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A review by crookedtreehouse
Batgirl, Volume 1: Batgirl of Burnside by Cameron Stewart
3.0
I remember the big deal made about this title when it came out, how it was a huge smash for DC's faltering New 52 (brief history lesson from a comic retailer perspective: DC's New 52 relaunch was initially a huge success where a decent chunk of subscribers initially asked for all 52 titles, but by the time the six month came around, almost all of them had dropped two-thirds or more of them, and not for purely economical reasons). I wasn't reading it because I preferred Barbara Gordon as Oracle, and didn't like even the idea of her returning to Batgirl.
I was wrong, of course. [a:Gail Simone|45103|Gail Simone|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1266594414p2/45103.jpg] did a wonderful job providing a story that gave Barbara agency over the change, provded compelling character-centric reasons for the change, and then used Barbara's healing process as part of compelling stories. Gail Simone's run on [b:Batgirl, Volume 1: The Darkest Reflection|13228436|Batgirl, Volume 1 The Darkest Reflection|Gail Simone|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1361895856l/13228436._SX50_.jpg|18420381] was imperfect but fun, and mostly well-put together.
I understand that people were excited at the creative sea change that occured when Simone's run, admittedly, got stale, causing DC to pivot to a new team of writers and artists. And, from an art perspective, this book is fantastic. [a:Babs Tarr|8529099|Babs Tarr|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1581633318p2/8529099.jpg]'s character designs, body and facial grammar, and panelling are on-par with the best artists of DC at the time, and [a:Maris Wicks|4395846|Maris Wicks|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] colors are a perfect complement. I would read anything those two put out together.
Unfortunately, [a:Cameron Stewart|317625|Cameron Stewart|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1351355913p2/317625.jpg][a:Brenden Fletcher|3174231|Brenden Fletcher|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1490731383p2/3174231.jpg] write like tech bros stabbing at wokeness. There's a lot of well-intentioned politics undone by sloppy writing and what I think and hope is unintentional misogyny and anti-queerness.
You can absolutely write an evil character who is into drag. But you should be aware that it's a common trope that has helped right wing child molesters shift the stereotype of sexual predators from the real offenders: politicians and Catholics/religious leaders) to trans people and drag performers who, statistically, are much more likely to be victims of sexual assault than perpetrators. So if you're going to make an evil, deranged villain trying to take down a heroic woman you'd better give him a solid reason for it instead of using the reveal as a flimsy, "shocking" reveal. Fletcher and Stewart did not.
But that's hardly the only fault of this volume. None of the villains are interesting, despite the initial concepts of gentrification, identity theft through app development, and ignorant but rich tech bros being intriguing. Barabara's personality is unrecognizable from previous runs, and while this is sort of explained by the overarching plot of this volume, it's not a satisfying explanation. Which leads to the main problem: the main, non-problematic villain reveal at the end of the volume is incredibly stupid, and exposes that these are two writers writing about technology who don't understand how technology works. Like they're two writers writing about college like who don't know how to write about what college life is like. Like they're two male writers writing a mostly-female cast book who don't know how women talk or act. Like they're two comic book writers who don't know how to write compelling comics.
Mostly, this is two dudebros taking up space in a comic about women and not having the talent to write convincing women.
I'm going to ignore the Barabara dating a cop who hates Batgirl agle not just because it's a shallow cliche but it's just an example of two people who don't know how cops work (or, in many cases, don't work) writing about cops. It's probably intended well. It's probably meant to show two sides of America's view on police but, like everything else Stewart and Fletcher have presented here, it fails in execution.
Why three stars? The art.
This book never made me angry at Stewart and Fletcher's ineptitude. It just made me sad that, even though I was bored of her work by the end, a talented woman was taken off a woman-centric comic story, only to be replaced by two guys who are better at hyping themselves than they are at writing comics.
I would skip this and by a Babd Tarr art book.
I was wrong, of course. [a:Gail Simone|45103|Gail Simone|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1266594414p2/45103.jpg] did a wonderful job providing a story that gave Barbara agency over the change, provded compelling character-centric reasons for the change, and then used Barbara's healing process as part of compelling stories. Gail Simone's run on [b:Batgirl, Volume 1: The Darkest Reflection|13228436|Batgirl, Volume 1 The Darkest Reflection|Gail Simone|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1361895856l/13228436._SX50_.jpg|18420381] was imperfect but fun, and mostly well-put together.
I understand that people were excited at the creative sea change that occured when Simone's run, admittedly, got stale, causing DC to pivot to a new team of writers and artists. And, from an art perspective, this book is fantastic. [a:Babs Tarr|8529099|Babs Tarr|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1581633318p2/8529099.jpg]'s character designs, body and facial grammar, and panelling are on-par with the best artists of DC at the time, and [a:Maris Wicks|4395846|Maris Wicks|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] colors are a perfect complement. I would read anything those two put out together.
Unfortunately, [a:Cameron Stewart|317625|Cameron Stewart|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1351355913p2/317625.jpg][a:Brenden Fletcher|3174231|Brenden Fletcher|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1490731383p2/3174231.jpg] write like tech bros stabbing at wokeness. There's a lot of well-intentioned politics undone by sloppy writing and what I think and hope is unintentional misogyny and anti-queerness.
You can absolutely write an evil character who is into drag. But you should be aware that it's a common trope that has helped right wing child molesters shift the stereotype of sexual predators from the real offenders: politicians and Catholics/religious leaders) to trans people and drag performers who, statistically, are much more likely to be victims of sexual assault than perpetrators. So if you're going to make an evil, deranged villain trying to take down a heroic woman you'd better give him a solid reason for it instead of using the reveal as a flimsy, "shocking" reveal. Fletcher and Stewart did not.
But that's hardly the only fault of this volume. None of the villains are interesting, despite the initial concepts of gentrification, identity theft through app development, and ignorant but rich tech bros being intriguing. Barabara's personality is unrecognizable from previous runs, and while this is sort of explained by the overarching plot of this volume, it's not a satisfying explanation. Which leads to the main problem: the main, non-problematic villain reveal at the end of the volume is incredibly stupid, and exposes that these are two writers writing about technology who don't understand how technology works. Like they're two writers writing about college like who don't know how to write about what college life is like. Like they're two male writers writing a mostly-female cast book who don't know how women talk or act. Like they're two comic book writers who don't know how to write compelling comics.
Mostly, this is two dudebros taking up space in a comic about women and not having the talent to write convincing women.
I'm going to ignore the Barabara dating a cop who hates Batgirl agle not just because it's a shallow cliche but it's just an example of two people who don't know how cops work (or, in many cases, don't work) writing about cops. It's probably intended well. It's probably meant to show two sides of America's view on police but, like everything else Stewart and Fletcher have presented here, it fails in execution.
Why three stars? The art.
This book never made me angry at Stewart and Fletcher's ineptitude. It just made me sad that, even though I was bored of her work by the end, a talented woman was taken off a woman-centric comic story, only to be replaced by two guys who are better at hyping themselves than they are at writing comics.
I would skip this and by a Babd Tarr art book.