Babs apparently suffered a severe, traumatic blow to the Genre Savvy here, though I guess I can't blame her for not figuring out the mystery when the plot itself clearly has so little idea what the hell it's doing or even talking about.
It has been so long since I've read a story where Babs works with someone who doesn't know her identity that it feels weird to see the line drawn again.
Shocked me too, but I dug the hell out of it. Incautious open-to-the-world Oracle drives me nuts. It's OOC with Babs as she should be and dramatically reduces the significance of her relationships with Hel and Dinah and Zinda.
Though I'm not a fan of the vague but steadily accumulating suggestions that Jim doesn't know the Oracle identity anymore (her whining about Batman getting the credit here, the interaction before Hal showed up in Blackest Night, the shitfest of an Oracle mini, etc etc). His "she's an informant of sorts" at the end would tend to reinforce that he does know, at least, but I dunno, the general aggregate of opposing evidence is troublesome.
Regardless, though, I like the use of Looker here, it's an on-point, intelligent, very Babs-standard methodology, shows her back to high-functioning highly-effective basics and emphasizes the notoriety and pull of Oracle in the cape community.
Anyone know where this might pick up?
My guess is this is an attempt to set up a new rogue for the BATGIRL title. It'll need some, and seems to be Barbara's title as much as Steph's.