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The New 52- Arkham War # 2

By Mark Rodriguez

In the absence of Batman and the rest of the Justice League, the Arkham inmates have taken full control of Gotham City. Bane has come to take over the city for himself and plans to unleash the army of Talons to do so.


'The Bane Mutiny' opens with a muscular freak called 'The Brute' literally tearing a Man-Bat apart, sending a message to the real Man-Bat to be afraid of him. Langstrom himself knows of his and has his army of bats heavily armed and ready to shoot. Brute tells his men that Bane said the Arkham crazies will fold easily, and is surprised to see everyone hit by raining gunfire. Man-Bat tells the survivors... if there are any... to tell Bane that science is always at war with ignorance.

Meanwhile, Gordon and fellow officer Pierce are hiding in a police van, and he reassures her that he's been through this kind of hell several times before and he always manages to get through it. They plan to sneak into Blackgate and get Agatha Zorbatos and anyone else out safely.

Penguin has his men bring the bodies of Brute and his thugs over to Bane and tells them they shouldn't have gone into the Man-Bat sector. Bane invites Penguin for a walk. Bane knows of Penguin's family history and knows he care more about the city than the usual maniac that's trying to take it over. Bane wants Penguin's help in restoring order in the city. Penguin asks for a favor, to kill one of Bane's men, a traitor named Igantius Ogivly, who tried to take power from him as 'Emperor Penguin'. Bane agrees to do so. Penguin in turn warns him that the Scarecrow and his men are planning against his use for the frozen Talons.


As Bane heads off to deal with this, Penguin heads over to the police van and opens the door, already knowing that Gordon and Pierce were inside. He actually lets them sneak into Blackgate so they can rescue their friends while the inmates are fighting it out among themselves. And yeah. The White Rabbit is there too, throwing down as well, for the damn hell of it.

Gordon tells Agatha that it's too late to save anyone else and they have to leave NOW. Meanwhile, Two-Face is shooting everyone down. Poison Ivy yells out if anyone knows if Scarecrow is done so they can leave already.

Scarecrow and Man-Bat are trying to hurry things along and steal the frozen Talon assassins. Just then Bane shows up to stop them and has pinned Scarecrow down. Crane asks for help, but Langstrom says the Talons take priority and tries to fly away. Bane grabs him by the wings and slams him down. He walks away with the Talon and says he'll get back to them later. He then sees one of the fallen officers.

Gordon, Agatha and Pierce get in a police car and manage to drive away. Agatha feels bad her man stayed behind but they say they can try to get back in tomorrow. Just then Bane lands on the hood of their car, holding the injured man. Bane hands them over to them saying they 'both want the same thing for the moment' and 'he can also play the angles'. Gordon doesn't like the sound of that. Pierce says tomorrow is always another day... but Gordon says it doesn't mean it's gonna be a good one.



My Opinions-

Pretty interesting issue, though not all that much happened. I'm surprised Bane did offer to work with the Penguin instead of just take him out directly. I guess the theme in this story is Bane and Penguin playing multiple sides. The Penguin pretends to be on Bane's side and warns him of the Scarecrow's attempt to steal the Talons... and he also pretends to be on Scarecrow's side by stalling Bane long enough to give them the time to do steal them. And then he, for whatever reason, let Gordon and Pierce go into Blackgate and rescue their fellow officers. Bane also let one of them go and handed them over to Gordon. I guess as far as they're concerned the real war is among the costumed freaks of the city and not the regular boys in blue.

I'm still not sure how Bane intends to control the Talons. It would actually be kinda funny to have the Talons yell out 'The Court of Owls have sentenced you to die!' and hack and slash Bane and all of his men, as Bane is surprised and confused with a WTF look on his....mask. I mean, the guys are fiercely and suicidaly loyal to the Court. It's just what they are and what they do, so they won't serve just anyone. Bane really has no way to intimidate them into serving him since they'd rather die than betray their cause. I'm not sure if Court of Owls/Night of Owls' story mentioned they just wake up in a clean blank slate eager to serve whoever unfroze them... but I seriously doubt the Court would be that sloppy. So I guess we'll see how they solve this problem whenever they finally get to it.


Also hey, another White Rabbit cameo.

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