Comics

Detective Comics
#4 by Tony S. Daniel
#5 by Tony S. Daniel & Szymon Kudranski

#4 seems decent enough… until you realise that's supposed to be the end of the story, at which point it doesn't so much leave the odd thread hanging for the future as not resolve anything, which just highlights the bits that don't quite make sense.

And as for #5… Two half-length stories don't help matters. The main one (by dint of it featuring Batman and sort-of continuing the on-going thread, written & drawn (as usual) by Daniel) is a mix of catch-up and set-up rather than a full tale, has dubious satire/criticism of the Occupy movement (and if it wasn't meant to be critical of it then it fails by being critical), leaden dialogue, and a reveal that's thoroughly useless because a) that villain's on the cover, and b) last issue Batman said he'd be going after him… not that he is going after him -- he's after some small-time gangster types, and the Penguin gets brought into it through an entirely different route. Nice art, particularly Penguin's new casino, but damn if the story it tells isn't weak.

The nominal back-up strip, Russian Roulette (written by Daniel with art by Kudranski), is well-drawn -- in an appropriately grubby kind of way -- but seems like even more of a scene-setting prequel than the main story, and doesn't necessarily make a whole lot of sense. What does Eli add to Catwoman's plan, other than mucking things up and needing her to save him?

Quite a tumble for the former second-best Bat book, all told. If Batman and Robin has continued to pull its socks up in issues 4&5 (which I haven't read yet) then it'll move up a notch in my affections.