Batgirl # 1 (2008)

 By Mark Rodtiguez

Cassandra Cain was first introduced in the No Man's Land saga in Batman's history as Gotham was rebuilding itself after a huge earthquake tore the city apart. Cassandra became the new Batgirl, years after Barbara has abandoned the role due to being wheelchair bound thanks to the Joker. The new Batgirl was a hit and she got a mini-series in 2008. Let's check it out.

'Redemption Road- Square One' opens with Batgirl staking out some men grabbing some sort of illegal shipment from the docks. She narrates that had her life sacrificed in order to make her into a living weapon. She was offered another life if she promised not to kill. She swore on this, but two men made her break her promise. She plans to kill once she finds Slade Wilson and David Cain. Batgirl leaps into action. 

Batgirl dodges the gunshot from one of the men while the other is fumbling to get his gun out from his pants. She slams the guy's gun in his face and slices him up with 2 Batarangs she's using as blades. The other man shoots himself through his pants in fear, still being unable to pull his gun out. Batgirl narrates that these guys are stealing custom made gun magazines, the type of things her father David Cain likes, so they might know where he is. She only needs one of them awake, so she goes to the one that just shot himself. She asks him where Cain is and she says he never heard of him. 

Batgirl snaps the guy's wrist and starts pressing the sharp edge of the batarang into his face. The frightened man says he doesn't know who Cain is, he just works for some guy and was told to pick up these things. Batgirl knocks him out with a headbutt to the face. She finds a note that reads that this shipment was for an Armand Lester, which means nothing to her. She swings off, leaving the men tied up and unconscious.

At Wayne Manor, Alfred communicates to Bruce via earpiece that Cassandra's bed was never slept in. Bruce says she sometimes sleeps on the floor due to her upraising. Alfred comments that since she's returned and joined The Outsiders, he's barely seen her. Cassandra hasn't even bothered to personalize her room yet, not a poster or a photo or anything. He says maybe Cassandra doesn't feel like she deserve to live here, she doesn't consider the manor her home. Bruce says it's the early days and she needs time. 

Alfred says they need to show her she belongs. The manor has lots of photos of Bruce with Dick and Jason and says it must remind her of things she never had. They call her family but it never leaves their mind that she was trained by assassins and was raised by her monster of a father. He says they need to think of her a troubled young woman in need of understanding and acceptance. Bruce says those are fair points and he will be back soon. 

Batgirl sneaks into the Batcave and starts looking up Armand Lester on the Bat Computer. She says it hurts her a little to tell Bruce she returned to make up for what she has done, but in actuality she wants to use his resources. Just then someone arrives.

Nightwing says he doesn't know why Batman put her with the Outsiders, but he knows she's on a short leash, which most likely includes not being in the Batcave unsupervised. Nightwing can tell that she's been out on patrol and asks what she's been doing. He asks if maybe she took something she shouldn't have and reaches out to her. Cassie swats his hand but Nightwing's hand isn't moving. Both of them glare at each other. 

Batgirl swings away but Nightwing follows and cuts her off. Nightwing says they tested her to make sure she didn't have Slade's mind control drug in her and she passed a lie detector, but they fell for this before and polygraphs can be faked. Nightwing doesn't trust Batgirl and swings his escrima sticks at her, which she blocks and swats out of his hands. He says he knows movement is her first language, but she's not psychic and sooner or later he'll do something she won't expect and beat her. 

Batman arrives alongside Tim Drake Robin and tells them to stop. He says they're family and shouldn't fight. Nightwing says she's been out in costume doing who knows what and was also lurking around the Batcave alone. Cassandra says she can't just stay in her room waiting until it's her time to fight for them. Batman says she's right.

All you need is family

Nightwing asks if they let her dictate terms after all she's done. Batman says she wasn't responsible for her actions and he doesn't know the full story. Robin says neither do they, but they've been working with her to fill in the gaps in her memory and match it with what they do know. 

They explain that not long after the death of Tim Drake's death, the three of them left Gotham for year. Cassandra lived as stable of a life as she could, working on her verbal skills thanks to Alfred. However, Deathstroke entered the picture and drugged her with a rifle dart. Deathstroke convinced her that Cain had other daughters and talked her into breaking into his cell to kill him. With Batgirl's mind twisted, she tried to convince Robin to join her. She used the League of Assassins Mystics to revive Lynx, kill her again while wearing a Batgirl costume and try to frame Robin for her murder. While Robin was running from the cops, Cassie found and killed another one of Cain's daughters. 

Following Cassie's orders, who was still drugged at the time, Robin broke Cain out of Blackgate and brought him to the oil works. Cassie wanted Robin to side with her and when Robin refused, she shot Cain herself. The gun was rigged by Deathstroke however and there was an explosion at the oil works. Cassie found out her father survived and killed her ninjas. He cooked up the whole scheme to open an assassin shop with Cassie as his second command and Deathstroke as a silent partner. 

Cain told Cassie he had other daughters but she was his favorite, which she fell for due to being drugged. Cassie went off to fight Supergirl and join the Titans East to help Slade get his own kids back. During this time she killed Bombshell. In the final battle with Slade's team, Robin injected Batgirl with a counter-serum. Not being completely purged of the effect of the drugs, she went after her father to punish him. Cain promised her that he didn't know about Slade's drugs and she bought it. 

Cain and Cassie started working together and obtained a new drug named Pheno that can turn people into metahumans. Cain planned to turn his army into super powered assassins. Cassandra went off on her own again and worked with Robin. Cassie found and killed and exec from Pheno's manufacturer. The drugs finally left Cassie's system and once she saw the news of the murder, her memories started flooding back. Cain and his scientists and daughters all vanished as well, having the seen the news and knowing they lost control of her. Cassandra returned to the Waynes. 

Nightwing says he can't believe Batman just took her in after just two tests and 'promising not to do it again' especially since he goes as far as to have plans to take down members of the Justice League should they ever go rouge. Nightwing asks what they're doing about Cain. Batman says he is still top priority but the Pheno is too unstable, he can't make super assassins with it. Nightwing says someone with enough sense should be out there making sure, and he leaves. Batman tells Cassandra to not make him regret trusting her as he walks off with Robin. 

The following night Batgirl is following her last lead, an abandoned school owned by an associate of Armand Lester. She narrates that Nightwing is wrong, she can feel she is no longer under the control of Slade and Cain. She does feel guilty about the things she'd done under their influence though. She regrets the pain she'll cause them once she finds and kills Cain. She hopes maybe they'll understand and maybe she can still stay but she doubts it. She'll be alone again and she'll never have a place, or a family, or be normal. 

Batgirl decides to worry about that later and focus on her mission. She finds fresh blood behind a door. She realizes she's not alone in the building. As she opens the door, she sees a woman with two large knives as several women are strapped down with their throats slashed. The woman says that Batgirl just opened the wrong door. 

My Opinions-

I'll start saying that this is the first time I read a comic with classic Pre-New 52 Cassandra Cain as Batgirl. I always liked her look from what I read about Wizard magazines and other articles talking about 'The New Batgirl' during the No Man's Land era. I like her vicious style and using Batarangs as if they were Wolverine claws. She's also been around around long enough to be recognized by the common thug.

Wow, the book went from a quick read to full on exposition. I loved the art and the large panels with bright colors and great detail. The exposition info-dump was necessary though to better explain Batgirl's previous ventures and why she hates Deathstroke and Cain so much. I just kinda wish it was better done. It was mostly these huge images of Batgirl, Deathstroke and Cain with tons of dialogue with me trying to figure out who is saying what. I would have preferred more panels here and there. I like little cameos here and there, so I would have liked seeing a flashback panel of Batgirl fighting Supergirl, or her fighting with Bombshell or the rest of the Titans East here and there. 

Either way, it's a cool start to a good story with insight in Cassandra's character and motivations. Her past was hell and now she has a chance at a better and more stable life (as stable as life as a member of the Bat Family could possibly be that is) but she knows that she will lose everything whenever she finds and kills Cain. And yet, she must go on, she cannot abandon her personal quest. Even though it's personal, it's still not a good idea to leave someone like Cain just running around wanting to create super assassins. 

I like Alfred's sense of sympathy for Cassandra and the stuff she's been through, and how even they can't completely let their guard down around her due to her past. I had no idea she actually with the Waynes, but they have had several stray kids in the past. 

Overall a good book and a good opener. Just kinda wish the long info dump was broken up with more panels here and there. Maybe cut out one or two the full page/half page splash panels to make room. Like the Nightwing splash page could have been half a page for example. Like I said, it felt like it was going too fast due to the large panels so a sudden screeching halt once we got to all the backstory.

Now in terms of what was going on back in 2008, this musta been sometime after Batman Begins because they were advertising Batman Gotham Knights, a series of animated shorts, each in their own style, that take place sometime after Batman Begins. Also DC Universe Online was starting up, and they, they released Birds of Prey and Witchblade on DVD sets. SoulCalibur IV was also out at the time. And finally, don't forget to follow Batman on your Verizon Wireless Flip Phone. Out of all of those things, that back cover ad really felt like a blast from the past.