Review: Birds of Prey #14
[Editor’s Note: This review may contain spoilers]
Writer:Â Kelly Thompson
Art:Â Sami Basri
Colors:Â Adriano Lucas
Letters:Â Clayton Cowles
Reviewed by:Â Matthew B. Lloyd
Summary
Cassandra Cain is undercover, as Queen Nubia has reached out for help in rescuing five Amazons who have been abducted and are being held by The Ninth Day.
Positives
What jumps out almost immediately about Birds of Prey #14 is that Kelly Thompson has finally figured out what a Birds of Prey mission should feel like. It’s a massive improvement from the extradimensional, supernatural milieu that she’s set the first 13 issues of the series. We even get Barbara Gordon back behind the computer in her role as Oracle running the mission.
Sami Basri does a nice job on the art in the issue. His action sequences look good, even if they are pointless. There’s also some nice framing and angles to make things look interesting, and he uses repeated images effectively as well.
Negatives
It’s not a home run though…. Thompson wastes too many pages on pointless sparring between Big Barda and Grace? And Onyx? I don’t have an idea who these characters are. As this issue proves, Thompson doesn’t know why they’re here because all they do is say “tough” things and spar with Barda. Even Barda’s presence feels pointless.  The story could’ve moved forward instead of wasting pages on characters no one cares about and pages that don’t make the reader care about F-list characters.
Having Cassandra Cain go under cover seems like an admission by Thompson that she knows nothing about Cass. Cass is probably the least Bat likely to go undercover. She’s not that kind of character. She’s a hide in the shadows and surprise you type, not a hide in plain sight type who can rely on fast talking to get her out of tight situations. For years she didn’t talk at all. Thompson seems to have bent her into someone unrecognizable.
While Birds of Prey #14 addresses why Black Canary isn’t the one undercover (she was undercover a lot in previous BoP runs), it’s never a good idea to reference the worst era in a character’s history. Thompson has Barbara tell Dinah she can’t to undercover anymore because she well known as a famous rock star. That period of Dinah’s life should be excised from continuity like the blight on her character that it is. The fact that she can’t go undercover is reason enough to get rid of it. The whole idea was stupid from the beginning so to make use of it here demonstrates that Thompson doesn’t know what’s right for the characters she’s writing. That goes double for her portrayal of Cass as a cool undercover agent. No one believes that.
Verdict
While Birds of Prey #14 does show signs of improvement from previous issues, it also continues to expose Thompson’s weakness as a writer in the DC Universe. She just doesn’t know the characters well enough and can’t distinguish the good from the bad in terms of previous stories. Her characterization remains surface level at best. It’s a mediocre start for the first issue under the “All In” banner. If this is the best Thompson’s got, it’s not a lot to get excited about.
