Nightwing’s return to Bludhaven has not been the welcoming Batman’s former protégé was expecting. Instead rediscovering who Dick Grayson is, so far all Nightwing has found is yet another place filled with corruption that he has become the center of. This new story arc in Bludhaven has been an interesting look at where Nightwing is in his life as he has a lot of similarities with the crew made up of former villains. The last issue moved the story forward by making things personal for Nightwing and having him become the center of the city’s new direction. Can Nightwing find the life he was looking for in Bludhaven? Let’s find out with Nightwing #12.
Writer: Tim Seeley
Artist: Marcus To
Colorist: Chris Sotomayor
Story Rating: 6 Night Girls out of 10
Art Rating: 8 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 7 Night Girls out of 10
Synopsis: In Ravenswood Heights, while investigating a crime scene a police officer asks Detective Svoboda if Nightwing will be taking their jobs. The detective says that Nightwing can’t even stop a little graffiti.
A little bit later, Nightwing surprises Detective Svobodai at the crime scene with Robert Chapman’s dead body in the middle of a room. The detective says that all the clues point to Shawn being the person responsible given her past. She goes on to say that is all she needs to convict Shawn.
Nightwing tells the detective that not everything is so black and white. He goes on to tell her that if she looks harder she’ll see that something is not right with the crime scene.
Nightwing leaves the crime scene. As he travels through the city Nightwing thinks about how this trip to Bludhaven was supposed to be about rediscovering himself but now he is set on proving Shawn and Gorilla Grimm’s innocence.
Nightwing visit Jimmy Nice’s place. Nightwing tells Jimmy about the police arresting Shawn in order to question her about a recent crime. He goes on to say that he needs Jimmy’s help as the Run-Offs are being set-up to be arrested one-by-one.
Jimmy agrees to have Nightwing join the next Run-Offs meeting.
Jimmy then reveals his own backstory to Nightwing. Jimmy explains that he used to be addicted to drugs and alcohol. His addiction led him to lose control of his car six years ago with his girlfriend inside. His girlfriend died in the crash and while he got off on a technicality Jimmy knew he was responsible for her death.
Jimmy then says that he knows that he knows that Nightwing is conflicted as to whether the Run-Offs are innocent or if he wants them to be innocent.
Nightwing explains how back in his Robin days he learned how to read people in a way Batman didn’t through their faces and movements. Through these skills he was able to tell from how Shawn was acting that she had faith in him.
Jimmy agrees to help however he can but that Run-Offs will either see Nightwing as someone to be afraid of or hate. Nightwing understands that but still needs to meet with them.
The next day Dick Grayson is training some kids in gymnastics at The Haven Community Center. After seeing his students off Cherry Annable meets with Dick. She mentions how she knows that Dick is Bruce Wayne’s ward and was wondering if Bruce would donate some money to Bludhaven, since it’s not too different from Gotham City.
Cherry mentions that the community center he works for was being run by a criminal. Dick tells Cherry that Shawn was innocent and that the kids were never in danger. Cherry tells Dick that it’s not about the kids being safe but the parents and kids feeling safe, which is what she is working on doing.
Dick asks Cherry if she got Nightwing’s permission to use him in her ads for the city. Cherry says that Nightwing is an illegal vigilante so she did nothing wrong but she would offer him a job if he came to her office.
Later that night Nightwing meets with the Run-Offs. Nightwing asks the Run-Offs to tell him everything they know about the current “conspiracy” going on in Bludhaven. Mouse mentions that Jimmy told them that they should shift the blame when they do something wrong. Jimmy says it’s okay and they should share their information with Nightwing.
Mouse, Stallion, Giz and Thrill Devil reveal that Paulie Paterno, Bob Chapman and Carter Forsyth approached Gorilla Grimm about a job they wanted him to do for them. They go on to say that the deal involved The Second Hand, a group known for specializing alien weapons to fight superheroes. Gorilla Grimm turned the job down which led to the businessmen to blame each other for missing shipments.
Stallion mentions that he recently got a similar job offer from Forsyth but also turned it down.
Nightwing pieces all the information together and decides to go see Forsyth at the Marcus Casino for more answers. The Run-Offs tell Nightwing that they are going to go with him as it is their group’s business as well to help their own.
At the Marcus Casino, Forsyth and his assistant are packing up to leave the city. Stallion breaks in with Nightwing and the Run-Offs right behind him. Nightwing questions Forsyth about Paterno and Chapman’s recent deaths. Forsyth says he is leaving the city because he believes he is the next one to be killed.
Someone suddenly knocks Nightwing and the Run-Off’s down from out of nowhere. The person grabs Nightwing and it is revealed to be The Orca.
Nightwing quickly escapes The Orca’s grasp and dodgers her attacks. As he does this Nightwing thinks about who The Orca is, her real name is Grace Balin and she used to be marine biologist who spliced her DNA with a killer whale to repair a spinal cord injury. He doesn’t get to much time to think though as The Orca’s gang surrounds him.
The Run-Offs join Nightwing to help him fight Orca and her gang. While the Nightwing and the Run-Offs are able to take care of the gang, Orca alone is able to overpower them all. Nightwing ends up having to use his own body to defend the Run-Offs against Orca’s attacks. Before Nightwing passes out Giz uses his squirrel helper to attach a device that severely hurts Orca.
While the Run-Offs thank Nightwing, Orca says she was just trying to make her new friends happy. She then reveals that her gang was just a distraction for the ones really after Forsyth.
Elsewhere, Forsyth is being chased by someone on a motorcycle. The person on the motorcycle is shown to be part of the False Face Society and attacks Forsyth. End of issue.
The Good: Nightwing’s search for a place to call his own has hit a wall that is stopping both the character and series from moving forward. This is not a completely bad thing as it was to be expected with this journey of self-discovery Nightwing is on. To his credit, Tim Seeley continues to make you as a reader want to find out what happens next in Dick Grayson life. Unfortunately with Nightwing #12 the main focus of this first story in Bludhaven is turning out to be the weakest part.
The strength of this series continues to be Dick Grayson himself. Both in and out of the Nightwing identity, Seeley continues to show his great understanding of who Dick Grayson is at the moment. That understanding comes through every page as Seeley gets us to identify with the sense of being lost Dick is going through at this point in his life.
Using his recent past in having assumed several roles has added to the character’s confusion of who Dick Grayson really is. This is nicely highlighted by Nightwing’s interaction with Jimmy, in which we learn about the latter’s backstory. The scene between the two was a much stronger than Nightwing’s interaction with Shawn Tsang in the last issue. Because unlike his interaction with Shawn, which was more to develop her as love interest, we actually got to focus just on who Jimmy is as a person. In turn this makes Jimmy a character that you want to see Nightwing help become a better person and be friends with.
This heart to heart with Jimmy was balanced out the rough interactions Dick had with Cherry Annabel and Detective Svobodai. These two interactions did a lot more to build Nightwing’s connection to Bludhaven than the final battle scene. With both Cherry and the detective we got a clear understanding of where Nightwing stands in the city on several different levels. In doing so Seeley is able to build intriguing long-term sub-plots for this series as Nightwing establishes his home in the city.
Marcus To continues to provide some great looking artwork. With this being the first issue in this Bludhaven arc that we had a big action set piece To was more than up to the task in drawing it all. While most of the focus in the big fight scene involving The Orca focused on Nightwing, To made sure to show us the different skills the members of the Run-Offs have. He was also able to effectively make all of the talking head scenes we got for the first two-thirds of the issue fun to follow. The brighter colors that Chris Sotomayor employs helps this series continue to separate itself from the darker tone most Batman books take with their artwork.
The Bad: While Jimmy Nice and some of Shawn Tseng’s backstories have provided added depth to the “Bludhaven” arc I am starting to get annoyed with how much time we are spending with the Run-Offs. With the amount of members in the group it would have been better if Nightwing didn’t become so directly involved with the group that he ended up teaming up with all of them immediately.
There should’ve been a much more slow burn approach for these former villains so that we can get behind each of them over time. Unfortunately, like Shawn, they are all coming off less interesting because their development in this series and relationship with Nightwing is being rushed.
His team-up with the Run-Offs isn’t helping Nightwing either. Even though we saw an example of his detective skills earlier in the issue Nightwing looked unprepared with everything that happened later on in the issue. There were small mistakes that Nightwing was making the made him look unexperienced when fighting the Orca. It was also odd to read some of Nightwing’s quip as a thought rather than something he says outloud. Those quips are what makes Nightwing a fun character to see fight compared to other members of the Batman Family.
Overall: Nightwing #12 did its job in moving this “Bludhaven” arc forward on several fronts. It’s in these instances where Tim Seeley focuses on the multiple plotlines he has involved Nightwing in that this series continues to shine. Unfortunately the Run-Offs’ part of the story is starting to show itself to be the weakest part of this arc. Luckily Marcus To’s energetic art style is able to lift up the weaker parts of Nightwing #12. Hopefully the next chapter of this arc is able to focus on the strengths of the story, something I’m confident Tim Seeley can do.
