Batgirl #15 Review

A prior Batgirl review commenter asked if it bothered me that this title is penned by a male author, and that since I sing the praises of Batgirl almost every single time, shouldn’t it bother me? I had to think long and hard about this and my final conclusion is no: I don’t mind that my favorite female comic character as of late is written – very well, I might add – by a dude. My reasons are two-fold. The voice, while annoying sometimes, is genuine and believable. I was a college girl once – though not of the cape and cowl variety – and I buy the voice. Secondly, I am always impressed by the complexity of the stories in this title and the many female characters woven in. In essence, it’s dependable.

Batgirl #15

Now, onto the actual review. After a brief hiatus for the Road Home one shot, we return to our regularly scheduled program wherein Proxy is catching up on the whole Batman back story. I had a little moment of recognition as I cracked open the first page. I follow Dustin Nguyen elsewhere on the net so when I saw the cute cartoon characters, that synapse fired and clicked. Oh yeah, seen these little guys before. Here, they are used as a a gimmick to compliment Steph’s explanation of almost the entire Batman mythos. In the first of this new two-parter, Steph is studying with her friends and as usual, questioning her purpose in school. I know she feels she must go, to hold up some semblance of real life and balance. But her mind is always elsewhere. She is suddenly interruped by a student running madly down the hall. Cue Newton from two issues ago when Vampires came alive off the silver screen.

There are a lot of factors at work in this issue. One, we’ve got the recurrence of Newton, the Physics PhD student, and now, Miller’s introduced the apparent Grey Ghost, who ends up being the guy from the train a few issues ago. I don’t know if I’d say he was stalking her but it’s a pretty good bet. He shows up in time to help/foil her attack on the cloaked figures who were after Newton. So many things are left unanswered but the mysterious cloaked dudes who were hunting down Newton are bad news. In the wake of his unfortunate end, the police uncover something that points fingers at Batgirl, hence drawing to our unfinished conclusion.

As always, the intricacy and forethought that go into this series astounds me. Maybe I should come to expect it now but it’s still tops. I like the art by Nguyen and Fridolfs a lot, though it follows closely in Garbett’s wake. It’s nice to get a new set of artists now and then.

I love reading this title, especially now, because it doesn’t hurt my brain like anything Morrison is churning out and it’s not dark and depressing like most everything else I’ve got on the list. As always, a great read.

Tags: Batgirl Batman Comics Bryan Q. Miller Dustin Nguyen