Detective Comics #763

Posted: Saturday, October 20
By: Ray Tate

"La Cucilla"

Writer: Greg Rucka
Artist: Sean Martinborough(p), Jesse Delperdang(i)
Publisher: DC

Plot: The curse of Chuck Dixon Strikes Again!

Detective Comics cannot blame all it's problems on "Last Laugh." Though, the reader can lay the onus of blame on Chuck Dixon and his loyal follower Greg Rucka.

Helena Wayne despite Hypertime allegedly allowing for stories featuring earth-two heroes and indeed an earth-two does not appear. We're stuck with the Chuck Dixon version of Huntress, who is the most generic and worthless of characters in comic books today. Consider that the post-Crisis character had her own comic book, and that in that comic book, she was a competent and capable crimefighter. Consider that Ty Templeton in the Justice League portrayed her as a hero worth the title. Consider that Doug Moench and Paul Gulacy, portrayed her plausibly as Batman's guardian angel in Batman vs. Predator II not to mention convincingly generated a sexual tension between the two. Now, contrast Dixon's two-dimensional hussy to those Huntresses, not even the Huntress or Grant Morrison's Huntress, and you can see blatantly what is lacking.

Upon seeing a jokerized knife-thrower, Generic Woman is pinned to a box. Does she immediately realize her cape is cloth, or does she go for her generic darts: the better to give them up to a person skilled with sharp, pointy objects? Does Huntress thank or welcome the help of Sasha (Dyna Girl who has grown away from her role as Electra Woman's sidekick), or does she drop her tights to show off her wrinklies? Whoever thought such machismo could possibly radiate from a character without the equipment? Does Huntress talk about Batman with the respect that is his due? Does she remember working side-by-side with him in various incarnations of the JLA? Does she remember he and she colluding a workable solution to a young bomb vigilante? Does she remember when he entrusted Gotham City to her care during an Ebola plague? Or does she hate him as much as he hates her for no other reason than she being a woman? Does Huntress distinguish between her prey like she did when rather than see him go to jail she "adopted" the young bomb vigilante, or does she lump them all into one handy category to perforate? Is Huntress correct in her actions? Has she ever been? Huntress is far more experienced, not even counting the former incarnation, yet she is still proven wrong by an upstart.

Stupid, shallow and inept, Generic Woman has all the impact of confetti, and Mr. Rucka seems to be using her for no other reason but to showcase what a great gal is Dyna Girl. She isn't that great. Her mantra of "just wanting to protect people" wears thin on the nerves, and she sorely needs more depth. What kind of music does she like? What's her favorite color? Not that you can tell with the near black-and-white look to the book. What food does she appreciate? What is her history?

What's good about the book? The artwork by Sean Martinborough. The characters are strikingly animated and show more emotional depth than is given in the dialogue and narration. In fact, this is another book, that demands White-Out and your own creative thought balloons.

In the back up feature, Judd Winick and Cliff Chiang introduce readers to Josie Mac: an interesting Missing Persons detective. It's nice for a change to see a strong, likable, intact female character in the DCU. She actually has more history than Dyna-Girl, the nominal star of the book, and it's an engrossing history that allows readers to connect to her. Despite the artwork and the back-up feature, I wouldn't recommend Detective Comics even if Sasha and Huntress made out it in it.