Superman Batman #64

Hey, remember last month when Gotham City Sirens switched out writers and didn't say so on DC's website?  Well, they did the same thing with the art team on this title this month.  Instead of Albuquerque, we’re given Scott Kolins who, while serviceable, isn't Albuquerque. These bait-and-switches are annoying and something that shouldn't really happen in this day of easily updatable websites.

But, onto the story. After a few months of great one-and-done stories, we have here the opening of a multi-story arc.  We spend our opening scene with an ancient Kryptonian space battle, though it should be noted that the Kryptonians ripped off George Lucas's Star Destroyer design.  Kryptonians don’t believe in intellectual property, apparently.

We cut to modern times and, for some reason, Batman has decided to explore a ship that seems to have just popped up in the vicinity of Earth. There's there obligatory fight scene and Superman shows up. It's all very talky, as this issue attempts to set this arc up. I just find it hard to buy Batman in a spacesuit. He's the type of person would rather attempt a project on his own rather than allow someone else to screw things up in some way. I completely understand that. However, I seem to recall him spending more time playing the Oracle role of staying at home and guiding the actions of others during interstellar engagements. To see him investigating in a spacesuit was a little odd. And he’s got his own rocket ship? Did he launch that from Earth? Does the FAA just not care about Gotham City policing anymore?

In all, this is a rather forgettable first chapter in an arc. I look forward to seeing what happens from here. DC Comics' website seems to indicate that Casey isn’t writing the next few issues, so I'm not sure what’s going to happen.