Rating: *** 1/2

A little bit of a letdown with this issue relative to the three previous ones, but it was still very good.  I think the letdown for me came more with the artwork by Philip Tan.  The previous issues with artist Frank Quitely were very good because he tells a good story visually with his artwork.  Tan’s, however, doesn’t do much for me in the issue.  Some parts of the story are too dark and I didn’t enjoy the panel-to-panel storytelling.  Quitely’s artwork gave me a grand epic feeling.  Tan’s work seems cramped and jumbled.  However, the story of this opening arc is still very good.

We open with a villain by the name of Lightning Bug collecting some money from a club owner.  Just as he’s about to pop this guy, the Batmobile swoops in and hovers right behind him.  Lightning Bug makes a break for it and crashes through an apartment window.  He makes his way out of the apartment into the hallway and meets up with who he thinks is Batman and Robin, but is instead the Red Hood and his new partner Scarlett.  The Red Hood has decided to go a different route to fight crime and instead of handing this guy over to the police, the Red Hood cuts his throat and kills him.  “Let the punishment fit the crime” is his new slogan for punishing criminals.

We know that the Red Hood is Jason Todd, the former Robin, but I keep wondering if Grant Morrison is going to throw us a curve and have the Red Hood be someone else entirely new.  I did say, however, that I think it would be more interesting to have Jason recruit Damian and have him be his new Robin instead of Scarlett.  One definite new character is a man called Oberon Sexton, The Gravedigger.  A mysterious masked figure whom Commissioner Gordon introduces to Dick Grayson at a Wayne Enterprises function.  He has an interest in crime and is knowledgeable of riddles.  I’m sure he’s destined to be a villain of sorts to our new Batman.

We move on to the new Batman and Robin staking out a meeting of the Penguin and some other crime bosses, but before they can make their move, the Red Hood shows up.  The Red Hood cuts up all of the crime bosses except for the Penguin who crawls over to the newly arrived Batman and Robin.  He begs them to protect him.  The Red Hood doesn’t agree with Batman “shielding a known felon” and attacks Batman for this and we end here.

As the Red Hood attacks Batman, Dick asks the question if Jason is behind the mask.  Again this made me think that this is not Jason under the mask.  Throughout the whole issue, we do not see his face.  If it’s not Jason then who can it be?  If it isn’t Jason, a cool way of revealing that it’s not Jason would be to have the Red Hood kill Jason Todd.  I think just having Jason Todd as a Punisher-type character in the DC universe could get boring.  The only way I could see it really working would be to have Damian join up with him.  There would be more drama and reason to care about both of these characters if that were to happen.

A good job here by Morrison.  I love all of these new characters.  It’s time for Dick Grayson to have his own Rogues Gallery.  The Circus of Strange was a great start and this Gravedigger character looks promising.  Still the best Batman book out there.  Highly recommend it!