Stephanie Brown Batgirl Volume 1 Review

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So without any further ado, it's time to talk

about the comics we are reading right now here

inside the pullback. Welcome to Gotham. Hello

and welcome to The Pull Bag. This is episode

353, continuing on with Batman Month. I am of

course TFG and Mike. Joining me is Ryan, the

Unevenflow Merkley. Hello, sir. Is this his own

Craig's Batgirl? I don't think so. Are you really

gonna jump on that bandwagon? That's gonna be

a whole other discussion for a whole other day.

God. What? I was referencing the... Adam West,

but anyway, yeah, I know well you haven't probably

seen this but on Facebook because I'm well aware

of What you're bringing up, so I don't care about

Whatever the plot of it is going to be that's

fine, but I am one of the few people maybe Maybe

there's more than a few, I don't know, that just

reacted negatively to Mr. Twilight being the

new Batman. And honestly... Oh, I thought you

were going to reference the odd negative reviews

of CW's new series. Okay, there's that too. I

thought we were going somewhere else here. There's

that too, but that CW stuff actually started

on the Pattinson Batgirl thing. So my buddy Doug

Abel, who runs Talking About My Generation podcast,

He basically said, if I can't accept Robert Pattinson

as Batman, then the only Batman that should have

ever existed is Adam West, because that was the

original television character, yada, yada, yada,

yada, yada. My thing is, comic book casting has

been really good. Like, you look at Marvel, and

there's so many people that I either never heard

of or couldn't picture in the role that have

turned out perfectly. And another example of...

What is another Batman? I'm gonna be honest with

you. I could care less about the vulture as a

character I've never been interested never enjoyed

it whatever and Michael Keaton freaking knocked

it out of the park in homecoming. I absolutely

loved him in that. Yeah, he was such a good job

and There are so many other example the one people

bring up is Heath Ledger as the Joker The negative

reaction to that originally exitters See, I didn't

have a negative reaction to Ledger. Yeah, I didn't

have a negative reaction to Ledger because my

first thought was ooh Patrick Verona from 10

things I hate about you as a villain. That's

kind of cool or the guy for you know, he played

Von Lichtenstein in a night's like I had already

followed Heath Ledger's career somewhat By the

time I was like ooh That actually kind of works

with him being the Joker. Yeah, he's just a good

actor. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, for Pattinson,

Twilight was over a decade ago. How the hell

old is that now? It's been a long time anyway.

It's been a long time. And look, here's the thing.

He's not the same dude. No, and I understand

that. He is an actor. He is someone who who gets

put into roles or get cast in certain roles and

he does whatever job he has to do. The problem

is with myself and everybody else that continually

makes the Twilight jokes is I even looked at

the guy's filmography. Twilight is the only thing

I can actively say I've seen advertisements with

him in it on the big screen. I've never actually

watched the Twilight movies. I have zero interest.

I don't care if they're good. I don't care if

they're bad. I don't care if they're teenage

winery bullshit. I don't care. The point is,

for the last ten years or more, however long,

whatever it is, you know, all is I've associated

him with is those films because it's all I've

ever really seen him advertised in. Yeah, but

I think it was you could make the same point

for a lot of others Did anyone know who the hell

Chris Hemsworth was before a bit part relatively

in Star Trek? 2009 yeah, and then Thor yeah,

yeah Even Chris Evans, you know his big role

quote -unquote was Johnny Storm Torch yeah in

two not very good Fantastic Four movies. I love

those Fantastic Four movies Anyway, to be fair

he was good in the He was good in them. Him?

Okay, I know this is way off topic, but I need

some off -topic crap, because, you know, I'm

two weeks out of brain surgery, two weeks and

a day out of brain surgery. Just got the stitches

out. Well, as of this recording, it's two days

ago, or one day ago, whatever. Anyway, point

is, Chris Evans and Michael Chiklis made those

films for me. I mean, Vic Mackie as the thing?

Come on! He was good too and then anyway anyway,

all right, so if people who are being played

by other people So batgirl 2009, this is the

Stephanie Brown batgirl it is written by Brian

Q Miller Artists are as follows Lee Garbett Trevor

Scott Sandra Hope Perry Perez Jonathan Glapion

Tim Levens, Dan Davis, Aaron Sode, Oliver Gnome,

and a bunch of other people. Like, there's like

six other names on here. God, I'm glad I let

you do the names of people. Guy Major is the

- yes, I know, right? Guy Major is the colorist.

Yeah, the first time it occurred to me that I'm

just not cut out for. It's just when we're talking

about Livio Reminelli and the IDW. Livio Remandelli,

yes. Yeah, whatever it is. Ravioli. It's not...

It's not Livio Ravioli. You were so much better

than my shitty pronunciations. Anyway. I screw

names up too at times, so... So... We haven't

talked about this a whole lot, but you jumped

on to, because you are always interested in number

ones and seeing stuff from the beginning, you'd

sort of jumped into DC more after New 52. Once

the New 52 began, yeah. This is set before New

52. This was set actually just really in the

wake of Final Crisis. Right. And the Stephanie

Brown character has reappeared, but she was one

of the reasons I didn't jump into the new 52

There were a couple others actually all of most

really most of the reasons are featured in these

issues So this is post final crisis meaning Bruce

Wayne is dead quote -unquote He didn't quite

die, but anyway, spoiler alert. Yeah, spoiler,

spoiler, spoiler. It's one of those things where

it took me a while. I didn't really realize until,

oh wait, because I think it was you, I'm pretty

sure it was you, that said something about Dick

Grayson as Batman. And I am a huge Dick Grayson,

Robin, Nightwing. So that was the other... Reason

I didn't jump on the new 52. I enjoyed that and

I thought there was a ton of There was a ton

of different ways and distance they could have

gone on With it, but they it got ended prematurely

for the reboot to the universe But I enjoyed

that I liked the idea of seeing Not only how

different Batman would be as a character because

Batman really is a title. It's not necessarily

a man yeah it's become a man since then but for

example Robin is definitely a title yeah many

different people have been Robin including Stephanie

Brown yeah and yeah Batman to me was just it

was more of a title than the man and it was interesting

to see not only how different he is, but it would

have been nice to have seen more of how his relationship

with, not just his allies, but his villains is.

Like, how different would the Joker and some

of these other characters be when it's no longer

the same guy under the hood? And they played

with it a little bit. They had an arc where Two

-Face pretty rapidly figured out that, hey, this

isn't, it's not the same guy under the cowl.

And I like... It's that I wish it had more time

to breathe and go on yeah, but I think the thing

with other people being Batman other than Bruce

in this timeline or even in the new 52 timeline

Or any other time like outside of Terry McGinnis

like if you put Dick Grayson in the suit if you

put even Commissioner Gordon in the suit I think

what I love is We did this episode a while ago

Steve and I did Kyle Higgins and Scott Snyder's

Gates of Gotham, where again, it was our first

Dick Grayson and his Batman story. At least the

first that I read. And in that, Batman has a

scene with Commissioner Gordon. And he basically

all but tells him that, hey, I'm not the same

guy under here. Kind of a thing in that I believe

I believe I have to go back and reread it and

make sure I'm right But I love scenes like that

when we realize that Hey, this ain't Bruce Wayne

And I like seeing the characters grow up. Mm

-hmm. I Mean, it's the logical conclusion that

eventually Dick Grayson who has been essentially

groomed to eventually take over Something happened

to Bruce. It's a logical conclusion that at some

point you get to see that notes fair You could

make the point that maybe he'd want to continue

being Nightwing or something like that But you

know the point at this time was that Batman was

also a symbol and there always needs to be a

Batman says Amanda Waller but In that same vein

so Stephanie Brown got killed off in fairly infamously

might I add way back in war drums Which is part

of the war game series She was not killed off.

Well, it was not all that well done and It left

a lot of unanswered things with the character

and it left a lot of potential growth on the

table and at the time she was Robin and This

story takes place as she takes over as Batgirl

from Cassandra Cain who has in the wake of Bruce

Wayne dying who's decided to leave Gotham City

and decides to give the mantle of Batgirl to

Stephanie Brown, who was previously Spoiler before

she became Robin. Then as Robin, she dies. Well,

actually, she gets kicked out. Then she becomes

Spoiler again, then dies, then comes back as

Spoiler for a bit and is now Batgirl. That's

not confusing at all. Now I started to understand

why you start try to start at number ones. You

gotta start at the beginning in order to get

the whole story. I mean like Yes, we brought

you I brought you on for the the Joker bit for

endgame last week and whatever But I mean whatever

it is what it is And I get it there. You know

there are points like in Scott Snyder's new 52

run where you could start at Volume 8 which is

the Commissioner Gordon run technically that

is a new starting point considering. It's not

really Bruce Wayne is Batman, but Stephanie Brown

Batgirl I Like this. I thought it was interesting.

I'll say this now. I'm sure I'll say it again

throughout the rest of the episode Right now

in 2019 it has been Six years since I read 12

issues of a comic in one go the last time I did

that was when we covered welcome back Frank way

back in the very first Punisher month here in

the pull bag. A classic volume of the Punisher.

Absolutely. I did not realize when I originally

bought the two traded collections of Stephanie

Brownback Girl that it was each one half of the

series. So when I came to read it on on the Sunday

before this episode or week before this episode

goes live, I was like, oh, wait a minute, how

long is the, oh, it's the first half of the arc.

Okay, well we're obviously not gonna record this

on the Sunday before the Wednesday that it goes

up because I still have to sit here and read

all of this. And it's not a bad read at all.

I actually enjoy Brian Q. Miller's writing. It's

the first time I'm, I'm pretty sure this is the

first time I've read his stuff. I love the characters.

What I enjoy most about this story is when Stephanie

finally comes into her own and she and Babs are

working together and Babs gives her a better

suit than her Spidey suit that she has in the

beginning of this Yeah, I thought so one of the

things I thought was interesting and I liked

is For obvious reasons and I mean she's done

this with other characters before but Oracle

aka Barbara Gordon she's She is almost the main

antagonist early on mm -hmm like he could make

a point just because She's not happy. There's

somebody new in the suit. She doesn't really

approve of Stephanie it took Barbara a while

to approve of Cassandra mm -hmm and This is a

very if you're a fan of Oracle and a fan of Barbara

Gordon. This is somewhat sort of required reading

as well, because there's a lot of focus on her

and her feelings. But even as Stephanie is fighting

some of Gotham's finest villains. Scarecrow.

Yeah, Scarecrow, daughter of Calculator, is in

this too, although not in the same role, but

she joins the team. But still, there's a good

number of different characters who are seen and

from different books. But even then, with all

of that, Stephanie kind of has to fight Oracle

at the same time. At least for the first little

while. Yeah, for the first little while. And

again, it's a good tension thing, you know, them

trying to feel each other out, Stephanie trying

to fit herself into the role, you know, trying

to make it her own, because not every Batgirl

is the same character. No, and the other thing

I like to was her interactions So I like a lot

of the interactions and seeing how she fits in

with the different members of the team I should

mention this since you may not be aware but originally

in the comics she had great dated Tim Drake and

so we get to see Red Robin and her we get to

see some of my favorite stuff, which is Damien's

reaction to her because Damien at this point

was a lot more interesting to me than he had

been Because he's under the tutelage of Dick

Grayson, who is not his dad. Right. And very

much teaches and behaves differently to him than

his dad did for certain. And it's just fun seeing

his reactions to kind of everything and everyone

around him, all at the same time as there's at

least a part of him that's kind of grieving because

his dad's gone. Yeah. I understand that Damien

is grieving. partially in this but until one

of the writers and I need to bring this up as

well several people have said online recently

about giving writers suggestions for stories

and how you're not technically supposed to do

that even though as much as you want to see a

a Phineas and Ferb and Doctor Who crossover,

or whatever, or a Calendar Man and a Condiment

King team up, whatever. Or see the end of Game

of Thrones rewritten? Oh, yeah. Well, it's, you

know, it's just not ever gonna happen, and most

writers and most creators don't particularly

like being, you know... unsolicited the main

reason is because they cannot use any portion

of what you tell them ever exactly yes it has

it has happened in the past famously where somebody

pitched an idea that was similar enough the writer

forgot about it and used just a fairly insignificant

portion it just had a very small amount of similarity

but it was enough that the said writer was taken

to court and It's crazy when writers learns that

yeah, and it's a problem on social media I follow

a good number of writers the one that gets it

the most I swear is poor Joe Michael Straczynski.

Yeah, who's done a number of different comics

and Babylon 5 and other other animation things

absolutely actually Or that we mentioned earlier.

Anyway, he's done a number of different things

and anyway Yeah, he gets them all the time and

it drives him nuts and I don't blame him because

Yeah, so everybody's summer anyway. Yeah, so

my thing with Damien is I don't think I'll ever

like him just in general until They make some

sort of futuristic storyline with him or some

sort of alternate storyline with him kind of

like how Nightwing the New Order was an alternate

storyline for for for Grayson as as night it

was an original story by Kyle Higgins and everything

else and whole different aspects and what like

even now reading Damien before new 52 but specifically

Damien in the new 52 i could not stand that kid

i'm less of a fan of him in new 52 i liked him

more beforehand mostly because like i'm sort

of mentioning before he kind of had to grow up

a little bit more and a little more quickly because

of what happened to Bruce and I also enjoyed

it because as he had he had a more varied cast

of people to interact with so one of the things

I like about this book period and I liked about

Stephanie Brown is she's not the typical Bat

family character. She's a lot less grim. She

makes clips while she's fighting. She's a bit

like Terry or spider -man in personality like

she's generally seems to be having fun as the

character and admittedly one of the things that's

turned me off a little bit with a lot of the

DC stuff lately is how incredibly dark or grim

or unhappy everybody kind of has to be although

it was Marvel who once popularized the comment

that you know you can't have your characters

be happy Which no actually you can it's nice

once in a while. They don't always have to be

miserable and that's another thing I liked about

this is Particularly once she gets to work together

and once she's got the approval of at the very

least Oracle. Yes Stephanie seems to have fun

and yeah, she can still be serious So on the

art side of thing to a one to point out because

you used it as a thumbnail on I want to say Facebook

with you use the shot of Stephanie in Scarecrow,

which I thought was really good artwork. I really

like that. I love it. It's amazing. But also,

I mean, she could be serious when she needed

to. I genuinely like this book, and it's a lot

more fun than... I'm not trying to say anything

negative because I've reviewed all the Batman

books we've done lately extremely positively,

but it's nice to have a fun Batman's book. Yeah,

it is a very fun Batman book. It is a Batman

book that has Batman in it, but the main focus

is Stephanie Brown as Batgirl coming into the

role. It's her, as you said, interacting with

all of the other Bat family members with Robin,

Damian Wayne, or Damian whatever his name is

supposed to be, you know, Red Robin, Tim Drake,

Tim, they actually call him Tim Wayne in this.

She's got her own. Commissioner Gordon, essentially,

and Nick Gage. Exactly. You know, she's got that.

She's got Oracle. And I, I've always been a Dick

Grayson, Barbara Gordon kind of fan. And I love

that Miller takes, Brian Q. Miller takes time

to, there's an exchange that I'm on right now

with the two of them where... she but you know

he gets knocked out of the sky or something or

other or the signal goes dark she's like Batman

Batman incoming bogey what it looked familiar

you know it's just that that Babs and Dick kind

of you know back and forth back and forth and

this is why I'm really digging Grayson as as

Batman yeah it was fun to see it's also fun for

me at least to see Barbara To take more of a

mentor role as well. Yeah something that she's

had other Batgirls and other parts of the bat

family that she's held But This is one that there's

no Bruce helping with or teaching in addition

really. Yeah No, this is basically Barbara doing,

you know doing the teaching thing the way that

she wants to do it And it works. They are a team.

You know, we talked earlier about how Scarecrow's

in this. You know, Roulette is in this. Roxy

Rocket is in this. Manbat, Clayface. Clayface

is in this. Livewire is in this. Just absolutely

villains that you don't normally see in, okay,

maybe Scarecrow, maybe Clayface, but you know,

in most bat books. In most, I'd say. Playface

isn't super heavily used, but yeah, I know you're

right. Yeah, I mean, you know, I mean, Roxy,

Rocket, and Livewire are technically Superman

villains. Technically. But again, you know, seeing

Stephanie team up with Tim, seeing her team up

with Batman and Robin, the art in this is all

amazing. Once she gets her own suit that isn't

the Cassandra Cain suit, I absolutely love it.

I love the design on all of them. There's a page

where Batman, Robin, and Batgirl are facing off

with roulette. Batman is in the shadows, and

the other two are in the foreground. Oh, I love

that page. That page is amazing. And again, it's

a story about a girl coming into her own as a

superhero. And it progresses nicely throughout...

all 12 of these issues. It tells stories, as

I already said, about her, her past, like dating

Tim Drake, Red Robin. You know, it has her dealing

with her mom and all that and everything else.

There's just so much here in these. I also think,

yeah, and I also think as a fan of Batman Beyond,

I enjoyed the fact that honestly, the Barbara

Stephanie relationship reminds me a lot. of Terry

and Bruce. You've got one person who just can't

do it because of something that happened to them

and physically is generally unable to trying

to mentor somebody who's trying to grow into

an extremely difficult role that they already

went through. I got a lot of those vibes too,

which is definitely not a negative either Yeah,

cuz again like we said this is at a time when

Babs is being oracle this is a time after the

Joker shot her and paralyzed her and and and

all of that You know, yeah good I was just gonna

say I mean, I just like that everybody who has

a guest star to I just like all the guest stars.

It's nice to see Tim Drake who had at this point

been, I don't want to say upgraded, graduated,

I guess, to Red Robin. You have, you know, Dick

Grayson who's graduated to Batman. You have,

and not only that, but gets to lead or be a big

part of the JLA. And you have, you know, to a

lesser extent, you have Damian kind of graduating

into the Robin role. Yeah, absolutely this this

book was even though it was a long read. Yes

super fun I absolutely love it. I love the It's

part of what is it? It's part. It's close to

the end of it It's part of the final arc the

flood where in the opening bits of part three.

It's like you know Babs and Dick are like she

has the use of her legs again, and they're doing

this whole dream sequence thing I love that they

did that they kind of reimagined the whole hey,

I'm going to shoot you now kind of a thing But

they give her this amazing life with with Dick

and Damien and Tim and Commissioner Gordon Her

father and all that and it was a nice little

start to that part of the arc You know, you even

have Selena in here as well, and very, very cool.

I'm very glad I did end up reading this. I'm

glad we're covering it on the show. Like I said

in the beginning of the show, I wanted to cover

this before. I just didn't have the time or the

whatever. Wasn't gonna spend X number of dollars

on all 24 issues. But now that I have both of

the trades on Comixology, it's pretty awesome.

Yes, some of my favorites non Gail Simone Batgirl

stuff. It's just fun. I miss it reminds me how

much I missed kind of that era of DC Comics just

before flashpoints and everything that happened.

It's I don't know what to say. Yeah, I'm not

trying to knock Barber Gordon who for a lot of

people myself included I grew up with her as

Batgirl but it was just really fun to see somebody

else in the role and Batgirl for a long time

had been Changed to Oracle and there was a ton

of different stories about that Etc etc But it

was So go back to that for a bit at least to

like I like seeing Oracle again. It's been quite

some time Yeah, yeah, it's a very cool fun story.

It Is its own thing. You don't need to have read

70 other issues beforehand It's like like we

said earlier, you know beginning to end. It's

its own thing We may cover the other half of

of the arc later this year i i don't know i don't

know what the heck the heck's going on for the

rest of the year so um what would you give volume

one for stephanie brown zero to five uh very

solid four yes no stick with no four and a half

out of five it's just fine it's a lot yeah Different

than it's not perfect. I think a lot of it peaks

with the Barbara Stephanie stuff Although having

said that it was nice to See, you know dick initially

kind of being a jerk dick is kind of a dick for

a bit Because one thing people forget or one

thing that people Will kind of have to know At

this point is he's feeling out the role as well.

He's slowly figuring out. He's not Bruce Wayne

Batman And again, you know somebody who absolutely

adores Batman Beyond same sort of thing. It's

you know, we see Terry find his role or find

his voice in that series and Yeah, and in this

we're seeing multiple characters try to find

their own and try to find their place in a post

Bruce Wayne world Yep, I am right there with

you four and a half There wasn't a single piece

of art that I didn't love the stories you're

right It's all about finding yourself whether

it's Stephanie whether it's Grayson whether it's

even Damien Barbara The villains because they

used such an eclectic vert like it like it's

not just Scarecrow, Catwoman, Joker, Penguin,

it's not just the standard big bads that Batman

always faces, it's putting villains in a story

that basically challenges Stephanie as Batgirl.

You know, not every Batgirl is going to go up

against Livewire, and you know, they even make

the Bluebird reference the Supergirl. So, that's

kind of cool as well. So, four and a half from

me as well, absolutely dug it. I think it's great.

It's fun. If you're looking for something to

be and to just entertain And to tell a story

that's different featuring the bat family I thoroughly

recommend it. It's not the It's not the system

And that's one of the reasons I really liked

it. So Absolutely Coming up for the finale for

Batman month this year. I don't know how this

is gonna work I don't know who's gonna be honored.

It might be Ryan and I it might be Ryan JT and

I, it might be... I don't know. If the readers

are really unlucky, I'll... be around. I'm not

sure how I'm doing this. I honestly have no idea.

I had this idea a while ago to do a... which

I know how to do the technical aspect of being

live, but... Next episode of 354, we're gonna

do our personal top ten favorite Batman characters.

The only caveat to this is that they generally

have to start in the comics. Obviously Harley

Quinn started in animation and then made her

way to comics. Same thing with Batman Beyond

characters. They started in animation and made

their way to comics. But generally it's top ten

comic Batman characters. Like I said, originally

I wanted to send this out to the listeners to

be able to have them... write in their own lists

and we would somehow compile that through some

sort of mathematical genius thing but I think

at this point whoever's on the next episode with

me for hosting we're just gonna make up our own

personal lists and then we'll ask you the audience

after the fact if you want to send in your personal

lists or comment on that episode 354 when it

does come out in a couple of weeks kind of a

thing After that, June is kind of fully Starked.

Well, it's got a Stark, it's got a Fairyland,

it's got Turtles, and it's got Transformers.

So, 355 is JT and I are gonna finish off Superior

Iron Man with Volume 2 Stark Realities. JT and

I are gonna start Tony Stark Iron Man Volume

1 Self -Made Man. Comic concierge slash movie

revolt Dan and I are gonna talk about I hate

fairyland volume 4 which I believe is the final

volume from Scotty Young Joe Reed and I may or

may not get to TMNT invasion of the Triceratons

which was issues 76 to 80 of the IDW series and

then probably Ryan's gonna be back at the end

of the month with the Transformers Bumblebee

movie prequel Have you seen the movie yet? Have

I? No. Watch the movie at some point. Yes. Well,

you know if I had more money I could do that

So that's what's coming up in June we've got

Five episodes for you guys in June in July in

July It's going to be a bunch of cool stuff episode

360 of the pull bag is gonna be us talking about

the IDW 2020 thing that IDW did this year celebrating

their 20th anniversary, so it's five one -shot

stories of the various things that like Star

Trek, Gem, Ghostbusters, My Little Pony, and

TMNT. So that's gonna be an interesting thing.

Yeah, that's what's coming up here inside the

pullback. What do you got going on, Mr. Merkley?

Absolutely nothing. Of course. Angry tweeting

as at nightbeat. Oh boy, there you go. I am at

TFJoneMike on Twitter. You can also follow at

The Pull Bag and at Geekcast Radio for all the

other network updates. Make your greatest game

into comics and we will catch you next time with

our personal favorite Top 10 Batman characters

list next week here inside The Pull Bag. The

world does need a Batman. And it always will.

The mantle of Batman is an honor. You've just

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