terrible Trio, and their goal, White Rabbit. The heroes want to protect her for questioning while the villains want to silence her to keep our heroes from learning their master plan. We have the main players, the goal, and now it’s all about seeing who captures White Rabbit first. I say capture because of course she somehow, someway escapes getting shot point-blank to the head by Shush. How, you ask? Because she’s really fast and that’s as deep as the comic goes into.
Don’t let the synopsis mislead you. This comic is really a race between Batman and Robin and Shush and the Terrible Trio to see who can get White Rabbit from Blackgate Prison all the way to the streets of Gotham. Thanks to the art by Simone Di Meo this comic is awesome to read. The action, facial expressions, the environments, the colors, it all really adds to the high-octane action story that’s at play in the comic.
Either way, the comic is a fun ride as always thanks to the art and the colorful banter and dialogue from the characters thanks to Joshua Williamson. The story goes at a good pace from start to finish as the comic transitions from one action phase to the next as the characters chase after White Rabbit in the prison while Batman deals with a bomb set by Shush to cover her escape. Then the comic gets even more action-packed as there’s now a chase on the streets with solid vehicular combat between the Dynamic Duo and the villains.
SPOILERS Section:
Of course, there are a few downsides to the comic and this is where we get to some major spoilers. First off, the character of Shush still doesn’t impress at this point. Granted, unlike many other derivative legacy characters in the past few years, what Shush has over the rest of them is that she’s not aggravatingly annoying. Shush is a competent enforcer with a certain style that I believe only works in this comic series because of all the extra little details from Simone Di Meo’s art, the most obvious being the design of her speech bubbles always have a light grey to indicate she’s speaking in a soft manner.
There’s also the fact that the series, and by extension Joshua Williamson, hasn’t given a good reason for Damian’s high school storyline to exist. I only bring this up because the comic explicitly brings this up and Damian goes full meta by pointing out that he got the “full high school experience” with the archetypal bullies, cold principal, and mousy teacher. And Damian says that unless Batman gives him a single good reason to go back, he ain’t going back and I don’t blame him. If Williamson doesn’t play his cards right, the high school storyline could be a waste of time for the readers and Damian especially.
Then there’s the reveal of who the real main villain of this story arc is and….it’s weird. So, while Batman is chasing down Shush to rescue White Rabbit, Damian chases the Terrible Trio and tails them to their hideout so he can rescue the doctor they kidnapped before. And it’s there that Damian is confronted by, wait for it….The Dark Man-Bat. If you’re confused, don’t worry, so am I. I tried looking up who the “Dark Man-Bat” is and I came up with only Kirk Langstrom, aka Man-Bat. So, whoever this is, I’ll let the next issue tell me more. But going off of this issue, this reveal is a big head-scratcher.
Final Thoughts:
Batman and Robin #3 continues where the last issue left off with the heroes trying to secure White Rabbit before Shush and the Terrible Trio kill her. The comic is a race between the dynamic duo and the villains who are all trying to get White Rabbit, and the art and writing do a solid job in making this an action-packed issue. While Shush doesn’t doing anything big, she’s at least not annoying or insufferable like recent new legacy characters tend to be, and is a competent threat to Batman this issue. However, the big reveal of the true mastermind is a big head-scratcher, so the next issue will need to pull double time to assert why they’re the main villain for this story.