Gotham City Sirens was a series created by DC to showcase the bad girls of Gotham, those being Harley Quinn, Poison Ivy and Catwoman. The series was to be an ongoing written by Paul Dini, and art by Guillem March, and was meant to showcase the three girls, but after issue three, already DC has changed the book, that is not a good sign.
Issue two ended with Harley being kidnapped by Hush, and Ivy and Catwoman going after her, issue three opens with Edward Nigma saying that the Riddler is dead, and Edward Nigma lives on. We then have a short one page scene of Ivy and Catwoman asking Nigma for help, he says no, and leaves them. The issue is not about the ongoing story of the sirens and is just a showcase for the Riddler; it’s all about him getting to grips with the new Batman and them solving a case together as an unlikely duo. Don’t get me wrong after I got past the fact that this wasn’t what I bought the comic for, or even what DC advertised, I enjoyed this issue, but this wasn’t what I put my money down for.
The art by Guillem March is as usual, horrible in the first few pages, then it gets better, then is acceptable at the end, someone needs to take March off this book, as his watercolor style along with art that takes half a comic to work every month is getting annoying. March’s Riddler is, alright, in later panels, but in the first page, he looks like the Joker, it was like March was told he was doing the Joker for this issue, told he wasn’t, asked what to do with the pages and the editor said “Just put some green on it, no one will notice”.
The writer DC advertised for this issue was Paul Dini, but when you look at the cover in the comic shop it says written by Scott Lobdell. DC did not mention in their preview that Dini was being replaced, and that the story would not be about the Sirens, and would focus on the Riddler and Batman, that is annoying as DC just put this out without caring about the fans who wanted to read the story about Hush and Harley, if I wanted to read a Batman/Riddler team up, I would have read one of Dini’s many team up issues in Detective. I have never seen a writer be taken off a comic for a fill in issue and the artist remaining, it is very different. If DC had came out and said “Paul is really busy doing the game, he can’t do issue 3 so filling in is….” but they didn’t, they just advertised a different story and waited till fans headed for the weekly comics to find out. That DC is poor business.
So all in all, this is a good issue for showcasing the Riddler, however it is not the best and not what I bought this comic for, so for that reason and the fact that the art is consistently mediocre I am done with Gotham City Sirens. DC just lost my $2.99 every month, or even my bargain purchase whenever I see this, give this comic a miss, and if you’re like me, and like good Bat-books, give this entire series a miss.
Gotham City Sirens:
Reviewed by Suavestar
