Weekly Comic Book Review

By Christopher Yost (writer), Ramon Bachs (artist), Guy Major (colors and digital inks), Mike Marts (editor)

The Story: Tim Wayne, formerly Robin, now the Red Robin, has been traveling all over the world, looking for clues for his crazy theory that Bruce Wayne, his adoptive father, is alive. The only one to believe him so far is Batman’s arch-enemy. The last issue ended with Red Robin being stabbed and left for dead. In this issue, things get worse.

What’s Good: Issue after issue, Tim Wayne is being pushed out of the comfortable world of fellow heroes by his irrational disbelief in his adoptive father’s death. This has made him more alone than most characters I can think of, and has forced him into an alliance with someone totally out of his ability to handle: Ra’s al Ghul. Yost makes us feel not only Tim’s loneliness, but also his discomfort around strangers he cannot trust. That is a universal childhood and coming of age experience and shows where Yost is taking us with Tim.

These coming of age and loss of father themes are rising in a number of books out of the wreckage of the Battle for the Cowl, most especially for the “four brothers” Wayne (Dick Grayson, Jason Todd, Tim Wayne, Damian Wayne). Tim’s journey here is not just a journey to manhood independent of the father, but independent of the new patriarch and of his society. The new and former Batgirls face similar struggles in new roles in a world without Bruce Wayne and this all points to an impressive cohesiveness of editorial vision between Marts and Siglain.

The art team is a flawless choice for this book. Bachs has become increasingly skilled at making Tim muscular, but still youthful. In the beginning of the series, it was easy to mistake him for a man, especially in his new cowl. Now, in costume and out, he’s quite obviously a teenager trying to pretend he’s not out of his depth.

What’s Not So Good: Yost really loves his temporal jumps in Red Robin and they can become a bit disorienting. A flashback as an occasionally-used tool can be effective. When overused, or experienced through multiple characters, they can make the story less clear or pull the reader away from what makes the story great. A step too far, in my opinion, was the introduction of Vitoria in Brazil in some indistinct past, without enough context to really add her to the story. However, these are small points, and some might argue, stylistic, in a much larger success.

Conclusion: The Red Robin series feels like a monthly dose of a summer block-buster: action-packed and thrill-jammed. Check it out!

Grade: B

-DS Arsenault