Faster than a DC Bullet: Birds of Prey, Part XXI: A Clash of Daggers

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2013 (contents: 2012-13)
Borrowed from the library
Read June 2016

Birds of Prey, Volume 3: A Clash of Daggers

Writers: Duane Swierczynski, Gail Simone

Artists: Romano Molenaar, Vicente Cifuentes, Admira Wijaya, Daniel Sampere, Juan Jose Ryp

Letterers: Dezi Sienty, Dave Sharpe

Colorist: Chris Sotomayor

A Clash of Daggers opens with a standalone tale about Batgirl, Jim Gordon, Catwoman, and a leftover Talon from the Night of the Owls. It's a neat, character-driven story, where Batgirl, Catwoman, and the Talon, later given the name Strix, all have to learn to trust one another, making leaps of faith for their various own reasons: Catwoman allows herself to be arrested to delay the police so that Batgirl can take Strix in and help her reacclimate from being a tool of the Court of Owls.

But it's okay for Batgirl to be a roommate to a girl who's never known anything but killing?
from Batgirl Annual vol. 4 #1 (script by Gail Simone, art by Admira Wijaya & Daniel Sampere)

The next story must take place before that one, because the Birds, Batgirl included, are still recovering from Poison Ivy's toxin in Your Kiss Might Kill. Katana's sword is stolen by the Dagger clan, and the Birds accompany her to Japan to steal it back; they also bump into Condor, a sort of clumsy oaf of a superhero. Though the details of the Dagger plot kind of escaped me, this is one of Duane Swierczynski's better Birds of Prey tales: the girls work together as a team, Condor is fun, the banter is good, and Romano Molenaar and Vicentue Cifuentes turn in the best art the book has had in a long while.

No, it's okay, pick on Condor.
from Birds of Prey vol. 3 #14 (script by Duane Swierczynski, art by Romano Molenaar & Vicente Cifuentes)

The last story sees Strix joining the Birds as a replacement for the departed Katana as they track down a terrorist arms dealer. I don't really care for the subplot about Dinah's malfunctioning powers, but other than that this is a decent, solid tale-- not quite as good as the previous one, but still entertaining enough. It's amazing how much good a consistent art team goes, making the characters feel like real people. It's pretty action-heavy, though, so I hope what comes next can draw out the character dynamics of this constantly fluctuating team a little bit more clearly: I like Dinah, Batgirl, Ev Starling, and Condor, and am prepared to like Strix, but I don't think these birds have yet been allowed to soar.

I couldn't decide if I wanted to do the top half of the page (for some good Starling banter) or the bottom half of the page (for some good Black Canary/Condor banter), so I ended up not cropping it at all.
from Birds of Prey vol. 3 #16 (script by Duane Swierczynski, art by Romano Molenaar & Vicente Cifuentes)

Next Week: A new writer takes over when the Birds of Prey face The Cruelest Cut!

Faster than a DC Bullet: Birds of Prey, Part XIX: Your Kiss Might Kill

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2013 (contents: 2012)
Borrowed from the library
Read May 2016

Birds of Prey, Volume 2: Your Kiss Might Kill

Writer: Duane Swierczynski

Artists: Travel Foreman, Jesus Saiz, Javier Pina, Jeff Huet, Timothy Green II, Joseph Silver, Cliff Richards, Romano Molenaar, Vicente Cifuentes 
Colorists: June Chung, Gabe Eltaeb, Chris Sotomayor

Letterers: Carlos M. Mangual, Dave Sharpe

I just reread my review of Duane Swierczynski's previous volume of Birds of Prey, which indicates I enjoyed it quite a bit. I'm sad to say that the same cannot be said of this muddled, unfocused volume. The book begins by tying up the story begun in the previous volume. I think so, anyway, as it's been three years since I read it, and Swierczynski does little to reorient the reader. It's pretty unsatisfying. I thought Black Canary formed the Birds of Prey to take down some bigger threat, but here the bad guys are just after her-- for murder! (Of her husband, no less.) Which hardly makes them "bad," though their methods are pretty over the top. But one giant fire/explosion, and this plot line is completely over, which seems a little easy.

Good guys without superpowers can jump out of exploding buildings and be unharmed.
from Birds of Prey vol. 3 #8 (art by Jesus Saiz & Javier Pina)

The book then becomes a series of weird detours, made worse by the fact that regular artist Jesus Saiz departs and is replaced by Travel Foreman, who is just... not great. His action is blocky and without energy, and his characters start out looking a little too posed and get worse and worse across the course of the volume. His first story is about a "Talon" of the "Court of Owls": all derived from an exciting Batman crossover, I'm sure, but it comes out of total left field within this book. It hooks into the ongoing narrative of Birds of Prey, though, as it ends with Poison Ivy being grievously injured taking out the Talon, and Black Canary fulfills a promise she made to her ("months ago," apparently, even though I think this team could only have possibly been together a couple weeks by internal chronology) to take her to the jungle. Batgirl comes along too-- I guess she's joined the Birds?

Faster than a DC Bullet: Birds of Prey, Part XVII: Trouble in Mind

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2012 (contents: 2011-12)
Borrowed from the library
Read May 2013

Birds of Prey, Volume 1: Trouble in Mind

Writer: Duane Swierczynski
Artist: Jesus Saiz
Additional Art: Javier Pina
Colorists: Nei Ruffino, Allen Passalaqua, June Chung 
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual

Things have changed a lot since we last saw the Birds of Prey: the Huntress and Lady Blackhawk are nowhere to be seen, and Barbara Gordon is walking again, having resumed the role of Batgirl. Dinah Lance a.k.a. the Black Canary is still wanted for murder, though, and so in order to fight a new threat she's uncovered, she's put together her own "covert ops team run by a bunch of supercriminal hotties": herself, Ev Starling, Katana, and Poison Ivy. And Barbara Gordon wants to help, even if she won't be seen with them in public.

While it's quite a jump from The Death of Oracle to Trouble in Mind (some might say it's a whole new universe), the recognizable threads of Birds of Prey are still there, and Trouble in Mind is their best outing since Tony Bedard's Club Kids. The action is fast without ever being too frenetic, there are some great set-pieces (particularly the train fight), the narration keeps character without ever becoming overwhelming, there's an intriguing mystery. Though the story doesn't fit within this seven-issue volume, it never stops moving, and it doesn't feel decompressed; every chapter adds a new wrinkle or complication to the mix. The story's choppy sometimes, but that's never not on purpose, and it's good comics, serving to disorient the reader in the same way that the characters are.

The characters really shine even though the action doesn't stop moving. Dinah is still recognizably Dinah, an action hero with the right amount of compassion to get the job done, and Ev Starling is a lot of fun from panel one: kind of a crazier version of the Huntress. Both seem to have something lurking in their backstories-- the murder for Black Canary, something we don't quite know yet for Starling. Poison Ivy works surprisingly well. She might be a "villain," but it's obvious that in her own mind and own world she's a hero fighting the good fight, and she integrates well. Katana we don't know enough about yet, but her gimmick is entertaining enough all on its own.

Jesus Saiz also turns out to be the best artist on Birds of Prey since Nicola Scott left. Clean pencils and inks, great with facial expressions, resists the tendency to cheesecacke, draws cool and coherent action. I hope he sticks with this title a long time. (Maybe he'll get the pull to simplify Jim Lee's overly busy redesign for the Black Canary. Just losing the shoulderpads would be an improvement.) Javier Pina fills in for one issue, and proves up to the task, too.

This is my last volume of Birds of Prey for a while: the next volume, Your Kiss Might Kill, is out, but too recently for me to pick up via ILL. It's a series that's had its occasional false start and misdirection, but at its best it's delivered some fun comics with some entertaining characters. I look forward to coming back to it some day, and to picking up more stories about these same characters-- especially Black Canary and the Huntress-- elsewhere.