Some thoughts about Batman #117

Everything has to end now.

The city is facing one of his biggest disasters yet, fear is everywhere and Batman will have to his best to control one of his most recent allies but even if he solves this, things might never be the same for him.

You thought I was done talking about this run don't you?

Well, I'm done all right, at the very least about this proper title by this writer since this is apparently the final issue of James Tynion IV on Batman. I admitedly dropped the book mostly because of real life issues but I think I would have dropped it eventually anyway because of how consistently, well, "cringey" it was.

What do I mean by "cringey"? Well, because of all the ticks that I associate with Tynion's writing which is probably some of the worst that I've seen from DC's roster. Take for example the horde of "original" characters Tynion came up with which were quite frankly, poor imitations of already established characters except that Tynion gives them an obnoxious twist that tries way too hard to be modern. Just see Punchline, Clownhunter and Ghostmaker, don't each one of them remind you of many other more popular creations? (For God's sake, Ghostmaker is basically Batman-like #93). Worst of all is that he pushed all of his pet-creations so hard that they became even more infuriating. Hell, this issue alone is mostly centered around Molly Miracle's conflict and Molly Miracle might as well be the blandest creation that Tynion came up with during this run (and that says A LOT).

Second, the constant "big crossover event after big crossover event" formula that Scott Snyder popularized in recent years ran its course waaaaay before Tynion arrived and Tynion just made things worse. Tynion was always a "Snyder-lite" but he got much more frustrating during this series because of his tendency to follow all the damn same themes and concepts that his former teacher did and I have a lot of complaints about Snyder's writing but at least there was some sort of uniqueness during his Batman run (Sure, he got worse but early on he was pretty good). Tynion's ideas are the kind of creatively bankrupt material you only have seen in the 90s but even during that decade, the Batman books still were willing to experiment with new stuff.

Hell, I can't believe I'm saying this but I think I respect Tom King's run a lot more than Tynion's. Yes, King botched the execution 90% of the time but at least each of his storyarcs offered an attempt to tell something new, the Joker didn't even play a main role during King's era aside from a storyline (which he shared with the Riddler). Tynion had the nerve to create a Joker War event that didn't tell us anything about anyone aside from how much he loves the Joker is as an antagonist (Which Snyder already did several times).

About the issue itself, there's not a lot to talk about. It just a stereotypical conclusion that tries to deliver big moments but fails because of lackluster villains and lack of a proper plot which becomes even worse when it focuses on Molly whatever. Not to mention that the ending is so abrupt that I honestly said: "Wait, that's it" and went to look if there actually was an issue left but no, this in fact is the final issue of Tynion's Batman (Yes, I also checked that his actual last story will be told in an special but this reminds me too much of Snyder's Justice League conclusion).

Jorge Jimenez' art is amazing though and Tynion is very lucky to have such a talented artist that elevated each of his scripts to new levels with beautiful characters and intense action scenes.

... Oh, and Becky Cloonan and Michael Conrad had a second feature about Cassandra Cain and Stephanie Brown which is fine I guess but I'm not particularly enamored with their writing either and I'm not sure if they will do better during the upcoming ongoing. Jorge Corona's semi-cartoony style is pretty good and reminds me of Babs Tarr's art which is always a positive.

I think I said all I wanted to say about this work and I'm not sure if I'm willing to pay any more attention even if there's an special about a worthless event coming. Enough is enough.