I hate Palmiotti and Gray’s writing. I mock them every time I look through Previews. So damned if I know what I’ll do now one of their comics has made me tear up, has ruined my day, effectively kicked me in the stomach to the point I want to crawl up in the fetal position.

Clearly, the reason this issue of Jonah Hex succeeds is Darwyn Cooke’s artwork. No way anyone else could have made this story so affecting.

I should want to read more of their issues, just in case I’m missing something, but I don’t think anything can really top this issue. In just one issue, they fit in about as much tragedy as occurs in Hamlet.

It’s not particularly thoughtful tragedy, or brilliantly plotted tragedy, but it’s real effective and all because of Cooke. It’s haunting, in fact.

Though the cover doesn’t do the interior content justice.

I do love this issue for Robin calling the flamboyantly gay South American toreador gay. Or whatever Morrison named his second original villain for the series.

The rest?

Not wild about it.

Batman and Robin get their butts kicked, again. Morrison gets in some meta-textual references to Jason Todd’s resurrection (nothing about Bucky though) as it compares to the soon-to-be resurrected Bruce Wayne. It’s not particularly useful and is painfully obvious.

I’m also a little confused about Robin heading back to a Lazarus pit for his medical treatment (he got shot five times in the back). If he can just get resurrected over and over, what’s the point in putting him in dangerous situations?

And if Tan’s art was bad before, it’s really awful this time. It was so ugly I had to check the credits, because it’s beyond the banal mainstream he’d done the last issues.

Ok, what? I’m a little groggy or whatever, but why can Jason Todd’s untrained sidekick beat up Damian? Wasn’t he trained by the League of Assassins? It just seems silly.

This issue is the first one in the series where it doesn’t feel like Morrison’s got a hold of what he’s doing–Batman and Robin is supposed to be a quality mainstream book. With the Tan art, it feels mainstream all right, but there’s not so much in the way of quality. The writing’s fine, but it’s all soulless.

Take, for example, the Jason Todd and sidekick breather scene. What does Jason Todd look like out of costume? Some broken down bad guy. Morrison portrays him as completely nuts, the sidekick too, which makes them really boring when it becomes to the dramatics. The Penguin’s far more interesting….

Having the Red Hood be internet-savvy doesn’t make everything all right.

Philip Tan’s an interesting choice for Batman and Robin. He’s absent any personality, which actually doesn’t hurt the book during the Red Hood’s scenes. Morrison’s characterization of Jason Todd is as a complete nutjob lamer, which works pretty well. He also seems like he’s ready to get creepy with his underage sidekick.

There are two excellent things in this issue. First is Dick Grayson trying to play Bruce Wayne at a charity function. It’s endearing and entertaining (though I wish Morrison had let Damian a little more lose amongst the society types). The second thing is Batman and Robin on stakeout together. Again, endearing and entertaining, without losing the edge Morrison’s established for the series.

The rest of the issue is either action, crime boss talk (which offers some hints at the first arc’s secret villain) and the Red Hood. Those scenes don’t matter too much. They’re epical, not sublime.

This issue’s strange. Not strange creepy, strange it doesn’t fit the first two. It’s like Morrison realized he wasn’t going to have Quitely forever and so he better get some things done. More happens in the third issue than happens in the first two (times two). Damian doesn’t just form an emotional attachment to a victim, he also realizes Dick’s going to look out for him. So there’s a partnership developing there.

More, Morrison manages to “wrap up” his whole Professor Pyg thing in one issue. There’s the “real” origin, the origin the Pyg tells Robin about when he’s doing the James Bond villain thing and the Pyg’s defeat in the end.

It’s also got Dick borrowing from Damian (in the roughness he goes after a suspect) and Damian borrowing from Dick (none of Damian’s attacks are vicious this issue).

Morrison’s using the superhero comic medium to full potential here.

Reading this arc–I know, I know, the circus stuff makes it perfectly suited for Dick Grayson–I can’t help but think of Batman Returns and the evil circus in it.

Again, this issue is Morrison decompressed. Seeing Quitely do an extended action sequence–the issue is basically just the action scene, with some bookends with Dick and Alfred discussing the state of things (after the first night out)–is odd. I only know him from his Superman work with Morrison and that book, while it did have a lot of action, was also heavy on the iconography. Batman and Robin is not. It’s a mix of a lot of things and there’s something magical about seeing someone with Quitely’s deliberate, realistic to the point of it being unattractive, lines do a superhero book.

Morrison’s staying pretty mainstream here. No metaphors, no real homage (past the cover). Just good writing.

How can Morrison infuse so much humor, so much idealism, in such a nasty story? The book’s full of that buoyant Dick Grayson positivity, which is what makes his scenes with Damian so funny, but it’s juxtaposed with the serious negativity of the Pyg story.

See, the issue opens with the Toad and his threats and the Toad’s funny and nearly cute. When the Pyg shows up at the end with his zombie-masked people, it’s a definite departure from what one might expect. It’s rough, whereas the scenes between the Bat-Family are cute–I mean, Damian treating Alfred like a servant? It’s hilarious.

Batman and Robin is also decompressed Grant Morrison. There’s not a lot of talking, there’s a whole bunch of big panels and full-page spreads. It’s a commercial comic book to be sure, but a subversive one. Besides the Quitely art in general, I mean.

Moench leaves his Batman subplot unresolved. He still is getting less and less frightening to criminals. Soon he’ll be on cereal boxes and underwear. This inevitably is another thing Moench could have concentrated on, but did not. I like Moench and I like his writing, but the way he leaves this issue, like he’s going to turn around and continue the subplot… Unseen’s a problematic limited series. It’s written like a (lengthy) story arc in an ongoing series. It raises expectations then lets them dangle in the wind.

Some fun elements, however, include Batman fighting in his cowl and nothing else, dangling in the wind himself, though no one ever draws attention to it. Of course, Moench’s Batman has apparently never heard of infrared goggles–the solution to “seeing” the invisible man is lame and complicated, when infrared (which Batman has, right?) would have solved the whole problem.

But decent.

Moench’s all-too human Batman runs into more problems this issue, which is an all action Kelley Jones issue and needs to be seen to be believed. Moench’s invisible man character is so totally unhinged, so totally insane (I forgot to mention the issue before, when he decapitates an ex-girlfriend–DC doesn’t do age warnings?), he doesn’t really fit as a Batman villain. He’s way too dangerous. The Black Mask (didn’t he feed a woman some of her husband or something in Catwoman) comes across as less dangerous.

This approach to the villain could, potentially, offer for some good material, but Batman’s seemingly unaware of this particular criminal’s viciousness, at least as compared to Batman’s regular villains.

It’s a decent issue–some great art–but Unseen is definitely never going to rise above being a time-passer. Just like most of the Legends of the Dark Knight stories.

Unfortunately.

Here’s one of those “it just don’t make sense” moments. Batman versus the invisible man and Batman can’t take him in a fight. I thought Batman was a ninja and can’t ninjas fight in the dark (look at Daredevil)? Moench’s take on the character emphasizes detection over martial arts ability and, while it works in terms of providing an interesting read, it makes the Batman-oriented fight scenes awkward. Is Unseen supposed to be some kind of pre-1990s Batman Elseworlds, before all the paramilitary nonsense?

Probably not. Moench was probably just trying to it some dramatic oomph; he’s the goddamn Batman after all, he’s supposed to be able to defeat anyone.

Still, the series is hitting its stride. There is a disconnect, however, in the Bruce Wayne scene. Jones makes it excessively creepy (hulking Wayne, cowering subordinate), not matching Moench’s script at all.

Two issues left seems too many.