The whole point behind the miniseries and the crossover between Batman and The Flash is revealed. And, I won’t lie, I’m a little underwhelmed.
Heroes in Crisis 6
Written by Tom King
Pencils and Inks by Mitch Gerards and Clay Mann
Colors by Mitch Gerards and Tomeu Morey
The Flash 65
Written by Joshua Williamson
Pencils by Rafa Sandoval
Inks by Jordi Taragona
Colors by Tomeu Morey
The padding out of HEROES IN CRISIS continues with the sixth issue, as Tom King once again gives us a flashback issue where the heroes who went to Sanctuary (and Harley Quinn, who broke in to visit girlfriend Poison Ivy) experience the moments leading up to their deaths. I’m sure these little moments and pages where we get snippets of all the heroes’ confessionals will make sense in the larger narrative once the series is revealed. But in the month-to-month reading of these issues – which run $4 each – it feels like excess being used to turn a 6- or 7-issue story into nine issues.
Wally West, Harley Quinn and Gnarrk are the ones giving the main narration here. I’ll admit to having no idea who Gnarrk is, though I know he’s been a member of various incarnations of the Titans since he was created in 1971.
Everything culminates in an emergency drill at Sanctuary and the reveal that it was Booster Gold who took down the heroes before having a confrontation with Harley Quinn, though with three issues left, I imagine that there’s still more than meets the eye going on there. All of HEROES IN CRISIS so far has felt like a giant tease, and I would really like to have the story move forward a little faster.
Meanwhile, in THE FLASH, the four-part crossover with BATMAN ends with the heroes pushing Gotham Girl to her limits, and the toxin inside that moves her closer to death whenever she uses her powers finally gets the better of her. The two detectives work hard to save her life, but that doesn’t mean they’re back on the same page.
The tattered trust between the pair of heroes gets even worse when not only Barry pushes Bruce about his plans for Gotham Girl, but Iris gets involved, too, to chastise Batman for making everything worse.
The final pages of the issue features a conversation between Batman and Superman, “in the near future,” where Batman tells the Man of Steel that they don’t know who they can trust and “He could have gotten to anyone. Turned them,” noting that they need to investigate all the heroes that haven’t been “acting like themselves” lately. Superman suggests bringing Barry Allen into the investigation, but Bruce isn’t sure they can even trust him.
What does that all mean? Well, it’s just more of a setup, this time for the next big DC Comics “event.”
I’m really starting to get event fatigue with DC Comics lately. There’s way too much stuff going on. One of these days, one of these big events has to end, right?