Unfortunately, Barr gets rid of his pervy, statutory rape ready romance between Halo and Geo-Force at the beginning of the issue. How? Well, Geo-Force’s romantic feelings toward Halo were really just misdirected feelings he never got to direct toward deceased little sister Terra. Yes, really.
For her part, Halo was just confusing her feelings of brotherly love for Geo-Force.
Pervy with a p.
Anyway, the rest of the issue is Geo-Force going nuts on a sleazy college professor who’s trying to get favors from Geo-Force’s friend for a scholarship and Batman calling Superman to stop Geo-Force. The fight scene is long and Barr thinks it out, having Geo-Force weaken Superman, which makes things interesting. The rest of the Outsiders have small, Christmas oriented stories going on and, though it’s a disappointment there’s no scene of the Outsiders’ Christmas, they’re nice vignettes.
Barr does a one-eighty and gives Halo a great schoolgirl crush on Superman, leading to some really amusing scenes.
It’s a nice issue–though too easily resolved in the end–but it’s odd how well Barr writes Superman. Sans all the complications of Batman, Barr really shines with the Big Blue Boy Scout. In fact, it’s probably the best issue (even with the perv elements–I have to wonder who decided it was a bad idea, Barr or some terrified DC exec).
A-
Recommend on Mahalo
2 responses so far ↓
1 Marionette // Feb 2, 2008 at 4:06 pm
I just got the BATO Showcase for reasons I don’t entirely fathom, so I can read along with you.
Oh joy.
2 Marionette // Apr 12, 2008 at 6:43 am
And funnily enough, this is the last story in the volume.
You’re right, it does have some of the best writing we’ve seen, but the basic plot of “one hero has to stop another hero from doing something misguided so they fight a lot” is the distilled essence of cliché.
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