What a great issue. Dick is trying to deal with his loss . . . of both Batman and Bruce, when he gets a visit from a few of Ra's al Ghul's friends. About 100 of them actually. Of course he takes them all down, and then when he puts on one of the earpieces from the fallen Ninja he's engaged almost instantly in a conversation with Bruce's nemesis. He wants to meet with him but he won't tell him what for. Eventually they come to an agreement and Dick flies over to the Thar Desert. It turns out that Ra's wanted a face to face because he had heard rumblings that the Dark Knight was no more. He knew that if he saw Dick, he would be able to read his face and know if the rumors were true. He then taunts Dick a little bit. I think, Ra's already knew that Bruce was gone. And he knew that Dick would be the obvious choice in the line for succession. I think Ra's wanted to test Dick's mettle. I think he wanted to know whether or not Dick was able to fill the shoe's of his nemesis. The man he most hated and . . most respected. Ra's doesn't really say much about that, other than offering Dick the sword that they fought with before he leaves. "These swords were used once before between the detective and me during our lengthy conflict. Take the one you wielded today as a reminder that our paths will cross again." Dick refuses, but by the time he gets back to the cave . . the sword is already sitting in the chair by the computer. I'm thinking Dick passed Ra's little test. Which I guess is both good news and bad. In the beginning of the story, as Dick is looking at Bruce's empty costumes on display he can't help but think of the eyes and face of them as empty black holes. And then he thinks of actual black holes and how if someone gets to close to them they can never escape. When Dick's looking at the sword, he thinks . . "Welcome to the black hole, detective." I thought this was a great story by Peter J Tomasi. I think he really got to the heart of both of these characters. You could really feel the anguish and frustration on Dick's part. Don Kramer pencilled it, and . . . the artwork was phenomenal. Don did a stint on Detective for a while and I was really impressed with his stuff there. But, this issue? This issue was almost perfect. I especially liked the desert scenes for some reason. This truly was a great issue.
Yeah, I just wanted to say I agree completely with you here. Peter Tomasi did such a great job providing insight into the thoughts of both Dick and Ra's with regards to Batman in this issue. I especially enjoyed Ra's here, as he really seemed disappointed that "The Detective" didn't meet his final defeat at the end of Ra's sword. I thought Peter really caught the essence of Bruce and Ra's contorted relationship perfectly.
ReplyDelete