Review: I Am Batman #16

Overview: In I Am Batman #16, as the Fox family secrets finally come to light, will anyone ever be the same?

Synopsis (spoilers ahead): I Am Batman #16 begins with a man killed in New York.  His assailant says he will pay.  This death has more significance because it brings Lucius Fox to New York from Gotham.  He is met at Teterboro Private Airport by his family.  The victim was the executive assistant to Tanya Fox, Ethan.  She is devastated; she considered him to be family.  Lucius hopes this will bring the family together.  It may just tear it further apart.

Jace and Tiff are elsewhere talking.  Jace tells her that he knows she is the new vigilante in New York and she counters by saying that she knows he is Batman.  Everyone in the family has secrets and lies.

In Brooklyn, a mass shooter strikes a business.  The gunman flees the scene when the police arrive, but that is not all.  The gunman is taken down by Batman.  The gunman repeats the will pay mantra before he shoots himself in the head.  The police have no leads.  Tanya and Lucius have a conversation about coming clean.  A woman in Queens is kidnapped.

Jace arrives back at base, and he is met by Vol.  Vol links the Ethan killing and the mass shooting to Fox.  His fear is that someone else has discovered that Jace is Batman.

We join the woman hostage from Queens.  Her kidnapper, not disguised, gives her a glass of water.  He may kill her, but he will probably kill him because someone has to pay.

Jace meets up with Hadiyah.  Jace tells her he is scared and confesses to her that he loves her.  She does not take this news well and walks back inside.

Finally, Jace meets with Lucius.  He tells his father that he is afraid he got sloppy.  Lucius worries that that is not the only thing to be concerned about.  Tam interrupts the two, and the three meet Tanya.  There is a video message from Ezekiel King, the leader of the Moral Authority.  King is accusing the Fox family of being digital dictators.  He demands ten million dollars, or else Jace’s mother will be killed.  This confuses Jace because Tanya is right there with them.  She then tells Jace that she is not Jace’s biological mother.

Analysis: What I Am Batman #16 misses in action; it makes up for in spades in revelations.  This issue is the start of the unraveling of the Fox family.  All we hear about are secrets within the Fox family.  Tiff knows Jace is Batman, and Jace knows Tiff is the vigilante.  Jace confesses his love for Hadiyah.  The ultimate secret is that Tanya is not Jace’s mother and his real mother is now in the custody of a killer who wants money from the Fox family.

The art is fantastic.  The emotions of the characters are on full display.  Tanya is drawn looking run down and concerned through most of the issue. This culminates in the final panel, where she confesses to Jace that she is not his mother.  The pain is evident in her eyes as she tells Jace.  From the look of Lucius, he loves Tanya, but he, too, is buried too deep in secrets and lies.

The scene of the mass shooting is horrific, but I want to commend Christian Duce for not making it as gory as he could have.  The weapon used is an automatic rifle, and the bloodshed could have been graphic as in other scenes of this series, but restraint was used.  The terror of the scene is not lost.  It is shown perfectly in the unnamed worker who finds herself looking down the rifle’s barrel, but she is saved only because the weapon jammed.  We see this character again after the shooter kills himself, and she looks absolutely terrified.  From the art, it is difficult to see that she will ever recover from this ordeal.

Editor’s Note: DC Comics provided TBU with a copy of this comic for review purposes. You can find this comic and help support TBU in the process by purchasing this issue digitally on Comixology through Amazon or a physical copy of the title through Things From Another World.