The Brave and The Bold #3 Review

The Revolution hasn’t bothered to review the first two issues of The Brave and The Bold. Since I don’t have the time to review every new comic book that arrives at the Bunker, I usually reserve reviews for issues that either make a real positive or real negative reaction on me. The Brave and The Bold has failed to do either. It has been a resoundingly average read. I just haven’t found much to say about it.

That all changes with The Brave and The Bold #3. Why? Because we get the appearance of the classic Legion of Super Heroes villains, the Fatal Five! Yeah, that’s right, the Fatal Five is back. Yet another appearance of characters from the Levitz Era Legion. We have yet to see the Fatal Five in the latest reboot version of the Legion of Super Heroes. The Brave and The Bold #3 should be a fun read. Let’s hit this review.

Creative Team
Writer: Mark Waid
Penciler: George Perez
Inker: Bob Wiacek

Art Rating: 8 Night Girls out of 10
Story Rating: 7 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 7.5 Night Girls out of 10

Synopsis: We begin with, Batman and Blue Beetle outside of El Paso, Texas and stuck in a blizzard. Batman comments that they walked into an ambush and Neferto hit them with this localized blizzard. Batman and Blue Beetle escape the blizzard.

Batman comments that the weapon Neferto used is called the Haruspex which alters probability to maximize the odds of a kill. Blue Beetle then uses his armor to search for the weapon. Unfortunately, a Blue Beetle cannot find the Haruspex. Batman tells Blue Beetle to calm down. And that he has a plan.

We cut to Batman chasing down a thug in an alley way. Batman tells the thug that he knows the thug buys and sells exotic weapons. Batman wants information on an alien who brought a weapon into town tonight. Batman wants to know who is buying the weapon. Suddenly, Blue Beetle realizes that he thinks he knows where the weapon is.

We see Supergirl in a sleazy bar looking for a navigator to help her find Green Lantern. One of the men in the bar tells Supergirl that the best navigator in the universe is Lobo. And that he is currently about to be executed in the town square. We shift to the public execution and Supergirl suddenly streaks in and saves Lobo. Supergirl asks Lobo if he will help our track down Green Lantern.

We shift back to Batman and Blue Beetle outside the home of a local crime lord known as La Dama. Inside the home we see Neferto negotiating with La Dama for the sale off the Haruspex. Neferto wants to exchange the weapon for something teleportational nature since he is currently stranded on Earth.

Suddenly, a gateway opens up in the room and out steps The Lord of Time. He says that he has traveled a hundred centuries in order to claim the Haruspex as his own. La Dama calls all her thoughts to her side and tells the Lord of time they she will not surrender the web been. The Lord of Time then summons the Fatal Five from the 31st century.

Batman and Blue Beetle then enter the scene and begin brawling with the fatal five. Batman knocks out the Lord of Time. The Lord of Time’s armor then automatically transports him back to his own era in order to heal. This strands of the Fatal Five in our present time. Tharok angrily exclaims that this was not part of the deal. We see La Dama pointing the Haruspex at Tharok and Batman. There is a large explosion in when Blue Beetle looks up he sees that Batman has been fused together with Tharok. End of issue.

Comments
The Good: The Brave and The Bold #3 provided just enough action to keep the reader from being bored by the generic storyline. Waid crafts solid dialogue. I’m not thrilled with how he writes Batman, but I love the chemistry that Waid creates between Batman and Blue Beetle. Blue Beetle is totally awe struck by Batman and that leads to some pretty humorous dialogue.

Waid does a nice job with Blue Beetle. His nervousness around Batman is so realistic for how a young teenager would act who finds himself suddenly teaming up with one of the greatest heroes in the DCU. I actually enjoyed Blue Beetle in this issue. And that surprised me since I was completely unimpressed with Blue Beetle’s solo title.

Of course, the appearance of the Fatal Five is what got me all excited about this issue. I am thrilled to see all these appearances across this new DCU of Legion characters in their pre-Crisis on Infinite Earth incarnations. All of this continues to fuel my hope that DC may be positioning the return of the Levitz Era Legion. I would be beyond thrilled.

It was cool to see the real Fatal Five back in action once again. They are a powerhouse team that is more than a match for any group of heroes. Plus, they have seriously nasty attitudes that make them even more of a threat. If nothing else, we are in store for plenty of good action as long as the Fatal Five remain in this storyline.

Waid delivers a great hook ending with the merging of Batman and Tharok. That is definitely enough to get me excited about reading the next issue.

I also dig this new format for this newest incarnation of the Brave and the Bold as compared to the format for the original Brave and the Bold. The original format consisted of having just two characters teamed up for a complete story arc and then continually changing the two characters that are teamed up for each story arc.

This new format has numerous heroes pairing up together in one large story arc and then going back and forth between the pairs of heroes with each issue. This new format brings in more heroes and makes the stories larger in scope. The more variety the better in my opinion.

The Bad: The Brave and The Bold #3 was a solid but not spectacular read. Honestly, if it wasn’t for the appearance of the Fatal Five this issue would have only scored 5 out of 10 Night Girls.

I am neutral on this current story arc. The storyline itself that Waid has spun on this title is decidedly average. It comes across like your standard comic book story and lacks any type of originality that hooks you into the story.

Waid’s Batman was way too friendly for my tastes. I’m not saying that Batman has to be a raging asshole like over in All Star Batman, but what we got in this issue was way too nice. I felt like Batman was going to ask Blue Beetle to spend the night in the Batcave for a night of painting their toenails while watching Hilary Duff in “A Cinderella Story.” Personally, I prefer my Batman with a bit of a dick-ish, egotistical and arrogant attitude.

The Brave and The Bold suffers from too many characters that I just don’t like. I am not a fan of Blue Beetle, Supergirl or Lobo. And we get all three of them in this issue. My dislike for Supergirl is well documented so I’m not going to rehash that in this review.

I still completely resent this new Blue Beetle because I am a huge fan of Ted Kord. And it is too bad because Blue Beetle is one of mi gente. Unfortunately, the resentment of DC killing off Ted Kord is too much for me to work through to enjoy one of the rare male Hispanic characters in the DCU.

And Lobo is a character I have never liked. He is a pathetic ‘90’s character that quite honestly should have been left in the 1990’s. He is a lame one-dimensional character that adds nothing interesting to a story. And it is interesting how this “all new” “all different” Lobo that DC promised we were going to get in this new DCU is pretty much the same boring and dull Lobo as before.

Overall: Brave and the Bold #3 was an average issue that got me excited simply because of the appearance of the pre-Crisis Fatal Five. That alone was enough to get me to purchase this issue. I can’t say that Brave and the Bold is anything interesting enough to recommend it to anyone other than die-hard Legion fans or a reader that is a huge fan of any of the characters in this storyline.