BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT #29 (REVIEW)

Batman: The Dark Knight #29

Writer: Greg Hurwitz

Artist: Jorge Lucas
          Ethan Van Sciver

Cover: Ethan Van Sciver
           Hi-Fi




The Rundown:
Things pick up where last issue left off (find review for #28 HERE), with Batman plummeting from the sky. Falling towards the city streets below after a battle with the Abraham Langstrom's version of Man-Bat. Although nearly ripping himself in half, Batman is able to save himself from certain death. He makes a quick stop at the Batcave and Jim Gordon's office before heading to Langstrom Mansion, to confront Abraham who is back in human form enjoying a meal. Purposely keeping his words in a theoretical manner as to not implicate himself, Abraham explains to Batman why he chose homeless people as his victims. Stating that nobody would miss them, to which Batman replies, that he misses them. Batman then heads to Kirk Langstrom's Lab to ask for his assistance in stopping his father, already having the antidote, he needs help administering it. Batman says that he thinks he has learned something from Kirk's actions in Detective Comics #19.
Abraham awakens and injects his form of the Man-Bat serum, transforms, and heads out into the city. He smashes his way into a homeless shelter looking to feed, when one of the homeless men takes charge and directs everyone out of the room to safety. Man-Bat attacks the man, sinking his fangs into the persons chest. While he feeds, it is revealed to be Batman, who has apparently ingested the antidote and sacrificed himself so that the antidote would make its way into Abraham's system. Batman is barely able to hang on long enough for the antidote to take effect, and reverts Abraham back to his human as the police arrive to catch him red handed.

At his trial, Abraham Langstrom is let go after pleading temporary insanity. He is proud om himself, joking with the media until a homeless child tells him that he killed her father. Abraham's demeanor changes quickly as he says no more questions and returns to his home. While home, Abraham Langstrom tells us of how he now waits and watches to make his move. While the city (Batman) watches him right back.

The Review:
The long story arc of Man-Bat, or Man-Bats, was brought to an end nicely. Using the events from Detective Comics #19 brought things around full-circle. At times it felt as though they were over saturating the Man-Bat character with the addition of She-Bat and an alpha form of Man-Bat. However, with a pretty good story by Greg Hurwitz, it all made sense  and added to the character of the New 52 version of Kirk Langstrom and Man-Bat. It helped that they kept the Man-Bat serum within the Langstrom family (with the exception of the al Ghul's army of them) and not some random character, as now there is room for future stories involving Kirk and Abraham, their father-son relationship problems and now Man-Bat issues.
The art was done by two artists, with Ethan Van Sciver continuing on his work from last issue in the first five pages, and Jorge Lucas taking on the rest of issue #29. Ethan's work was top notch, and preferred of the two. The title page was double-paged, and looked amazing. Almost looked 3-D. Now, Jorge's work wasn't bad, it was a touch rough, but it did its job and told this story well. It didn't help that the two styles were very different and did not transition into each other well. His final panel on the last page was top notch itself.
Overall, it was a solid issue getting a 4-out-of-5, and was a good ending to the Man-Bat story arc which I'd give 3.5-out-of-5. It will be interesting to see how soon they choose to involve the character, or even the newer version in Abraham Langstrom's Man-Bat, after almost over using the character within on story.

I thought that the series was ending on issue #30, however it looks as though this was the last installment of Batman: The Dark Knight. Perhaps it was simply a mistake over on DC Comics and there will be an issue 30. If not, they ended this story arc in a manner that works as a finale for the title. I don't really consider it the end, as more of a renaming with it is simply making room for the new Batman Eternal series. But overall, it was a decent title and was great for giving us some of the new origins for Batman's rogues gallery. Hopefully something that the other Bat-titles will continue on. For more Reviews, News and more on Comics, Movies, TV, Games and Wrestling be sure to check out The Non-Geeky Nerd! Until then...

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