Product Description: Familial discord lies at the heart of BATMAN: WAR DRUMS as Batman is taxed to the limit by new threats and trouble within his family. When Tim Drake's father discovers his son's identity as Robin, Tim is forced to quit the team. Everyone must adjust as the Spoiler Attempts to fill his boots, with disastrous results!
From Spoiler to Girl Wonder This trade is a compilation of a few different storylines. The primary one centers on the continuous and tenacious quest by Spoiler to be accepted as an integral member of Batman's inner crime fighting family, and in this particular instance, by actually becoming Robin. With Tim Drake currently "retired", Batman, who is quite appreciative of her steadfast persistence, finally accedes to it and grants her the Robin mantle on a probationary basis. We witness her trials and tribulations and also learn about Batman's one primary proviso for keeping her status ongoing and possibly permanent, always follow orders out in the field. It's difficult not to cheer for Stephanie. While she may be in over her head at times, her heart is clearly and admirably in the right place, plus her positive spirit is infectious. To some, just the thought of her becoming Robin may sound ludicrous, but a girl wonder is certainly an intriguing direction to explore, and it's safe to say that quite a few female fans would undoubtedly be rooting for this to occur. The eventual fate of Spoiler and the critical conclusion of this unique experiment and its' ramifications directly leads into and ultimately triggers the follow up epic War Games saga. The rest of the book involves two separate forays focusing mainly on the street crime element of Gotham. These types of tales can be interesting, but their appeal may be limited. Most people arguably prefer the over the top spectacle and shenanigans of his rogues gallery; even Nightwing's run in the past has been mildly criticized due to its' emphasis on this pedestrian style of story. In total, a mostly enjoyable yet uneven and disparate collection tied together more by their sequential publication dates than by any cohesive or connected theme.
Unfocused introduction to War Games I had actually read the War Games series as well as War Crimes before finally getting around to this one. I can tell you it didn't make that much of a difference whether or not I read it before or after. There are a lot of stories in this trade paperback, but the only one that interested me that much was the final one where Stephanie Brown takes over as Robin for a short while. In fact it is so short, I can barely even count her as being one of the Robins as it was only for about 49 days.
A lot of the characters involved in War Games sort of get their own stories in here. Leslie Tompkins, trying to help the unfortunate, as she is abducted to try and give birth to a baby when the mother's been shot. You get some nice backstory here about Leslie and her relationship to Bruce and Alfred. Mr. Feeze makes a brief appearance but doesn't exactly play the villain.
There's a boring story about Tarantula and an ancient legend known as the Mugre (don't ask). You also see the teaming of Orpheus and Onyz. Green Arrow has a small role in this but he is wasted as he dissapears as quickly as he arrives. You see Tim Drake struggle with his promise to his father not to go out as Robin any longer and also his relationship with Stephanie, his soon to be replacement. One thing that bothered me about this was it seemed like Batman accepted her as Robin almost immediately. It seemed pretty out of character to me, but I suppose he does the same thing in Dark Knight Returns as well.
It's a crossover storyline so it is a split over Detective Comics and the Robin comics which means the artwork changes every 20 or so pages which isn't so bad. Both artistic styles are quite different but I'd have to say I prefer the way Batman is drawn in Detective Comics.
Overall it's not too bad, but there were a few stories I could have done without, and I wished we could have seen more of Stephanie as Robin in here.
A good, episodic collection of intrigue "Batman: War Drums" is a collection of some of the latest stories in the comics. Batman has been moving from what I would have called "self-contained" storylines to some type of "expanding" storylines. Let me explain what I mean.
"Self-contained storyline:" typically a story told within four to six issues of the same comic. One storyline might run from Batman #300-#306, for example.
"Expanding" storyline: A story is much more complex, spanning several issues of several different comic titles. You read one part in Batman, finish in an issue of Robin several months later. NO MAN'S LAND, Knightfall, and Contagion are examples of such a storyline where multiple characters are involved. These type of storylines are in-depth. Batman stories seem to be moving in this direction.
However, "War Drums" has some self-contained storylines, including Batman pursuing kidnappers, a mystery at a new factory, and an encroaching gang war. What I find interesting is that in War Drums you see a combination of the two storyline types mentioned above.
You get the satisfaction of seeing one plot unfurl and complete itself. At the same time, you see a bigger picture developing around the self-contained storylines. The kidnapping, factory mishap, and scuffles that are resolved are all episodes pointing to a bigger trend in Gotham.
The work seen here, however, leads up to "War Games," which looks interesting. I hope the comics writers are learning that we are tired of following five or six titles just to get one good story. On this front, "War Drums" looks promising.
15 minutes of Fame for the New Robin.... This collection collects Detective Comics #790-796 and Robin #126-128 and is written by Anderson Gabrych and Bill Willingham (Fables) and illustrated by Pete Woods and Damion Scott. The first story is a stand-alone and deals with Batman on the eve of Jason Todd's (ex-Robin) birthday. The next two stories deals with how a female Rap star has her sister missing and injured by a rival record lable and winds up in the care of Batman's long-time friend Dr. Leslie Tompkins. Leslie is kidnapped along with the injured girl and Batman is hell-bent on finding them. And to make matters worse, the rival gang is equipped with hardware courtesy of Mr. Freeze (i.e. ice bullets that melt). The story basically re-examines the relationship between Bruce Wayne and Dr. Tompkins. The next two stories are by far the worst in this collection and features Tarantula (a character who I and a lot of Batman and Nightwing fans abhor). Apparently a Hispanic legend dealing with filth and grabage (literally) has come to life. Like I said this was by far the worst story in the collection.
Once you have dragged past or skipped over the former stories, the latter portion of the collection follows Stephanie Brown aka Spoiler and now the new Robin in her training to become Robin. We basically get a glimpse in her 15 minutes of fame as Robin. The stories are pretty-well written and is told from Stephanie's POV. We also get a look at Tim Drake's (ex-Robin) life as a civilian. But before he can get too comfortable, Robin's nemesis Johnny Warlock (see Robin: Unmasked) has hired a skilled killer to hunt down teenage boys at home matching Robin's physical description. It is up to Batman and the new Robin to stop the killer before she reaches Tim Drake. In between all this we get a stand-alone story featuring Zsasz. Zsasz in my opinion is a severly underestimated character. He is the Hannibal Lecter in Batman's Universe. He slits the throat of his victims and then tallies them up by cutting himself. This story is the best in this collection and the writer does a very good job of conveying Zsasz's threat and power.
I just have a single point to state here...the writer Anderson Gabyrch has this tendency to portray all African American characters as MTV marketed Rap Stars. Read the second story and you'll get my point. He is a new-comer and he has good potential (see the Zsasz story) but here his work suffers terribly because of the Tarantula story. Bill Willingham also writes well, his work shows Batman a little more light-hearted but still not bad.
This collection mainly sets the premises for the atrocious Batman War Games crossover (see my review). All in all the stories are good...not great but good. Recommended for the Batman completists.
Review from a newbie I can't say I'm very well-versed in Batman-I only started reading Robin at the beginning of the Unmasked arc. War Drums chronicles a time right before War Games which I am reading right now in weekly installment form. For me, this book was heaven-sent, because I missed an issue of Robin chronicaling the very short career of the girl Robin, and this book explains exactly what happened that so many people I've talked to seem confused about.
Anything Goes Trivia
Trevor
Megaton Man
