Broken Frontier

In this final part of Judd Winick’s arc on Batman and Robin, the Dynamic Duo must team up with former blown-up protégé, now resurrected super-villain, Jason Todd, a.k.a. the Red Hood, in order to save his equally scarred companion, Scarlet. No one is happy about the arrangement, but it seems like the Red Hood is the only one trying to make the most of it, his humor matched only by his brutality. Judd Winick, responsible for bringing Jason Todd back into play a few years ago, captures his violence and strange sense of honor, and does especially well in contrasting his attitude towards that of Dick and Damian.

It seems as though each member of the Bat-Family in this issue represents some core value of Bruce Wayne. Dick as Batman most represents Bruce’s sense of justice, as we see that while he can be brutal in his methods, he will do what he must to save the girl, and never take a life doing it. Damian, though cold and calculating, has Bruce’s sense of determination, vehement to prove himself an excellent Robin. Meanwhile, Jason represents Bruce’s ferocity when it comes to defending those he cares about, proving how effective a crimefighter he can be, despite his missing moral center.

While a fun story, it does not work as well as it could due to a lack of artistic energy. Tocchini’s work has a fluid, loose design to it, and while it has worked well on books like Ion and Radical’s The Last Days of American Crime, here  it seems muddled and lethargic. His figures and action lacking that punch to carry you through from one page to another. It’s not terrible, but it definitely won’t blow you out of the water.

Ultimately, there is not much of a resolution to this story, other than getting the Red Hood loose again to terrorize Gotham. Though it was nice seeing Bruce’s wards working together, it would have been enjoyable to see some more exploration of their relationships as a whole, rather than just showing how much of a “badass” Jason Todd can be. Still, it was interesting to see the Sons of the Bat team up; one can only hope we’ll see more of this dynamic in issues to come.