“Who’s in the mood to party?”
In the penultimate chapter of “Endgame” the time has come for allies and foes to put differences aside in the name for righteousness. People may have a tendency to only recognize Scott Snyder as “the Batman writer” once they hear his name but what they may not give him the same amount of credit for is his work in horror. He’s written Swamp Thing, American Vampire and now Wytches. He is no stranger to creepy storytelling and he flexes those muscles in this issue. Where some people might write the Joker as a crazed madman, incognizant to the chaos he brings, Scott Snyder has written him even more destructive. He writes Joker as a crazed madman who is ironically well aware of the repercussions for his actions and paradoxically more resourceful and crafty than most people in Gotham. Combined with Greg Capullo’s artistry every panel with the Joker is hard to turn away from and unsettling all in one.
THE POSITIVES
The Joker is literally unkillable. Okay not literally…well actually he is pretty damn near unkillable. In this issue Joker swims through all of Batman’s cave defenses, takes a shotgun blast to the back, and somehow manages to take a hand away from our favorite butler Alfred.
We didn’t see much of the Good Guy/Bad Guy team up but I’m holding out hope in the next issue we can see all of Gotham’s Rogues fight side by side with the Batfamily.
Finally the backstory by James Tynion IV and Dustin Nyugen was equally if not more creepy than the primary story. This was the final chapter on Dr. Zaheer’s time with escaped Arkham inmates and of course the Joker himself. With a shoutout to The Killing Joke in the beginning this story has rounded out the “Endgame” feeling surrounding the series and was a fun read.
THE NEGATIVES
I, like everyone else, was expecting The Court of Owls to play a more prominent role in this issue. Instead we got a couple pages that meant nothing in the long run. It remains to be seen if they’ll make one final appearance in the next issue but this one was certainly a let down.
I also wasn’t a fan of the way everyone just kind of shook off Alfred losing a hand. Certainly I didn’t expect Batman and everyone to drop everything and face to Alfred’s side, but the conversation between Bruce and Julia was a bit too mellow for my taste.
THE VERDICT
Batman #39 does its duty to get us ready for the final chapter of “Endgame” next month. Scott Snyder flexes his horror storytelling muscles produces a Joker at his creepiest level. The hype for next month’s issue is not be understated.
