Pick of the Brown Bag
November 1, 2021
by
Ray Tate
Welcome! Hope everybody had a Happy Halloween. I was pleased to see many kids partake and adults dress up with their kids. The lot of them left me candy broke. So good on them. If you haven't checked out the new season of Doctor Who, do so. It's a killer. Onward to the premiere of the November Pick of the Brown Bag.
Ah. Black Label. We meet again. Catwoman Lonely City is probably what the Powers That Be at DC originally had in mind for Black Label, before Batman Damned left behind the stink of a subpar porno theater from the seventies. Adult-oriented Elseworld, or What If should you make yours Marvel. Neither titilating or exploitive, definitely not fun, but mature subject matter. Alas, Cliff Chiang's Lonely City reads like a parody of dystopia. At least it looks pretty.
A bomb blows up Batman and Jim Gordon dead in flashback on page forty-two, about.
Another bomb takes out some cops who blame Catwoman for the boom-boom. No idea why. Bombs have never been part of her m.o. Whatever. It's not the universe proper anyway.
This episode sends her to jail where she stews ten years presumably in a deep funk. She's released from jail on page four. For anybody keeping track this makes her 45 at the incident.
Also on page four, we find Harvey Dent is the Mayor. This isn't the first time a Batman rogue became mayor. So, no real shock that Harvey got involved in politics.
Lonely Place shows that Gotham City actually thrived without Batman and Catwoman. So much for heroism. This version of Gotham City is so financially secure, they managed to purchase the Statue of Liberty....
...and the Arc of Triomphe.
Remember when Trump wanted to buy Greenland? He seriously intended to buy another country. Anyhow. The presence of these well known landmarks in Gotham City isn't quite as preposterous as reality.
You think I'm going to harp about Barbara Gordon's wheelchair and the postmodern shitty green eyes. Nope. Flashpoint never occurred in this universe. The Flash never went back in time to stop his doppelgänger from injuring history. Batman never found the technology to address the Killing Joke. Babs is as she was in the post-Crisis, may it rot in hell.
I'll be completely honest. Had I known the crippled incarnation of Barbara Gordon would be in this book, I never would have touched it. Cliff Chiang art or no. That's a dealbreaker. However, the wheelchair fits with the morose tone.
What makes Barbara's appearance hilarious in a bad movie kind of way is the hair. It's just too much. Batgirl's signatures are her bright blue eyes and crimson hair, flashing as she fights. She's like bubbly fire as Batgirl.
So, naturally she sheared off her hair in this dour universe. Cause, excitement, sex appeal and escapism is outlawed in Lonely City. These juvenile feel-good aspects have no place in a dreary book for adults.
Lonely City is the Merchant Ivory film of Black Label. A montage where Barbara actually cuts her hair perhaps accompanied by a histrionic speech in the vein of "I'm tired of being treated as a Bat Kewpie Doll!" is the only thing that would have made this any more ridiculous.
So, Gotham City is looking pretty good. Fresh out of prison, Catwoman is doing okay if not spectacular. She's been morning Batman for ten years, but she took advantage of the prison exercise facilities.
Babs is crippled, but Catwoman never liked Batgirl. So, what's the problem.
The Batman/Darth Vader styled police force developing in Gotham City behave poorly on page three, but these first three pages are there to sucker you into a long ride to nowheresville. The Bat Cops have a perfectly good reason for their actions, albeit a little quick on the trigger. Catwoman just broke into the police evidence room.
There's nothing special about these cops. They're not cyborgs. They're not drug-addicted soldiers or the like. They're just ordinary dudes in funky outfits. The one on page six even acts fairly personable toward Catwoman.
According to Harvey, the Bat-Cop-Vaders are tributes.
It's the full face mask that puzzles me. Why are they wearing a full face mask, when Batman did not? Harvey could have just redesigned the helmets. The tubes are also head scratchers. They don't lead anywhere.
So, they're not providing oxygen. The Darth-Man cops also wouldn't need oxygen since the air isn't toxic in Gotham City. Still, if these accoutrements were--No, no. It would still bug the crap out of me. As does this...
...Wait, what? Did the government topple on this earth? Is Gotham City the only democracy around? Is it in a bubble? I'm totally dumbfounded by this development. The Federal Government produces money. A city can't just produce its own monetary system.
Surely some fun must be available in this book.
Nope. Sorry to say. Lonely City is the dullest, prettiest thing I've ever experienced. Not counting Blade Runner 2049, which at least had nudity.
Wait objects you. What about Ma Hunkel?
How can a book with Ma Hunkel in it be so terrible?
She exists to create an illusion that Lonely City isn't all that dismal. She is a blatant reminder of innocent times and the promise of action where there isn't any, as is Killer Croc.
Concussion. Really? Okay. That's just so incredibly sad, and fits right in with everything else going on. I mean when Catwoman states this...
...We should hear some kind of big-boffo musical sting and cut to some other moment where Selina is preparing for the heist. Instead, Chiang kills the potential for mood by continuing the scene. Damn. The pace of Lonely City moves with the speed of a congested snail.
Those such as myself expecting a dynamite action filled Catwoman adventure will be highly disappointed. I just felt horribly tired after reading Lonely City.
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