InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Wut r u, loco or somethin'?"

Doop (xdoop) wrote in scans_daily,
@ 2009-09-27 20:39:00

Entry tags:

char: alfred pennyworth, char: batgirl/cassandra cain, char: batman/bruce wayne, char: robin/nightwing/dick grayson, char: robin/red robin/tim drake, creator: brian bolland, creator: roger robinson, creator: scott beatty, publisher: dc comics, title: gotham knights

"Scared Straight"

( Images behind the cut. )

(Post a new comment)

	taggerung301 2009-09-28 12:57 am UTC (link)
	bah, this story was good, but a tad disappointing when I first read it a while back, I was hoping for a real rehabilitiation - some low-level crook who actually managed to turn his life around oh well, at least it showed that the Bats wanted to try and help people without just hitting and punching them (sort of, a lot of that was involved anyway) (Reply to this)

	darkblade 2009-09-28 01:01 am UTC (link)
	Asshole Bats and a story showing their assholness was right. He could have gone straight but they don't even give him a chance. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	xdoop 2009-09-28 01:02 am UTC (link)
	a story showing their assholness was right I don't know if we were meant to think that. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	darkblade 2009-09-28 01:05 am UTC (link)
	Thats arguably worse. Having them be monsterous Knight Templars in their own book when we are at least supposed to have some sympathy for them. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	taggerung301 2009-09-28 01:08 am UTC (link)
	actually, the guy committed the crime before even seeing the bats they were smart to watch him (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

fungo_squiggly
2009-09-28 01:19 am UTC (link)

Because he was ripping off some guy for $100 bucks? That's not exactly "thank god the Bats were watching" territory.

On the one hand, he showed he wasn't entirely serious about going legit. And if he'd gotten away with it mister The Spook might have slipped back into a life of supervillainy. So he probably did need at least one in-your-face warning.

On the other hand, the Bat clan apparently went on to break his spirit entirely, possibly destroying any chance he might have had of genuinely turning over a new leaf.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	nezchan 2009-09-28 01:29 am UTC (link)
	I'll be honest, I thought the conversation with his roomie was leading to him leaving Gotham entirely, actually trying to escape the larger prison. But apparently that thought didn't cross anyone's mind. (Reply to this) (Parent)

blaketiger
2009-09-28 01:34 am UTC (link)

The batclan starts out by deciding to harass a guy who, according to the legal system, has legitimately paid his debt to society. At this point, they had apparently decided to scare him and make him 'fear' them, with no evidence that he intended to return to crime.

Yes, he ripped off a guy for a hundred bucks, and they were right to step in there. On the other hand, Cass then went on to assault him after he had been *kidnapped at gunpoint*, and that seems to have been the last straw. Nice work, Batfamily.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	xdoop 2009-09-28 01:46 am UTC (link)
	I think they only saw him get into the car, and they didn't know he wasn't going in of his own free will. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

blaketiger
2009-09-28 07:16 pm UTC (link)

Honestly, that doesn't make it better. If you're going to take it upon yourself to attack criminals in a manner outside the law, you need to be damn certain that the people you attack ARE criminals. That's not to say that mistakes won't be made, but when they are, especially when it has this sort of negative impact on someone's life, it'd be nice if said vigilante owned up

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	ashtoreth 2009-09-29 03:56 am UTC (link)
	Agreed. This story seems more like a cautionary tale about how close the Batclan are to the abyss. (Reply to this) (Parent)

aaron_bourque
2009-09-28 02:45 am UTC (link)

Well . . . Batman was right. I mean, hypnotizing the bank teller into breaking a $100 when all he had was a one? Sure, it's a minor crime, but still. And that was before the Batfolks showed up.

But this story is still pretty disappointing. They could have laid off him a little more. Or there could have been an actual rehabilitation.

Really, this story is meant to be ambivalent, they just didn't quite reach it.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

	sailorlibra 2009-09-28 01:36 am UTC (link)
	Do not like. The Batman mythos is very concerned with redemption. This seems OCC. (Reply to this)

	pmagod 2009-09-28 01:46 am UTC (link)
	I thought that was Pied Piper in the cover, which just makes "scared straight" take a whooooooole nother meaning (Reply to this) (Thread)

	liliaeth 2009-09-28 03:32 am UTC (link)
	Glad to know I wasn't the only one, or as they say, motto (Reply to this) (Parent)

	felinephoenix 2009-09-28 04:02 am UTC (link)
	I thought so too! (Reply to this) (Parent)

	ar_feiniel_ 2009-09-29 10:51 pm UTC (link)
	Ditto! I kept waiting for him to show. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	batcookies 2009-09-28 02:32 am UTC (link)
	You'll all be glad to know this guy was killed by Damian so we could all know just how kickass the little 10 year old was. Decapitated, in fact. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	thanekos 2009-09-28 02:45 am UTC (link)
	probably would've worked better with someone like King Snake. I mean, that's... atleast a guy who fights. Take off an escape artist's head, that's... not really that impressive, actually. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	stig 2009-09-28 07:50 am UTC (link)
	Except, of course, in Morrison's version the Spook looked nothing like the one above, and was an obsessive connoisseur of ancient architecture...so it might not have been the same guy. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	espanolbot 2009-09-28 09:18 pm UTC (link)
	Yeah, maybe this guy was still in prison and someone else just took the name? :) (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	bariman1987 2009-09-28 09:59 pm UTC (link)
	That would be strange to go through. I mean, imagine being this guy, in your cell, and the guards run up to you to see if you're okay. They tell you that someone going by your old supervillain ID has just been murdered. It'd make you want to stay in prison even longer, wouldn't it? (Reply to this) (Parent)

	brandiweed.livejournal.com 2009-09-28 03:02 am UTC (link)
	Eh, just another case of a story that utterly fails to live up to its cover (see also Incredible Hulk #49, Marc 2003). (Reply to this) (Thread)

	aaron_bourque 2009-09-28 03:21 am UTC (link)
	another case of a story that utterly fails to live up to its cover Isn't that generally a given, especially with Brian Bolland doing the covers? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	brandiweed.livejournal.com 2009-09-28 11:21 am UTC (link)
	So that was Bolland, huh? Didn't recognize it for some reason (and yes, I was too busy looking at the picture to look at the signature), even though the use of hatching is definitely his. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	lucky_sometimes 2009-09-28 03:08 am UTC (link)
	Is this every single page in the issue? (Reply to this) (Thread)

	xdoop 2009-09-28 03:12 am UTC (link)
	No. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

lucky_sometimes
2009-09-28 03:18 am UTC (link)

OK, it's not, since I just glanced back through the issues. However, it does violate this rule I'd say:

No more than one third the length of any single work should be posted on this community. In layman's terms, work refers to a story or chapter within a single issue or book. That's 7 pages of a standard American comic.We will love you forever if you indicate to us the exact length of a comic if you're posting more than 7 pages from one that's longer than 22 pages, so we don't need to bug you about it.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	xdoop 2009-09-28 03:22 am UTC (link)
	Several of the pages are cropped. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	lucky_sometimes 2009-09-28 03:24 am UTC (link)
	That's kinda ridiculous as justification goes. Are the rules THAT HARD to stick to? (Reply to this) (Parent)

	aaron_bourque 2009-09-28 03:27 am UTC (link)
	Yeah, but those cropped pages still add up. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	aaron_bourque 2009-09-28 03:26 am UTC (link)
	Yeah, it looks like it's at least 3 pages too many. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	xdoop 2009-09-28 03:33 am UTC (link)
	Okay, I've removed some more pages. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	xdoop 2009-09-28 03:44 am UTC (link)
	Also, thanks for not being a dick about it. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	psychop_rex 2009-09-28 06:24 am UTC (link)
	I love the Spook's 'Eep!' look on the cover there. (Reply to this)

	kusonaga 2009-09-28 06:32 am UTC (link)
	I definitely would've preferred a genuine rehabilitation. Now it's kind of meh. (Reply to this)

	runespoor7 2009-09-28 09:19 am UTC (link)
	"You intend to prevent the crime before it happens this time." Dear Beatty: Please don't write Cass like that. (Reply to this)

	jedd_the_jedi 2009-09-28 10:07 am UTC (link)
	I love the Bat-folks enjoying their cupcakes and donuts, and Alfred disapproving! Get ready for that perfect figure to go south. That, and the Bolland cover will give me nightmares for a while. It does help that I recently met Bolland and got his autograph. There, I had to boast about it. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	bariman1987 2009-09-28 10:01 pm UTC (link)
	Alfred's cupcakes and donuts contain no calories what-so-ever, and furthermore are highly nutritious. Because he's Alfred. I was thinking Cass was the scariest one on the cover, until I realized she looked like the tabloid Bat-boy. Then she became the funniest one on the cover. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	bruinsfan 2009-09-28 09:39 pm UTC (link)
	At first glance the image outside the cut looked to be the Spectre cowering in fear before the Bat-Family, and my immediate thought was "Y'know, they're not quite THAT intimidating..." (Reply to this) (Thread)

	ashtoreth 2009-09-29 04:00 am UTC (link)
	LOL Motto. I looked at the white skin, green hood and short gloves and went "That's Spectre! WTH.." (Reply to this) (Parent)