A Baby Seat for Katana

Batman and the Outsiders #10 - Pages 13-16
So it was all up to Halo to follow New-Wave and Matches Malone to the secret disused oil rig off shore from Gotham, using her distortion aura to not get seen. The aura basically acts like a mirage and makes the viewer see her in the wrong spot. Some kind of diffraction.Oh but I'm wrong! If she can shunt her image to the bottom of the sea where no one can see her, then the aura makes her invisible while simultaneously creating a copy of her image elsewhere, independent of the viewer. Doesn't seem very intuitive, does it? Why not just use it to make yourself invisible and damn the secondary image? Answer: Halo. And to make matters more Halo-ish, her power's probably on a time limit.
Maybe if you didn't think your thoughts so loudly your echo at the sea bottom can hear them, you'd have enough energy to maintain the illusion. Or is because you can't cast illusions and fly at the same time?
I wonder: Would Batman really make himself puke to keep his undercover identity going? I bet he would. Just a little stunt puke. I bet he actually ate something Matches would eat just in case someone examined his "groceries". He never gets the chance, sadly. At least it seems Batman works with law enforcement at higher levels than the GCPD:
Of course, it seems to me the best reason to base yourself on an oil rig is that it might be in international waters where the Attorney General can't get to you. But Batman knows better than I do. About that, if not about fashion.
Oh Mike Barr dialog, why am I always having to interpret you? Is Matches saying he wishes his suit was actually ruined (which would echo my thoughts exactly), or that he wishes New-Wave was actually cared about ruining his suit (still flirting, Bruce?), or that he wishes she was broken up, as in dismembered, for doing that (tough guy talk if only you can understand it)?

Meanwhile, Halo makes it but just barely. And she's having her own fashion malfunction.
Later panels will show she's still cloaking her presence, which I guess is why her bum's all a-glitter, so she's not actually resting, is she? And it would seem that it was FLYING that was actually hard on her. You know, the thing she does all the time.

Let's move our point of view inside a door now...
Coldsnap is in the Indigo Tribe! And I bet Heatstroke is a Star Sapphire. No wait, that clumsy onomatopoeia just gave me a Geoff Johns flash-forward. Ah, it's time for Black Lightning's execution, and there's something keeping the Sheltons from backing out of it (Mike Barr, presumably). Mr. Shelton vows to do whatever his wife does, and he's already started with a game of mirrors. He DOES know that's how he got into this murder conspiracy in the first place, right? Maybe Marcia's not the best person to emulate.

Ready for the show?
No, Steve Lightle, not THAT show. We mean the execution! But there's a spectator missing!
Again I question these assassins' methods and convictions. New-Wave is obviously trying to harden her kid sister who doesn't like killing, but that sort of shows why the Masters of Disaster work the way they do. What if they were asked to do a clean hit on the street, you know, like MOST hit jobs? Would Windfall prove a problem? The Masters of Disaster - we'll do it in a convoluted way that can't be traced back to you, except we'll force you to watch, so you'll be right there when the cops/superheroes come to arrest us all. Great slogan. Speaking of the cavalry...
Will the Outsiders arrive before Black Lightning commits suicide like he's apparently wanted to do for months? And if they don't, can Batman take a room-full of supervillains, the same villains who beat his entire team first time around? Well, probably, as the Outsiders are often more in his way than helpful. Point of fact: All Halo had to do was sit down invisibly and wait for the others to arrive.
Damn fool's gone and gotten herself discovered because she's "resting" by using the two powers that taxed her out in the first place. It's the Outsiders to the rescue, Halo's "mother" arriving in a... baby seat?
Considering that Metamorpho has turned himself into flying platforms, this is pretty ridiculous. Probably one of Batman's imposed tactics, just to piss that uppity Geo-Force off. Yoked like a bull as a small Asian woman tells him to TRACK QUICKER! BECAUSE HALO'S GONNA DIIIIIIIEEE!!!
Or not. She can take care of herself. Even without her team's confidence to back her up. In any case, who has any more confidence in GF, Rex and Katana? Better call in the real MVP - Katana's talking sword!
I can better explain talking, divining swords than I can the fact it can never slice through anything. Oh, I suppose that's Geo-Force's punching. Not at all where the water tank is. When they were supposed to be directly below him. Ah well. Take a rest, Stormbringer.

When there's something strange - like gritty urban heroes who give themselves up to assassins who take forever to kill him - in your neighborhood, who you gonna call?
HERO SHOT! Love Rex as the Drill Sergeant (I can't believe that name was never used in Dial H for Hero), and GF has a strong heroic pose (cognitive dissonance!), but how the hell is Katana holding her sword? Not that it matters because she won't cut anything with it.

Tomorrow: Katana doesn't cut anything.

Comments

Austin Gorton said…
Would Batman really make himself puke to keep his undercover identity going? I bet he would.

Absolutely. Dude doesn't do anything halfway (other than assemble his own team of heroes, of course).

And it would seem that it was FLYING that was actually hard on her. You know, the thing she does all the time.

Maybe it was all the underwater flying, er, swimming that tired her out?
Siskoid said…
Maybe she gets double tired because he projection is flying below her and she thinks, yeah, I must be doing twice the work!