: (4 of 5 cowls)

Brian Boland. It's a real joy to see his covers, and they probably sell more copies of Gotham Knights than the interior art or writing does. Not that either of the latter are bad, its just his work is so wonderful. This one didn't garner his usual 5 from me though. The composition seems a little off. The thug being beaten on is cropped out of the page, which minimalizes the shock of how badly Batman is beating him (though I'm grateful for the subtlety of the blood effect). Batman looks too cramped in the space Bolland put him in, as if he was trying to shove as much of him into the cover space, despite how incredibly uncomfortable he looks trying to be shown when there's a lot more space to stretch out in off panel. Superman just doesn't look like Superman (and he's missing the black "S" logo which has been used since Our Worlds at War). What is there is as well drawn as ever though, and the color is particularly well done on the downed thug.

Story: (4 of 5 cowls)

This was a very good use of Superman as a guest in the story. When Supes is pulled into other books, it's usually just to draw in a bigger group of temporary readers hanging onto his cape for the ride. This time it did serve a purpose. We all knew he eventually had to confront Batman about Vesper's murder, and it was very well handled here. I think what I enjoyed the most was how Grayson handled Batman's reaction (or virtual non-reaction) to Superman's insistent attempts to get information out of Bruce through reverse psychology. All in all though she illustrated pretty darn well the difference between Big Blue and the Bat. I also enjoyed Alfred's internal struggle, as we all know how much the situation must be weighing on him. Every "parent" worries about their children, and when a child goes down the wrong path, they look to themselves first for blame. Nicely done.

Artwork: (3 of 5 cowls)

The extreme heavy handed inking persists here, but it looks like Robinson is trying to draw some panels which suit it more. The initial page particularly works well with this, a crook's-eye view of the Bat. The full sized image for the title page is also very impressive, and it lends a deep dark sense to the issue. My issue from the cover follows here however, Supes' logo is no longer red and gold. Let's try maintaining some contonuity shall we? Overall a fairly impressive issue. Backing off on the heavy dark black inks in the smaller panels would have pushed this art rating to a 4 or 5 easily. Use the blackness for effect, not as the norm folks.

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