Chapter By Chapter (usually) features me reading one chapter of the selected book at a time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as read-along book club.

PART 2: KNIGHTQUEST

Last time Back-Up Batman decided to force himself into Bane’s plan to force a mobster to give up his territory by threatening his kids. Not-Batman offered his services to help the mobster…by threatening his kids. I’m not even part of the audience who needs to not like this new guy playing Batman and I already hate him. Not-Batman wants Bane, my theory being if he beats the guy who beat Batman he gets to be the new Batman officially. Not how that works but that’s kind of the point.

Meanwhile Tim has to put up with this nonsense while worrying about his kidnapped father and the doctor Mr. Drake and Mr. Wayne both share when it comes to their recovery, while she may be the next Bruce Wayne love interest. Or as Super Cafe would put it, “I’m Bruce Wayne. Want to know my secret identity?” At the time there were at least four different Batman titles just focusing on the regular crew, plus other characters tied to Batman or Gotham City with their own titles, stories, and specials. So Bruce is playing detective while Jean Paul is playing Batman. What happens next? Let’s read and find out.

This chapter goes back and forth between Bane’s crew, Bruce and Tim and Alfred, and Jean Paul. I’m going to combine their scenes into the three discussions.

First, Bane’s crew. We get a bit of Bane’s characterization interestingly enough as he plays with the children. Zombie notes that Bane’s never been near children before, with Bird also noting that Bane himself never had a childhood, growing up in a despot’s prison like he did. Later, Bird hears about Not-Batman and Robin meeting with Bressi and (in between Bane’s reminders that this isn’t the real Batman) realizes that Not-Batman may be working with Bressi. Bane may not like being challenged, and right now he’s reached that stage of addiction to Venom that he needs a hit just to feel “normal”, but Bird is showing some intelligence. Bane tells him to take the others when he confronts Bressi to return the kids.

Meanwhile, Jean Paul is still saying prayers to St. Dumas. While Tim is worried that Jean Paul is going through that same dark phase Bruce did after Jason’s murder plus the concerns of what “the System” did to Valley. Both Bane and Jean Paul suffer from a worse childhood than Bruce had. Bruce at least had loving parents in the early days of his life, and Alfred after his parents’ murder. Bane grew up in a prison and Jean Paul grew up being manipulated by fanatics so neither of them had a chance to turn out right. Even here we see a sleeping Jean Paul using the devices of his Azrael armor to create a new gauntlet for his Batsuit, but doing so while asleep, as if the Order’s programming has created a sort of dual personality, one that may be seeping into Jean Paul as Batman.

Finally, we have Bruce’s search for Tim’s father, and you have to feel sorry for poor Tim being caught between these two events. Based on their accents, the gun they carried, and referring to an elevator as a “lift”, Bruce realizes the kidnappers were British and may have taken Jack and Shondra out of the country. Bruce can’t find any evidence of an enemy for Jack that might go this far, and with the talk about Shondra being the only one who can fix Bruce’s back plus the miracles she’s done on Jack, I suspect someone wants her medical talents and took Jack for leverage.

For us comic fans, a few other detectives are namedropped as Alfred tries to talk Bruce out of going himself. The only one that might be known outside of comics is Christopher Chance, thanks to two different versions of The Human Target. Near this time the more comic-accurate version with Rick Springfield as Chance, using advanced disguise equipment to impersonate the target he’s protecting and finding the party trying to kill said target, had aired on ABC so novel readers MIGHT know that incarnation. Also mentioned is Joe Potato, a character I honestly only know from a DC Who’s Who book, and Timothy Trench, whom I don’t even have that option for. Alfred also namedrops Bertie Wooster and Jeeves, which given it’s a British franchise about a rich guy and his smarter butler getting into adventures would seem to be an odd choice. One would think the kidnappers would see through that, but we don’t know why this kidnapping happened.

That’s something I hope we find out next time, as well as how long it takes before Jean Paul gets his meeting with Bane. As for this chapter, it pushes the story forward and gives us something to think about so it was a good one.