Comics Review: Birds of Prey Vol I , II, and III by Julie Benson, Shawna Benson, and Claire Rowe

Hello, Fellow Book Worms and Book Dragons!

  I love comic books and when I have the time I love to sit down and grab up a stack of comics to read. Here are three graphic novels that I enjoyed recently. Maybe I will inspire you to pick up some comics and graphic novels to add to your reading adventures.

  Birds of Prey is a twenty-two issue series written by Julie Benson, Shawna Benson, and features art from talented artists, such as Claire Rowe. It was published by DC Comics in single issue format from 2016-2018 as part of DC's Rebirth initiative. Taking from decades of stories and variant teams, the Writers Benson bring to the forefront a series filled with action and adventure.
 

  Helena Bertinelli was free from Spyral and had returned to her vendetta as the Huntress. Dinah Lance had quit the band Black Canary, but had remained as their security. And Barbara Gordon had left Burnside to travel the world to hone her skills with masters of martial arts and combat. In Volume One: Who is Oracle?,  we pick up where the decades of storytelling left off. But when a person going by the name Oracle starts selling intel to criminals, Batgirl returns and enlists Black Canary's help to track down the false Oracle. But one of their leads is being hunted by the Huntress, leaving Helena Bertinelli in a stand off with Batgirl and Black Canary over mobster, Louis Terroni. Fleeing the three women, he is chased, only to crash his car. But when Batgirl, Black Canary, and Huntress arrive at the crashed car, they discover Teronni dead, and apparent victim of poisonous animal bites. This leads the Huntress to her next vendetta name, Santo Cassamento, warning Batgirl and Black Canary to stay out of her way. Cassamento was responsible for the murder of her family, and she is ready to deliver vengeance. But the three women soon come face to face with a new player, mob boss Fenice, who employs Metahumans to do her bidding. But Fenice has a deadly secret that she holds that will change the life of the Huntress forever. Who is masquerading as Oracle? And can the Birds of Prey stop a deadly army of serpentine Metahumans before Fenice gains more control of the mob underworld?
 

   Volume Two, Source Code, finds Batgirl's newly-formed Birds of Prey playing nice with one another. Dealing with the aftermath of their deadly encounter with Fenice, the three heroes gather to work to find a new Metahuman threat, Blackbird. This new enemy has been enhancing the powers of super-powered criminals to serve her purpose. Black Canary goes under cover to stop Blackbird. Meanwhile Catwoman has managed to steal something important from Terracare Industries that the owners want back. Kidnapping the family of criminal mastermind, Calculator, Terracare will release the hostages only if Catwoman returns what she stole. But it is not that easy, with Poison Ivy set to exact vengeance upon Terracare for their crimes against the Earth. It is up to Batgirl and Huntress to stop Poison Ivy from killing everyone at Terracare and save the Calculator's family.

  Volume Three, Full Circle, descends upon Gotham a virus from a secret society that targets men. With the help of Lois Lane, Wonder Woman, and other heroines, the Birds of Prey set out to stop the heinous cabal and rescue Gotham's men from succumbing to the virus. But as they battle the contagion, an old enemy is on the hunt for the real Oracle, using a deadly cybernetic assassin to track down the enigmatic hacker. Can the Birds of Prey rescue Gotham from those who wish to see it fall? Will Oracle be silenced by the assassin Burnrate? The team comes full circle in this explosive ending.    

  Let us take into consideration what is happening at the DC Rebirth round table. We are being treated to some amazing stories from top writers and artists. But that is not all. We are actually receiving stories that honor the past seventy-plus years of DC Comics and their characters. This is not a reboot, but a emergence of old-time storytelling that has been sorely missed. Julie Benson and Shawna Benson not only understand the characters they write, but they understand the importance they have to the fans. Added with the dynamic artwork that sucked me visually in, I found myself reading the series back to back. This is excellent emissary of this new Rebirth initiative, and I look forward to more from this creative team. An excellent series of books!


   Have fun reading this week. Let me know in the comments below what you are reading this week.

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  Because there is always time to read,
   Xepherus3 
 

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All written content and top logo (c) Copyright 2019 by Thomas Bahr II
Book covers are (c) Copyright by DC Comics, Inc.