Runner Up: Batgirl #36 – Mairghread Scott, Paul Pelletier, Norm Rapmund, Hi-Fi and AndWorld Design
It finally seems like the Batfamily troubles have finally met Batgirl.
For the last few months, Batgirl has gone through something of a transformation in the way that her stories are being told. Back in 2015 she received an upgraded costume and status quo during the DCYou era, but with that came this unfortunate lack of seriousness and gravitas as she remained hopeful through all of her problems. She had a good support network and being the owner of a multimillion dollar start-up, she was absolutely set.
But that era came and went, DC Rebirth happened and I don’t know, her books just sort of foundered to me because they lacked the importance of other Bat-books, until Mairghread Scott took over. She’s been putting Batgirl through the ringer and has been bringing her back down to the gritty and hard nature that the rest of the Batfamily has been going through and this issue is no different.
After being put up for an auction to see who would finally kill Batgirl. Barbara escapes, defeating the Terrible Trio’s Shark as the auction house catches fire, trapping everyone inside. Batgirl fights her way through to a metal gate that she can maybe cut her way through, but The Trios Vulture throws a knife into her back. She states that letting these people go would be bad for business and that Batgirl sealed their fates when she escaped their trap. Vulture is willing to let herself and many others die to protect her reputation.
This kind of callousness stuns Batgirl because villains usually want to live, but Vulture is absolutely on the side of culling weakness from the world and the Terrible Trio failing to kill Batgirl is something she can’t abide and will take everyone down with her. Fox betrays Vulture, allowing Batgirl to free everyone, including the carrion villain. Shark, however, is unable to move after his beating and Batgirl, still wanting to be hopeful and helpful tries to save him. With everything crumbling down around them, Shark pushes her out of the way of debris, killing him as Batgirl watches on.
As she crawls out of the ruins, nose bloody and face full of dejection, she heads to a meeting that she was supposed to attend in order to talk with her investors. Her friend Alysia, who she placed in charge in case she wasn’t able to attend meetings, tells her that the investors forced her to make a decision that ultimately led to Babs being pushed out of the company. Now, broke and homeless, Barbara’s thoughts drift to Shark and in the face of everything, she still sees positivity.
She gets her stuff from Jason Bard, the guy who she worked with on a Mayoral campaign or something along those lines with in earlier issues, and seeing how caring he’s become since their last few encounters, she actually kind of sees him as a friend. Black Canary hooks her up with a dingy apartment in The Narrows, but Babs sees it as a good start, thinking of Shark and Jason, even as her life is collapsing, she still has hope.
I know earlier I said that the stories prior to this also had hope as the ultimate ending to everything, but at the same time, Barbara also had a safety net of things to fall back on. She’s not calling on Bruce to help her, she doesn’t have Dick to confide in and she doesn’t have the money that she used to have and to her, that is perfectly fine.
With her Year of the Villain tie-in coming up soon, I can’t wait to see where things go for her.
Ty Talks Comics 