mysteriousmre's Reviews (1.22k)

Wow. I had heard Gail Simone's Batgirl was good, but I was surprised by how good it was. Barbara's battle to reclaim her life after a traumatic incident felt surprisingly real and is a great starting point for a character focused story. The antagonists aren't terribly interesting on their own they do play into the story's themes. Kinda reminds me of how antagonists are often used in Spider-Man stories if that gives you any frame of reference. Looking forward to reading the rest of this series.

This was a pretty fun compilation of classic noir stories. The art, like many reviewers here have said, is nothing short of phenomenal. What might hold you back from reading it though is the content. There's some fun twists in the plot, but its characters can be very tropy. ESPECIALLY the femme fatales. Not knocking the trope itself or their presence in the story (they're a classic trope in nour stories), but they're stylized very differently from the male characters in this book. The men actually resemble the animals they're representing, but the women look waaaay more human in their face and body proportions to the point where it's kinda difficult to tell what animal they're supposed to be. I would have preferred to see them stylized the same way the other characters were.

Also, and this is a personal preference, DID NOT expect the graphic nudity/sex. Wasn't really looking for a book with that kind of content when I started reading this and it honestly turned me off from the rest of the book *ba dum tish*. Probably wouldnt have had that problem if I had checked the rating, but I didn't soooooo yeeeahhh....Anyways, still a fun read. Just might not be everyone's cup of tea.