DC REBIRTH Month 17, Part 1

ACTION COMICS #989 by Dan Jurgens and Viktor Bogdanovic, Jor-El shows his son all the ills in the world, including a country about to fire chemical weapons on the rebels, which causes the Man of Steel to head there and stop them. Meanwhile, an agent of Oz has started shooting up the Daily Planet to convince them to stop printing what he calls "fake news". Lois convinces him that she will write an article that he is dictating to tell “the truth”. When she finishes, he attempts to blow up the building and Superman shows up to stop him by tossing him out the window. The terrorist blows up, but Lis and the Planet is safe. In the end, Jor-El tries to convince Jon to come with him to a new planet where everyone has super powers.

ACTION COMICS #990 by Dan Jurgens and Viktor Bogdanovic. Superman continues his battle to try and settle the war in Logamba, which he does by gathering up all their weapons and destroying them. Back at the Fortress of Solitude, Jor-El continues to try and convince Jon that he and the family need to leave Earth for his vision of a new Krypton. Superman arrives in Metropolis where Agents of Oz are trying to kill everyone in the city with a deadly gas. After taking them down, Jor-El arrives with Jon, who tries to convince his dad that leaving Earth IS the right thing to do.

ALL STAR BATMAN #14 by Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque, Rafael Scavone and Sebastion Fiumara. Batman is carted off by Briar and the Knight, but apparently Alfred shoots the plane down. He lands on an island, finds a banged-up Bruce but then has to fight the Knight, who is Briar’s son. Bruce helps distract the Knight and we learn is he has been created from Alfred’s leftover cells. In the end, the Knight slays his father and goes off as the new First Ally. In the backup, Batman faces off with Lady Vik, who ultimately kills her father. For killing her mother. She meets with Penguin and delivers the coordinates for the Genesis Engine.

AQUAMAN #29 by Dan Abnett and Stjepan Sejic. While Aquaman and Dolphin bond, Vulko and Ondine finally make their way forward with the help of one of the Shade, who leads them to the Treasury and they find the weapon they need. Meanwhile, Mera and Garth continue to fight with Loke and his followers. Garth gives Mera an amulet that allows her to pass through the Crown of Thorns. In the end, Krush arrives to tell Corum Rath that Aquaman is still alive and Commander Murk stabs him through the head.

BANE CONQUEST #6 by Chuck Dixon and Graham Nolan. After getting introduced to the Naja-Naja of Kobra, we see Bane and company taking one of the surviving members of the Triad hostage, looking for information. Since Bane and Kobra are in competition with each other, Dionysus devises a plan to kidnap Naja-Naja. They do, but that doesn’t mean Kobra knew this would happen and show up n the end to take their leader back.

BATGIRL #16 by Hope Larson and Chris Wildgoose. Back many years ago, Batgirl and Robin have a lengthy chat with the guys trying to allegedly kill her friend Ainsley. It turns out that Ainsley got addicted to the nanobots she had designed and ended up dying from it. Back in the present, Dick and Barbara tussle with the folks at the half-way house Ainsley was at and find they are all under the control of the Red Queen. After getting the situation under control, they discover the Ainsley’s sister Edith is the Red Queen, trying to avenge her sister’s death.

BATGIRL AND THE BIRDS OF PREY #15 by Julie Benson, Shawna Benson and Roge Antonio. A “super-flu” has hit Gotham, leaving the Comissioner in the hospital. But it has also hit Alfred, Batman and almost every man in Gotham, including villains. The team, with the addition of Harley Quinn, Catwoman.  Batwoman, Orphan, Spoiler and Gotham Girl, prepare to investigate. That’s when Wonder Woman shows up and joins in too.

BATMAN #32 by Tom King and Mikel Janin. Joker, Riddler and Batman all fight each other until Batman pulls out a knife and threatens to stab Riddler. Joker stops the blow with his hand, explaining “that’s funny”. The war ends and, back in the present, Bruce again proposes to Selina and she says yes.

BATMAN #33 by Tom King and Joelle Jones. Batman and Catwoman head through the desert to meet with King Tiger, who leads them into Khadym: a place that is off limits to the outside world. It is also where Talia Al Ghul is. Meanwhile, Alfred informs Dick, Jason, Damian and Duke about their “father’s” intentions with Selina to mixed reactions.

BATMAN THE DAWNBREAKER #1 by Sam Humphries and Ethan Van Sciver. In this DARK NIGHTS METAL tie-in, we see the death of Thomas and Martha Wayne as it happened on Earth-32.  Bruce is given e Green Lantern ring, transforms into a Green Lantern and kills Joe Chill. He then proceeds to go about being a vengeful vigilante, killing The Penguin, Scarecrow, Bullock and even Jim Gordon. The Guardians catch wind of it, and Bruce kills all of them, along with all the Corps. Becoming Batman The Dawnbreaker, he destroys the world and then is brought into the Dark Multiverse fold by the Batman Who Laughs. He travels to Coast City and attacks Hal Jordan, who is transported to safety by Dr. Fate, leaving Batman The Dawnbreaker to rule Coast City.

BATMAN THE DROWNED #1 by Dan Abnett and Phillip Tan. In this DARK NIGHTS METAL tie-in, we meet Bryce Wayne of Earth-11. As a defender, Bryce put on a costume when Aquawoman arrived to conquer the surface world. Bryce killed her leading to Atlantis submerging Gotham. Bryce performed surgery on herself and took some pills which allowed her to breathe underwater and also gave her super powers, allowing her to create a Dead Water army. She defeats Atlantis, but drowns her world in the process. She creates her own special Bat Signal to let the universe know she is in charge of Earth-11. The Dark Multiverse Batman Who Laughs arrives and sends her to drown Amnesty Bay. Aquaman and Mera fight her, resulting in Aquaman being wounded and Mera turned into a Dark Multiverse creature. Dr. Fate arrives and takes Aquaman away while Bryce lights her light to say she controls Amnesty Bay now.

BATMAN THE MERCILESS #1 by Peter J. Tomasi and Francis Manapul. A DARK NIGHTS METAL tie-in. Welcome to Earth-12, where Batman is seen holding the dead body of Wonder Woman. In return, he puts on an ancient helmet which totally corrupts him and he kills Ares along with anyone else who stands in his way. The Batman Who Laughs tells him about the Dark Multiverse and he heads to Langley where A.R.G.U.S., the D.E.O., Task Force X, Cadmus and the government have come together to seek a solution. General Lane drops a Valhalla bomb on Langley to try and stop the Merciless, who absorbs the bomb. In the end, we learn that Wonder Woman survived the battle with Ares and tried to remove the helmet. This only made the corrupt Batman mad and he killed her.

BATMAN BEYOND #13 by Bernard Chang. Batman has to shut off some switches in Gotham and tangles with Hacker and then Freon, who is convinced Batman killed her fiancé. Hacker and Shriek team up with Terry to stop Freon, just in time for Terry to go to the end of Matt's Tri-Ball game.

BATWOMAN #8 by Marguerite Bennett and Fernando Blanco. Kate has been captured and drugged by The Scarecrow and spends the issue having bad hallucinations. She eventually comes out of it and she and Colony Prime break free. The Scarecrow hits them with another toxin bomb and they hallucinate some more.

BLUE BEETLE #14 by Christopher Sebela and Scott Kolins. After watching a bad movie about an alien invasion, Jaime and his friends go on a cross-country road trip, to celebrate the fact he will soon graduate and get to work for Ted Kord. In the end, they four encounter real aliens and it’s up to Blue Beetle to stop them.

CYBORG #17 by John Semper Jr. and Will Conrad. Cyborg convinces his other world counterpart to give him the OTAC virus antidote, which they try on Exxy with positive results. The two head off to fight the two Anomalys, with Cyborg manipulating code to wipe this world’s Anomalys out. The Digiverse god, disguised as Blue, teleports our world’s Anomaly away. Back in our world, Anomaly's cybernetic followers arrive and threaten to kill all of humanity if they don’t produce their leader.

DARK NIGHTS METAL #3 by Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo. In Smallville, the Trinity, along with Lois, are watching Damian and Jon play guitars. But, with a cry of "Carpe Diem", Barbatos bursts forth from batman’s chest and battles all. In actuality, Superman and Wonder Woman are in Metropolis where it’s been turned to Hell on Earth by Barbatos.  Superman flies off to battles Barbatos in Gotham with little success and Flash arrives to take him to the Oblivion Bar. There we meet the Shadowpact, including Deective Chimp, as Kendra and Nightwing explain what has been happening in the spin-off titles. Green Arrow shows off the arrow he found that is made of Nth Metal. Superman deduces that Bruce’s Carpe Diem was a secret signal telling him he was in trouble, so, as the Dark Multiverse Batman and his Robins show up at the bar, where they kill Nightmaster, the heroes go to the points where the Nth Metal can be found. With the help of Cyborg, Superman crosses over to the Dark Multiverse, only to find out that he read Bruce’s warning wrong and this is really a trap.

DEATHSTROKE #24 by Written by: Christopher Priest and Diogenes Neves. Willow continues to look for Claire, but it looks like she may be falling into some kind of trap. Meanwhile, Wally is spending way too much time spying on Team Defiance. Kid Flash takes some fatherly advice from Deathstroke, even as he tries and often fails to be a kid hero. In the end, Deathstroke is kidnapped by the team that’s out to finish him off.

DETECTIVE COMICS #966 by James Tynion IV, Eddy Barrows and Eber Ferreira. After an intro in the Gotham City of the future, where Batman is an armed vigilante, we go back to Oz's Prison, where both Tims find themselves fighting Doomsday. Later, Future Tim explains how he became Batman, even going so far as to kill Damian when he was too out of control. He also explains that all that happens in the future is Batwoman’s fault. They escape Doomsday and head back to Gotham, where Future Tim tells our Tim to patch things up with Conner Kent, who doesn’t exist in this timeline anymore. Then he takes down our Tim and heads off to kill Batwoman.

DETECTIVE COMICS #967 by James Tynion IV and Alvaro Martinez. As Bruce continues to mourn Tim, Alfred receives Tim's distress signal and Bruce races to the hospital. Tim is revived, explains what has happened and tells him that Kate is going to be killed by Future Tim. Kate is meeting with Belle when she gets called to the Belfry and finds Tim alive. Meanwhile, as the team heads off to find Future Tim, we see that he is spying on Spoiler,  before he heads to Wayne Manor to see Alfred. The team arrives, just in time for Future Tim to activate Brother Eye.

THE FLASH #32 by Joshua Williamson and Christian Duce. We begin with Barry and Wally working together to take down Black Spider and his gang. Later, Barry and Kristen go to Iron Heights, where we see that the warden has no respect for them and even less for the prisoners. He especially hates The Flash. Meanwhile, Copperhead deals with failure by killing one of her men. In the end, Barry gets a surprise visit from Meena.

THE FLASH #33 by Joshua Williamson and Howard Porter. A DARK NIGHTS METAL tie-in. Following events in DARK NIGHTS METAL #3, the Justice League, with the exception of Flash and Steel, get sucked away by a Boom Tube and the Murder Machine and the Devastator arrive. After a bit of a fight, Barry runs to Central City, but ends up falling into the Darkness. All of the League end up in a Batcave battle against their respective Dark Knights.

GREEN ARROW #32 by Ben Percy, Joshua Williamson and Juan Ferreyra. A DARK NIGHTS METAL tie-in. Mr. Terrific teams up with the Gotham Resistance to take on the villains of the Dark Multiverse, even as Croc has been captured and begs to be killed. The team gets to Bane’s Sixth Ring and face off against the Dark Multiverse version of Damian, leading to our Damian accidentally getting shot by Green Arrow. But Damian uses that arrow to slay the Dark Multiverse Damian, revealing how the Nth Metal can kill these creatures. Dr. Fate shows up and spirits them all away to safety, even as Ollie proclaims that they now know the secret of how to kill the bad guys.

GREEN ARROW #33 by Ben Percy and Jamal Campbell. Now that he has been cleared of Wendy Poole’s murder, even though she doesn’t appear to be much help due to her current mental condition, Green Arrow and Emi are back to crime-fighting. He meets with Dinah and they rekindle their romance. Meanwhile, the Ninth Circle gives a vote of no confidence for Moria Queen and Broderick. In Japan, Shado battles some ninjas and we learn that Dante is still alive.  In the end, Ollie is at his own graveside when he gets a visit from his mother.

GREEN LANTERNS #32 by Sam Humphries and Scott Godlewski. Our heroes are trying to enjoy a nice pancake meal, when they receive a distress call that takes them away from their meal. Soon after, Simon takes them to a party where he feuds with Nazir. In the end, the two friends make up and Sion and Jessica try the pancake thing again. But, once again, they get called away…

GREEN LANTERNS #33 by Tim Seeley and Eduardo Pansica. Simon and Jessica ae sent to evacuate the planet Mol which is about to go Super Nova. The Ungaran Regent and his daughter watch from their warship. As Jessica tries to create a construct to keep the Mols safe, the warship gets damaged by a blast from the Super Nova and it appears that the Regent’s daughter may be dying from her injuries.

HAL JORDAN AND THE GREEN LANTERNS CORPS #30 by Robert Vendetti and Patrick Zircher. Guy and Kyle resume their normal patrols while John sends Hal to Earth to talk wih Superman about his recent dealings with Sinestro and Parallax. Superman turns into Parallax and they fight, until it’s revealed that this was all in Hal’s mind. Speaking of minds, it seems that Hector Hammond is partly responsible for these weird messages that Hal has been receiving.

HAL JORDAN AND THE GREEN LANTERNS CORPS #31 by Robert Vendetti and Patrick Zircher. Hector Hammond is being controlled by aliens from the planet Kroloter and is telepathically begging for help. Hal and Superman show up, but the aliens activate the “God Brain” and that results in Hal finding himself in Coast City with his family and Carol Ferris. Both eh and Superman figure out it’s a dream and snap out of it, leaving the aliens to surrender. However, Hammond kills the aliens before being forcing Superman to shoot him with his laser eyes. In the end, Hammond gets taken to S.T.A.R. Labs and Hal goes to visit Carol, but gets called away before he can see her face to face.