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DETECTIVE COMICS #769
Recommended (7/10)
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DC Comics
"Purity Part 2 of 3"
Writer: Greg Rucka
Pencils: Steve Lieber
Inks: Mark McKenna
Colors: Jason Wright & Wildstorm FX
Letters: Todd Klein
Editor: Bob Schreck
"Josie Mac: Lost Voices, Part Seven"
Writer: Judd Winick
Artist: Cliff Chiang
Colors: Lee Loughridge
Letters: John Workman
Editor: Matt Idelson
Price: $2.50 US/$4.25 CAN |
This is the second part of an intricate and convoluted storyline involving drug triads and a character from Rucka's first big story on the book. It is also ostensibly part of "Bruce Wayne: Fugitive." The dual roles do not suit the book, and the lead story suffers for it. Fortunately, the "Josie Mac" backup by Winick and Chiang serves up a heart-wrenching plot twist and has me as interested as ever. I feel sorry for those who are trying to follow the wafer-thin "Bruce Wayne: Fugitive" story into this book, but regular Detective readers
should find it more enjoyable.
While "Bruce Wayne:
Murderer?" was fairly tight and enjoyable, "Bruce Wayne: Fugitive" has thus far
been everything I feared a crossover would be: ill-defined, overly drawn-out and
often pointless. There's very little material about the actual "Fugitive" story
here, and what gets marked as a crossover seems to have lost all rhyme or
reason, as Bruce's talk with Leslie last issue seems as important as the
discussion the cops have with Alfred this time out, and yet only one of those
issues got named an official tie-in.
However, while I'm
disappointed in the meandering direction the "Fugitive" story has taken, I'm
still pretty intrigued by Rucka's tale of poisoned drugs, insane metahuman
assassins and mysterious secret agents that fills the bulk of the stories. It's
hard to judge the story without seeing the conclusion, as I'm not entirely sure
what role David Said has to play in the tale, and I don't completely follow the
story this issue; I spent a lot of time wondering who was who. But there's
certainly an interesting story at the heart of the matter, and though Batman is
at best tangentially involved, there's enough to like about the mysterious Said
(and his even more mysterious bosses) and the smooth and slimy Triad boss that
it reads like a good crime saga.
It's also good to see Lieber and Rucka reunited, although Lieber's work here doesn't look as intricate and detailed as the work I'm used to seeing from him in black and white. It's terrific work, with strong storytelling and a good stylistic fit with the rest of the Batman line, but I miss the enormous detail that went into his Whiteout stories. However, when another inker, a
colorist and a monthly deadline is involved, it'd be hard not to change styles a
little bit, at least.
Not surprisingly, given the
strength of the feature overall, it's "Josie Mac" that really shines this issue.
Winick has really captured Josie's frustration at wanting to do the right thing
but being unable to tell people why she should be given more leeway than a
regular beat cop. He has also built up her relationships over the last few
installments, such that the finale of this installment hits the reader like a
punch in the gut, knowing how close Josie was to the victim. And Cliff Chiang's
artwork, as always, is distinctive, detailed and gorgeous, especially the last
few pages set on the pier at sunset.
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