By: Tony Bedard (writer), Peter Nguyen & Andres Guinaldo (pencils), Jack Purcell & Raul Fernandez (inkers), Tony Avina (colors) and Steve Wands (letters)
The Story: Catwoman and Harley Quinn finish their fight with Catwoman’s crazy sister who thinks that Catwoman has been possessed by a cat-demon. Only by killing the cat-demon can Selina be set free….
What’s good: If you’re a big Catwoman fan, this issue will probably make you happy. The whole issue revolves around Catwoman and her sister, Maggie. Maggie is a crazy former nun who thinks she must exorcise this cat-demon that has possessed Selina Kyle/Catwoman. Of course, since Maggie is crazy she is trying to perform the exorcism with a sword, which is not exactly the approved technique.
I also got a kick out of seeing Harley Quinn running around with her big hammer again. For some reason, this element has been missing from a lot of issues of Gotham City Sirens as Harley has mostly just been doing cartwheels in the background. The hammer is kind of her trademark, so I liked seeing her at least trying to blast Maggie with it…of course, since they’re fighting in a graveyard, she ends up pulverizing tombstones.
The final interesting thing this issue did was actually tossed in some doubt that perhaps Selina IS possessed. There is one scene where Harley is compelled onto Maggie’s side of the fight and we see Catwoman with this freaky 6-eyed cat-thing emanating from her, which makes sense since cats are avatars of wickedness. Since Tony Bedard is a guest writer for this issue, I’ll be curious to see if Paul Dini follows up on this.
What’s Not So Good: The art is pretty challenged in places, but that’s going to happen when you have a virtual swingers’ party of artists: two pencilers and two inkers. The outcome is pretty messy and we are left with questions like “Who thought it was a good idea to draw Selina and Harley to look like they are 12 years old?” and “Who is responsible for this weird panel with Maggie choking Harley with her rosary?”
The story also isn’t really impactful. It isn’t a bad story, but this isn’t something where you’re going to tell your friends, “Hey…If you are not reading Gotham City Sirens, you are missing out on THIS!” It’s just very ho-hum and self-contained. Perhaps I’m too much of a continuity nerd, but I like to have some connection between my Big 2 comic series and their larger universes. If I want something completely separate, I’ll go read small-publisher stuff.
Oh yeah… And what a fugly cover. We’ve had some real beauties on this issue the last few months and this one is not good.
Conclusion: Very average story with challenging art.
Grade: C-
– Dean Stell