Batman (The New 52!) # 12

By Mark Rodriguez

Batman has stopped the reign of terror raised by the Court of Owls and defeated Lincoln March who turned out to be Thomas Wayne Jr and Owlman. But during Batman's escape from the Court of Owls' deadly maze, a mysterious girl rescued him and brought him back to life. Batman already knew her and told her to stay out of his way. This issue deals with who she is and how Batman knows her.

“Ghost in the Machine” starts with Harper working underground making sure Gotham’s electrical grid is working. She gets a call from her brother and is later at home getting dressed all nice and formal for Bruce Wayne’s big speech since she got a special invite, which took place in Batman # 1.

Harper doesn’t really wanna go, but Cullen wants her to attend since it will be a night without stress for her. Cullen also wants her to win the heart of Tim Drake and hopes he can see him there. Harper notices a cut on Cullen’s arm and asks about it, since it seems some people keep roughing him up. He tells her not to worry about it and just enjoy herself.

At the famous speech, Harper decides to snatch some goodies and is caught by Alfred. He doesn’t make a big deal of it and kindly escorts her out since she wants to leave. He does ask her what she thinks of Wayne’s plans to renovate Gotham’s slums. Harper doesn’t really have an opinion but says that Bruce Wayne doesn’t know the Gotham that she knows.

When she gets back home, she finds her brother beaten up and with his hair cut. She wants to get even with the guys that did this and for whatever reason, cuts her hair short in a similar way. They do eventually run into the guys, and Harper is armed with a taser. However, more of them show up and they’re hopelessly outnumbered. Just then a smoke bomb hits the scene and Batman beats the crap out them. He swings off as Harper and Cullen look in awe, and Harper is now amazed by him.

Later on, Harper is checking on every video she can find on Batman, but also studies how he has access to the power grid of the city to make sure he’s not seen in the city’s video surveillance. After lots of searching her managed to find a Bat-Box, one of his ‘ghost grids’ that not only helps him out but also helps maintain the main power grid too. Of course all of this he gets from ‘secretly stealing’ energy from Wayne Enterprises, but I think we know why. Anyways, Harper finds out that one of the ‘Bat-Boxes’ went offline, so Batman is visible. She decides to head out to fix it, like a thanks for his help from earlier.

As she goes into the Gotham sewers, she finds and fixes the Bat-Box and then sees a boat headed her way. Batman is in the boat with a villain named Tiger Shark. He fires off some sort of object that knocks the boat around and also sends Harper flying.

As Batman fights Tiger Shark, he wants to know how the Talon that attacked Wayne got into the Wayne Tower. The villain refuses to answer and sends a tiger after him. As Batman fights the tiger, Harper wants to help somehow and shuts off the run-off valve, draining the water and grounding the boat. Having defeated Tiger Shark and his pet, he notices the valve and narrows his eyes. Harper comes home happy that she helped Batman, but also stinking of sewer water.

The next day Batman shows up where Harper works and tells her she’s done. Harper says she wanted to help but then noticed that Batman purposely shut off his Bat-Box so the police would know where he was and help out. Either way, she said she helped ground the boat, but Batman insists that she’s done. However, that inspires her to keep helping.

Art shift.

My Opinions

This was a cool one shot that properly introduces us to Harper Row instead of her rather random appearance earlier on. I also looked back and noticed that she was indeed seen in Batman # 1 as Bruce Wayne was giving his speech. Talk about super foreshadowing. Even though the Owls don't particularly show up here, part of the story takes place in Batman #1 which kickstarts the whole thing, plus we do see Batman questioning Tiger Shark, who somehow helped the Talon get to Bruce Wayne in the first place. But man, who carries a tiger on a boat? And what kind of sewer is large enough to house a boat?

The women next to Lincoln March looks a lot like Maria Powers

The weird thing about this story was a sudden art shift on the final pages. I have no idea what happened, maybe they ran out of time for one guy to do and so the other artists finished up the rest. The only problem is the second artist used this slightly more line-heavy overly detailed style that clashes with the rest, and save Batman who's wearing a mask, Harper and everyone else looked rather ugly in this style. It's weird because it's all one story, and not like some other cases where it's a main story and a shorter back up story where this extra story is drawn by someone else. This is all one story and the art shift from one page to the other is jarring.

It was interesting to find out about Harper and where she comes from. She does stick around for a while, eventually becoming a vigilante herself named Bluebird in the Batman Eternal series. I do believe she has hung up the tights after DC Rebirth, but you never know when she might return.