- Written by Tim Seeley, Scott Snyder & James Tynion IV
- Pencils by Paul Pelletier
- Inks by Wayne Faucher & Tony Kordos
- Colours by Rainier Beredo
- Cover by Tony Salvador Daniel & Sandu Florea, Tomeu Morey
Cassandra Cain is Grayson’s only lead in solving the mystery of Mother…but will he be able to interrogate her before Red Hood takes her out? In the past, Batman must save Robin from a fear toxin-induced panic!
Pickup your copy of ‘Batman & Robin Eternal’ #3 at Comixology now!
It’s time for some character moments and a lull in the action for ‘Batman 7 Robin Eternal’ #3 this week. After two weeks of action the breaks are gently applied here to allow the characters to regroup and begin to assert themselves over their situation.
The stories are beginning to splinter to allow for different threads to play out in the coming weeks much as it did with last years ‘Batman Eternal’. Dick continues his involvement with both the Bat-family and with Spyral allowing for more of the ‘Grayson’ style spy action to bleed in to the series which Harper, Cassandra and Spoiler form as sort of shaky nu-Birds of Prey for the modern generation.
In the absence of Bruce as Batman, more on his appearance in this issue later, it’s interesting to see how the various Robin’s (not to be confused with the gang from ‘We Are Robin’) fall in to various roles amongst the team. Tim naturally takes on an Oracle type role and sets himself up with Batcave tech whilst Dick takes to the streets to investigate.
The wildcard in the group is Jason Todd. At the moment he is somewhat on the outside of the group and has yet to find a role. That could be a nod to his past but with his particular skill set Red Robin should easily find a place as the muscle in the group, hopefully that will come in near future.
‘Batman Eternal’ did cause problems for itself when it fully fractured the storylines and began to jump from one to another each week. So far it seems that Snyder, Tynion and Seeley have learnt from those errors and are keeping things tightly woven together for now relying more on the flashbacks as a way to tell multiple stories.
Speaking of which the flashbacks between Bruce and Dick this issue continue to build on previous issues nicely. Suffering the effects of the fear toxin Batman returns Robin to the cave and tries to calm him down. Where issue #2 gave the creative team a chance to show some of the psychology of Dick Grayson as Robin issue #3 allows for more exploration of the relationship between Bruce and Dick. Bruce’s near fatherly instinct is shown and it’s another nice reminder of times past.
Bruce Wayne also makes an appearance in the present day for the first time in this series. It was inevitable that he would be involved as it is highly likely that ‘Batman & Robin Eternal’ will lead to some kind of resolution to his lack of memory and reluctance to carry on his former life. His appearance bookends the issue making room for a larger appearance next week.
Art this week is once again provided by Pelletier and continues to maintain standards without breaking new ground. There are a few different locations depicted in this issue but hands down his best work comes in drawing the sections of Batcave interior that we are shown. I’m still hoping for bigger things from the artwork of this series however.
3 stars
