Hill, Bryan

AVERAGE REVIEW SCORE:

4 out of 5

(1 book)

Batman And The Outsiders: Lesser Gods

(Art by Dexter Soy and Cian Tormey)

Vol. 1.  Batman tasks Black Lightning with pulling together a new team of Outsiders, made up of Katana, Kaliber, Signal and Orphan.  Their first mission is to rescue a metahuman who has been kidnapped by Ra's al Ghul, but the man known as the Demon knows exactly how to fracture the team.

I'm always a fan of misfit teams, so I was glad to see that's what we get here.  As well as the leadership tension between Batman and Black Lightning, each of the members of the team comes with their own baggage and weaknesses which they'll have to collectively overcome if they're to succeed.

Having Ra's al Ghul (interestingly pronounced phonetically here as 'Roz' like in the Nolan movies, rather than the traditional 'Raysh') be the villain is a great idea too.  He's someone who's even able to keep Batman on the back foot and is therefore always a few steps ahead of this untested team.

This is just the first book of the relaunched series, but it's a very promising start.  Also, I love Cassandra Cain, so I'm always happy to see her in action - particularly against Lady Shiva.

4 out of 5

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DC Comics (here)