Batman And Robin #5

"Speaking of which, who the hell is this El Flamingo and why should I care?"

Reread Batman #666. Flamingo was mentioned there. He's connected to the Black Glove.

The themes of "eating people's faces/false faces/cutting off faces and using them as masks" have been all over Morrison's run. In the Club of Heroes arc Mayhew apparently wore a false face of himself, Dr Hurt said he sliced off the actor Mangrove Pierce's face and wore it, Professor Pyg puts similarly skin-like masks over his victims to give them new personalities. And now El Flamingo is revealed as a face-eater.

Admittedly, none of that stuff is THAT important, but the point is that certain touchstones of Morrison's run continue to reflect, refract and reverberate through every issue. And look at the cover to the next issue--Dick trapped and tied up by Jason--it echoes the situation (and cover) of Batman #674, in which Bruce was trapped by the Third Man. If you want to go even further, Sasha's constant harping at Damian, blaming him when he was actually trying to save her, kinda recalls how the Joker (in #663 and RIP) kept badgering Bruce because of the incident in Batman #655, when Bruce was actually trying to save the Joker.

I agree that this was the worse issue of B&R yet (though I liked the art more than last time), but for the reader who's really constantly cognizant of Morrison's run, there's still TONS of interesting stuff going on underneath the surface. The surface story was indeed a bit predictable in this ish, tho.

"@gobo Let me put it this way: For a comic that's suppose to be about Red Hood/Scarlett; Flamingo showing up is unnessicary and pointless."

We're getting into an awful lot of spoilers so...

They're setting up Flamingo to be a villain against Red Hood/Scarlett so it makes total sense for him to show up at the end. It ties things in with #666 and sets up what's going to happen next issue.

I don't mean to keep harping on Tan vs. Quitely, but how cool would that airplane scene have looked if Quitely had drawn it (or the motorcycle scene, for that matter).  Tan's style (which I understand some people like) is just too sketchy to make out the kinds of details I like to see in my books.

@gobo Well know I remember it's a callback to #666. (Thanks to @flapjaxx for reminding me). But this arc is about Red Hood and Scarlett. Plus isn't Flamingo suppose to be a villain for Damien? Cause in #666 he becomes the new Batman and I believe he fights him at some point. Him fighting Red Hood/Scarlett doesn't seem to matter in the grand scheme of things.

You're throwing around too many "Suppposed"s :) 

The arc is definitely about Scarlett and Red Hood, but they're not strictly speaking villains, they're like the Punisher only attacking bad guys.  Flamingo is a bad guy that's coming to town because of RH/SC, he'll deal with them but obviously Dick and Damian are going to end up involved too, ultimately leading to Damian and Flamingo encountering each other.

Him fighting RH/Scarlett is just how he comes to town and I'm sure them having their first "nemesis" will alter their course somehow in new and interesting ways as well.

@gobo: Well your seeing something I didn't really see. In fact the Flamingo guy coming in wasn't my biggest problem anyways.

Just the reveal of Red Hood was very boring. Then the whole issue is just bland and feels like any other comic book. There was nothing 'wow' or 'wonderful' about it. It was as bland as a Morrison issue your gonna get.

@stuclach: I'm sure Quitely would've made this looking gorgeous in his own style. But we'd probably be waiting still for this issue to come out. Tan did an exceptional job, once again, with this comic. It's not like Quitely but then again comparing it to Quitely wouldnt make any sense on critiquing it.

@TNC - I am willing to wait a bit longer to see the book as Morrison envisioned it.  Morrison and Quitely work so well together that I imagine Mr. Morrison sees Quitely's art when he visualizes these pages (I know I do).

Again, I know that many people prefer Mr. Tan's art, and I respect that, but I'm not in that camp. 

@stuclach: I didnt say I prefer Tan's art. I would love for Quitely to be on this full time. But that realisticly cant happen because this book would be late so often. But out of all the choices DC/Morrison made to be replacement artists they were all good except for this choice. Now it seems like a right choice because Tan is doing a great job in my eyes.

The big mystery reveal of Jason Todd was already done in Battle For The Cowl, so I'm glad they didnt do it here, it would have been retredding old ground.

Besides, Flamingo wasnt that much out of left field, he was teased the entire issue!

I actually found Tan's art to be quite good this issue, which surprised me, as I really did not like it last issue.

" It's been wacky, innovative, and has had some of the coolest moments to come out of comics in 2009"

 "It really does pain me to say this but this might be the worst issue by Grant Morrison I have read this year."

" Cause I would rather die then see this series suddenly turn into a bad comic book."

 HYPERBOLE is a terribel thing. it water's down meaning and arguement

@TNC - Jason Todd has been the Red Hood before, so maybe that's why it wasn't such a huge deal of a reveal (?).

And as a Morrison Apologist you are not allowed to question Flamingo coming out of the blue or any other odd story-telling choices, you are meant to blindly claim it as genius & ahead of it's time. Please play your role correctly.

@Wade: That wasnt brilliance by lazily hinting at this guy and then him showing up out of the blue to kill everyone. He was only mentioned through bizarre dialogue last issue and this time all we get is really a grisy plane sequence (which was cool to be honest). Morrison wrote this to be a Red Hood story and then the last two pages turn this into a completely different story.

If this was another writer we'd probably be yelling to the masses on how bad pacing that is.

When I was complaining about this type thing in past stories of G-Mo's (we know what I mean), you claimed it all as genius writing, now he's doing what he always does (bizarre dialogue, things being all over the place & vague) & you don't like it?

I'm glad to see your review is unbiased & judging the issue on it's own merits, though.

But, having said that, if I know you, by the end of this arc, you will be back-tracking & saying it was genius all along, begging on your knees before the Alter of Morrison begging for forgivness! :P

Its a bunch of 3 issue arcs, so Morrison can't draw out the introduction of characters like you might like.

I had no problem with Flamingo showing up becase A) he was talked about in #666 which plays heavily into everything that Morrison has done since (Prof. Pyg, Flamingo, Black Glove as the devil, 3 Batman demons, etc.) and B) he didn't ride in balls blazing and killing everyone in those last two pages like you said.  

@Wade: What Morrison did in the course of RIP and before that is totally different then this current run. I see what your saying but I dont find myself contradicting myself about the guy. I'm sure when I re-read this arc, even if #6 blows me away, I'll score it lower then say the first three issues.

I just think Morrison didn't handle introducing this Flamingo guy very well. I totally forgot about the #666 issue so that aspect was lost with me. Then he just randomly shows up and takes out Red Hood/Scarlett with no problem. He could've handled this better, that's all I'm saying.

@TNC- I'm only taking the piss, mate :) I think it's awesome that you can be unbiased & judge a book on it's own merit no matter who wrote it.

The funny thing is, I have no problem with this issue, the way Flamingo was introduced etc. Have we ... switched roles here???