Review:
Too many of my reviews are of books and stories from ten to twenty years ago. So I was excited to be able to review this one, hot off the presses. Maybe it would have tasted better with age? Because this tasted terrible.
With three Bs in this team-up series title, Batman: the Brave and the Bold, we readers are subconsciously invited to map which character fits which B. Who is the Brave? Who is the Bold? Is Batman one of the pair?
The answer to that last question is "yes" only for the shortest and final tale in the collection. Batman himself co-stars with Guy Gardner. In that tale, Batman deserves all three of the Bs. With a UFO crashing just outside Gotham, Batman battles both radiation poisoning and vivid hallucinations to save those in need.
This little tale by Joshua Hale Fialkov is teamed with painterly renderings from the pencil of Lisandro Estherren. It is also the standout story of the entire book. But it sets a low bar, as this tale itself lacks cohesion. The author mixes in several terrific and novel science fiction elements and concepts - the mysterious, image-based race of space voyagers; the different angles of radiation poisoning; the hallucinatory side effects. But teaming with Guy Gardner adds little constructive to the tale - he seems to be there only to portray the alien visitor as a unique galactic unknown. His presence ultimately prevents this tale from reaching its full potential.
The cover story team-up is between Nightwing and Deadman, two of DC's heroes with circus roots in their origin stories. Tim Seeley weaves both characters' back-stories throughout their adventure, a likely necessary repetition in the serialized format. It is clear here, going back to our Bs, that Nightwing, who leaps from the top of a high bridge to save a stranger, is the Brave while Deadman, who leaps unapologetically from possession to possession of others, is the Bold.
Seeley's Nightwing is full of reflective narration, pensively unpacking the unfolding action. It works well in Nightwing's self-analysis but the closer he moves to Deadman's mythology, the more it devolves into ridiculous, vaguely spiritualistic mumbo-jumbo.
Artist Kelley Jones's Deadman is gruesome and disturbing to look at. It is perhaps more fitting than the goofy ghost of other renditions. But Deadman is the only standout, visually. Jones's other characters blur together, victims of too few pencil marks. These visuals are not minimalistic overall, why could he not finish their faces or outfits? The result feels rushed and slap-dash, especially in the faces.
Finally, saving the worst for last, is the awful farce of Booster Gold's team-up with the intelligent dinosaurs of the Jurassic League. Nothing works in this story. Author Mark Russell's Booster is the time-travelling idiot of the Flintstones team-up. He shows all the intelligence of an 8-year-old with none of the deep responsibility of his 2007 solo series, which introduced him as a Time Master. And the Booster leadership skills that emerged in the runs of Justice League Generations and Justice League International have clearly been forgotten in another time.
The visuals from Jon Mikel fail to rescue the abysmal story. They are blocky and unrefined. Even the letters contribute to the flop - the funky, supposedly hi-tech or robotic font in Skeets's word balloons is nearly unreadable.
For its mix of one short sci-fi tale with some good ideas that fail to stick together, one decent team-up with rushed images, and a final one so bad it is not worth mentioning, I give this collection just 1.5 capes.
Description:
Collects: Batman: The Brave and the Bold #13-16
Authors: Tim Seeley, Mark Russell, Joshua Hale Fialkov
Artists: Kelley Jones, Jon Mikel, Lisandro Estherren
Published By: DC Comics
Published When: Oct. 28, 2025
Parental Rating: Teen
ISBN: 978-1799502852
Pages: 168 pages
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