Take it easy on me here, I haven't been reading Eternal since I stopped covering it last time. But I have been keeping up with it via The Batman Universe, so hopefully that will be enough, for now.
Dustin Nguyen does the cover, and it looks great. I love his work better when it has the more painted look, as opposed to the flat colors. I don't feel like that matches his art style very well.
James Tynion is doing the script for this issue, and things have finally picked up for this book. I am surprised as to how much it has improved over the past few issues. We got a lot in terms of story progression, as many events happened along the course of this book.
Mikel Janin does the art in this issue, and he has me excited to see his work on a month to month basis in the Batman Universe. He has such a clean, neat style. It will be fun to read his Grayson in the coming week. But I love how his Batman looks.
Spoilers ahead… (See what I did there?)
James Jr. is back. And he is trying to sow seeds into his father's mind that he has always been a bit messed up. James Jr. tells Jim, that he has arranged for the guards to be missing, and his door to be opened at a specific time tomorrow, and hopes that Jim will take the opportunity to escape.
Jason Bard has a plan to take in Batman to make Forbes "famous". But as we know, Batman is in on this plan. Vicki Vale convinces her boss to let her join, so that she can write up a story. Although, her boss believes it to end with the unmasking of Batman. Vicki isn't so sure she'll have her job by the end of this, but goes on anyway. Buzzfeed Joey seems to be one of the few who is seeing Stephanie Brown's spoilers in the internet, but no one is giving it the time of day. That night, Jason Bard enacts his plan, as they see Batman on the scene. He and his team move in, only to find Falcone's gang with possession of illegal firearms and narcotics. Bard claims them as affiliates of Batman, and order them to be taken in. Forbes is upset by this, as he has made a deal with Falcone. But he is forced to let Bard take them in, when Vale tries to get a quote as to why he wants to let them go. Forbes calls Falcone, and Carmine threatens to find someone else to do his job. However, Bard and Vale are listening to the phone line, and Vicki says she can have it on the Gazette within the hour.
Harper Row breaks in to Red Robin's Nest, and after making an awesome "Holy supercomputer, Batman!" pun, spies on Red Robin. He tracks down the creator of the nanobots, and heads to Tokyo to confront him. He also tries to track Harper, but the computer cannot locate her, since she is hiding in his untraceable bunker.
Stephanie gets a Facebook message from her friend, Beth, and ends up calling her on a different phone. Her friend has received a orange and blue box (the colors if Cluemaster) and Stephanie tells her not to open it. Beth opens it anyways, and it explodes. Later, we see Stephanie standing in front of Beth's house crying. Cluemaster is watching her via security system, saying that his daughter will come to them.
This issue was awesome. Best of the series, I have read, so far. I feel like the group has learned from where they went wrong, and are taking the Futures End approach, by giving you multiple stories into one issue, instead of spreading them out.
Batman Eternal #13:
Reviewed by Corbin Pool
