Batman Incorporated #6 (DC)

writer: Grant Morrison
artist: Chris Burnham

(via dccomics.com)

To most fans at the moment, Scott Snyder is the Batman writer of record.  I won't begrudge them that, because he's the one driving the crossover arcs.  I've struggled with this in the past.  I still don't particularly think Snyder rates as high as fans think, but he's at least kept Batman in high profile stories that his fans will probably remember.

However, I will have a problem with the instant crisis the Court of Owls provided the Dark Knight, just something that appeared and proved in Snyder's mind to be a defining struggle.  I don't necessarily believe that Batman should have a problem like that come about so easily.  It's akin to what Grant Morrison has been doing in Batman Incorporated, and in this issue particularly, which features a climactic battle whose impact is probably cheapened by the stuff Snyder has been doing.

Batman's final duel with Leviathan, the culmination of Morrison's 2006-2013 run with the character, ought to be a pretty big deal.  I guess it's cool that Morrison doesn't mind being upstaged, because he was certainly in the spotlight previously with stories like "Batman, R.I.P," which is echoed so directly in this end game that it may be exactly what Morrison wants, because it's not really about Batman and his final confrontation with Talia al Ghul, but their son, Damian, and where he ultimately ends up.

The most shocking thing to me in the issue is the apparent demise of Knight, the English Batman that Morrison brought back starting with the Club of Heroes arc prior to "Batman R.I.P."  It's a sequence that puts Knight's Robin, Squire, in mortal jeopardy, allowing Knight a heroic rescue that sees him replace her in the cross-hairs of the juggernaut who by the end of the issue has bested Batman himself.  Damian, the current Robin on probation for his own safety, is on the sidelines trying to make the decision to intervene.  Earlier in the rebooted series, Morrison teased Damian's death, so he's certainly not above doing whatever he wants in this book, because he knows he can pretty much get away with anything, and that's because of the Snyder effect.  The focus is elsewhere.  Fans will only take notice again probably with the final issue, to see how Morrison concludes his epic.

Six issues remaining.