Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #9 – “Night of the Owls”! In the previous installment, a swarm – is that what they’re called, a swarm? — of Owls attacks Bruce Wayne at his own manor! Home invasion! They try to murder the bastard, but Bruce dons his Metal Batsuit and fends them off while Alfred sends out the distress signal to the rest of the Bat Family.

Will they show up to help, or will they stay home and water their plants? The smart money is on Batgirl tending to her ferns, but the actual results may surprise you!

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #9 [July, 2012]
Written by: Scott Snyder
“Night of the Owls”

Bruce regales us with a tale of the original owners of Wayne Manor! In 1855, brothers Solomon and Joshua Wayne bought th—BOORRRRRIINNNGGGG!!!

They didn’t move into the home for two years because the place was absolutely infested with bats. Bats in the underground cave system. Bats in the walls. Bats in the oatmeal. Bats.

So the Wayne brothers introduced a predator into the cave. What preys on bats? Tiger owls.

And here we are today with history coming full circle. Really makes you think.

Alfred continues his work on dropping the temperature to sub-zero levels while Metal-Batsuited Bruce whacks off a bunch of owls, so to speak. Alfred sweats as he begs Bruce to come back into the cozy armory with him even though the doors might not even hold.

“Master Bruce, the Talons’ strength, their healing capabilities, please, for you it means certain–”

“What it means, Alfred,” Bruce interrupts, “is that I can play rough for once.”

Bruce gives an Owl a noogie.

“My suit is built for war,” Bruce thinks. “It’s made of meta-aramid fibers of–” –BOOORRRIIINNGGG.

Tougher than Kevlar, as it turns out, this suit. It withstands heat, cold, you know… medium temperatures, too. It’s meant for battle in extreme conditions. And here he is using it in his own home!

Shut up, Tiny Little Bald Man!

Bruce gets CLANGed and WHUMPed around nicely, until finally he’s prostrate on the floor. “He’s down, brothers,” croaks an Owl. “Get him!” hisses another Owl. “This is it Bruce Wayne,” moos another Owl. “Nothing left to keep us out. No more barriers. The Court always finds a way into your home! The Waynes always try, though, don’t you? Well, go ahead! Try whatever you like! More gates. More alarms. Heh, maybe try a guard dog.”

Do you know what Bruce does next? He unleashes a fucking dinosaur on them. An honest-to-god dinosaur. I don’t even know what’s happening anymore. Like, it’s a full-size fucking dinosaur in his house that’s stomping on Owls all of a sudden. What is this garbage?

Alfred warns Bruce that, per his vital signs, the time is nigh to black out for a bit. You know that move in Assassin’s Creed where you take a leap on an enemy from three stories high and stab him in the fucking throat? One of the Owls is doing this now to Bruce. The blade punches right through Bruce’s face armor and comes within one goshdang millimeter of his forehead.

“MASTER BRUCE!” wheezes the useless old butler. “I’M COMING OUT TO HELP YOU!”

Meanwhile, there’s a dinosaur rampaging the Batcave. Have I made myself clear on that point yet?

Bruce commands the computer to override opening the armory doors, trapping Alfred inside. “Master Bruce, you’re crashing!” Alfred yells as Bruce crashes.

“My ancestors…” Bruce thinks. “they used owls to kill the bats. Owls everywhere. But I forgot… the thing I forgot is… as soon as the owls left… …the bats… …came back.”

Bats are gross, sir. Why couldn’t you be Bunnyman?

And sure enough, out of the cave floor or wherever, who cares, a giant swarm of bats flows out into the Cave (around the dinosaur, mind you) and start terrorizing the Owls. Bruce stands up triumphantly and dons his cowl. Alfred reports that the temperature has now reached -20 degrees. He doesn’t specify Fahrenheit or Celsius, or even Rankine! And that would be impossible, because Rankine doesn’t dip into the negatives, you silly goose!

The cold should be affecting the Talons now, but please sir, Alfred begs you to consider your own health and well-being in the cold, cold Cave! Ah, but my dear sweet, sweet Alfred, the bats have come out because of the cold! Ergo, Batman’s fine. QED.

One of the Talons, or Owls, or whatever you want to call him, escapes. So Batman runs into his Batmobile and chases after an Owl symbol in the sky that’s there all of a sudden for some reason.

No explanation about the dinosaur? Okay.

The sky is red like a prolapsed anus. Alfred sends over a file of Owl targets. The ones in blue are the ones that the Bat Family are working on protecting. The ones in red… well, sir, pour a little liquor for your homies.

Oh yeah, and the green names are unaccounted for: Jeremiah Arkham and Lincoln March. A couple of nerd names if I’ve ever heard any! Batman’s going to head to Arkham Asylum to check up on ol’ Jeremiah. Then he’ll go after Lincoln March. How’s the for a solid plan? How about instead you stay the fuck home and… oh wait, yeah, Owls. Heh.

Apparently, Batman deals with Jeremiah Arkham in Detective Comics (Vol. 2), Issue #9, if that link works, then it’s the year 2035 and I finally got around to it!

Now he checks on Lincoln March, a politician who looks so much like Bruce Wayne that I’m beginning to think that the artist is incompetent. Right as Batman enters March’s office, someone unseen throws a knife right into March’s chest.

…tell him… I… *choke* …love… his… sexy little pen– *dead*

There’s a knife in this guys’s heart, shoved in right to the hilt, and he’s still talking like “…I… have a message… here… take it… there are… three… names… I tried to follow the donations to figure it out…” yada yada yada. Then he dies right as he’s about to say something possibly important, but doesn’t, and he says something stupid instead like “A better Gotham is just one dream.”

Alfred reports that the Talons have been subdued by the extreme cold. The list of names will prove useful, because instead of vetting them through another source, Batman is just going to assume they are indeed Owl bad guys and burn their houses to the ground!

We are treated to a little bit of a side story now! Jarvis Pennyworth pens a letter to his son, Alfred. There are intruders in Wayne Manor, so he has to try to flee to Britain forthwith. “You’ve long known that it is your duty to fulfill my role with the Waynes upon my retirement or passing,” it says, stripping Alfred of his dream to run his own hot dog stand.

But Jarvis implores his son never to come to Wayne Manor for these reasons three: the house is 1) cursed, 2) cursed!, 3) CUUUURSED!!!

The aged butler never saw it until it was too late, the darker legacy, the shadows behind the portraits.

Or the Owls.

You wouldn’t be the first person to cum for Jarvis, baby. This dude fucks.

So as Jarvis tries to run away in the rain, these hooting bastards tail him. The letter continues to lament the possibility that the writer may never see his son again. Never see him laugh or love or shit or juggle again.

And everything he did – serving the Waynes – he did for Alfred. Making a better future. Being a constantly absent dad. That sort of thing.

One day, Martha Wayne grumbles at a newspaper. “I’ve had it, Thomas,” she exclaims… oh wait, no she doesn’t. There’s no exclamation mark. “The mayor has shut down another five schools, that corrupt, short-sighted idiot… you know it’s only because the schools haven’t figured out a way to pay him off. It’s disgusting.”

Thomas gives the ol’ “I oughta let him have it!” as he sits and meekly sips his coffee. Martha gets mad. They need to do more.

So, they, uh, leave their current home and move into Wayne Manor. Whoops!

And Jarvis blames himself.

Jarvis tries to drive off of the property, but the gate is closed and locked.

“There is the cold hard truth, my boy. It is I who… it is I who have doomed us all.”

Jarvis stares up from his car and sees a giant, stupid masked guy clad in armor and a billowing, hooded cape, carrying a giant sword.

Now where’s that dinosaur?

Final Thoughts

This is beyond stupid. I’m tired of this shit. This wasn’t worth the wait whatsoever. Wake me up when Batman dips his balls in it. Good night.

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #8 – “Attack on Wayne Manor”! In the previous installment, Bruce Wayne is using the dead Talon named William Cobb to figure out how the Owls synthesized a compound that can help reanimate his cells, i.e. bringing him back from the dead over and over. Dick Grayson learns that the man is his great-grandfather, which makes Dick so angry at Bruce that he yells at him for about six panels before Bruce cracks him across the jaw with a brass-knuckled fist.

The Court of Owls prepares to kill their enemy (Batman) and take over the city (Gotham) so they can celebrate (with TV dinners). Let’s see how that pans out.

It’s the Night of the Owls! *hoot*

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #8 [June, 2012]
Written by: Scott Snyder
“Attack on Wayne Manor”

Bruce soliloquoys about how you can spend your whole life understanding your stupid city and yet know nothing about it. Case in point: Gotham = Owls.

Bruce stares at a miniature replica of Gotham City in one of his many useless mansion rooms. This room is for the Gotham replica. Duh. Alfred turns on lights that illuminate some of the miniature buildings, causing Bruce to recoil in eye pain. Alfred tells him to stop being such a pussy.

“You want a metaphor old friend?” Bruce says to the guy who doesn’t want metaphors right now. “Here’s one… I’m a man standing over a toy city he made himself while the real one, the one that matters, operates behind his back.”

Sweet-ass metaphor, sir. Here’s your doctorate from Metaphor Tech. “You’ve been sitting in the dark for hours,” sniffs Alfred. “And you have inflammation in most of the tissue around your eyes…”

Bruce certainly does look like warmed-over shit, no one can deny that. He stares out the window at a sunrise, calling himself an arrogant fool. Alfred tries to sooth Bruce’s frazzled nerves with more snarky assholery, but a loud THUMP brings Bruce’s attention back to saving the world. “Get to the cave,” he instructs Alfred. “I’ll take care of the intruder.” Bruce runs while Alfred is hot on his heels going “Sir! Sir! I can take care of it! Sir! Your health!”

But to the cave he goes, and Alfred determines that the intruder signals all over the manor aren’t making sense! Then he stops cold and tells Bruce to get down to the cave ASAP.

A man wearing Owl Ninja Gear busts through the railing of a wooden staircase and tries to snap at Bruce with a mechanical hand claw thing. “Bruce Wayne…” it says, “…the Court of Owls… has sentenced you to–”

Bruce cracks off a piece of staircase and smacks the Owl with it. The Owl laughs it away, amused by Bruce’s moves! He’s got moves, too, and it’s like how the Queen has moves. Bruce is more of a Rook, you see. Then Bruce uses his Rook leg to kick the Owl right through a door and knocking him unconscious.

Three more sets of yellow mask eyes peer out from the darkness of the next room…

Master Bruce, sir, this is no time for sex.

Alfred looks frantic and hopeless and he informs Bruce that he’s pretty much surrounded. They’re getting into the house from all sides. One is even coming down the stairs of the Batcave, literally hooting. And then Alfred’s line is disconnected.

Bruce does his best to run away from and/or knock out and/or murder the Owls, but one man can only do so much, I always say. He makes his way to the top of the roof. “Go ahead, Bruce! Try to run away! We’ll follow you wherever you go!” the Owl screeches.

Bruce has now snapped off a weathervane and is attempting to bludgeon the Owl with the “N” side. Then he jabs the pole end into the Owl’s chest. Then he scurries down the chimney where he gets stuck in an uncomfortable position until he dies. “We’ll get you, Bruce Wayne!” another Owl says, thwarted. “We’re coming for you!”

Now that the Owls have been stymied forever, Bruce heads down to the Batcave to find Alfred. He finds nobody but yet another Fucking Owl.

THAT DRAWER OF WOMEN’S PANTIES ARE FOR MY RECREATIONAL ENJOYMENT! I HAVE NOTHING TO BE ASHAMED OF!

Alfred shoves a giant coin onto the Owl. And when I say “giant” I really mean “giant”. Like, the Owl has probably been crushed to death. “Your lucky penny, sir,” Alfred says morbidly.

Bruce takes the mask off the not-dead Owl and reveals a creepy, pale, veiny face. Bruce screams “HOW MANY ARE COMING FOR US!” and the Owl tells him “Enough”, and not just for him. He’ll find that out very soon.

This is the part where Bruce breaks the guy’s arm, much to his chagrin. Then another swarm of Owls descends into the cave, so Bruce and Alfred-With-an-Ax run to a vault to lock themselves inside. The armory, as it were. “That’s okay, Bruce. We’ll find a way in. We always do,” an Owl sneers. Alfred agrees – the doors won’t hold forever.

Bruce hands Alfred a tiny little SD card that he found in the Owl’s gauntlet after breaking his arm. Take it and then turn up the air conditioning in the Batcave to full-blast! We’ll cold them out!

The Owls, meanwhile, look stupid bashing and clawing at the armory door. “You can’t hide forever, Bruce!”

Then one of them uses what the artwork seems to convey as telekinetic powers to unscrew bolts from the armory door. Bruce comes out in a full-body iron Batsuit. “Get the HELL out of my house!” he says intimidatingly. “Look at this, friends. Bruce came out to play!” taunts an Owl. “You know what we do to bats, Bruce? We eat them whole. Bones and all.”

Gross!

I’m so fucking high right now!

Meanwhile, Alfred gibbers at what he has found out from the SD card. “It’s a list of targets. And… nearly every public figure in Gotham is on it. Everyone who shapes the city.”

“The city comptroller… Betty Park…” Ol’ Betty gets accosted by Owls in her house.

“Gotham City deputy sheriff… Michael D. Davis…” Ol’ Michael gets snuck up on in his bathtub.

One by one Alfred lists names and see Owls fuck their shit up. All of them sentenced to die by the Court of Owls. And who else is on the list? Commissioner Jimmy Gordie. Mayor Hady too, but who gives a shit about him?

Anyway, Bruce tells Alfred to put a call out. Batman’s going to need his team assembled. Nightwing. Robin. Batgirl, Red Face. Emo Kid. Floozy. All of ‘em.

“To all the allies of the Bat presently in Gotham… I send this with the greatest urgency. Tonight, the Court of Owls has sent their assassins to kill nearly forty people across the city. The Court’s targets are all Gotham leaders. People who shape this city. I have uploaded a list of the targets’ names, here. The Court’s assassins – the ‘Talons’ — are already en route to their targets. They are highly trained killers with extraordinary regenerative abilities.”

BANG BANG!

Alfred says he’ll keep the line open as long as possible.

BANG BANG!

The Owls draw their knives out at Metal Batsuit-Man

BANG BANG!

And they try to get through the door to Alfred.

BANG BANG!

“We’re coming for you too, old man! Going to tear the skin off your back!”

This is getting serious! And – oh wait, the issue’s over.

Final Thoughts

I really want to see these Owls win. Bruce has been so arrogant about Gotham being HIS city that I want to see Gotham’s Illuminati-style society tear his ass to pieces.

But we can’t always get what we want in life, can we?