Review of Birds Of Prey Issue #6

     

     

Birds Of Prey #6 brings the first arc to a close with a battle to separate Megaera from Sin, but sometimes, you don’t always get what you want.Is Birds Of Prey #6 Good?

Oy! Kelly Thompson brings the new team’s inaugural mission to a close with a big move to save Sin in Birds Of Prey #6, but promises made are not promises kept when many of the open questions that plagued the series since the beginning are either not addressed or waved away in lazy exposition. You can at least say this arc ended as well as it started.

When last we left Dinah and the latest incarnation of the BoP, Dinah entered the belly of the Megaera beast (who talks like a 16-year-old TikTok influencer) to find a way to separate Sin from Megaera’s grip. Dinah was eventually expelled, but Sin and Megaera were locked in a battle of wills, with Sin holding Megaera at bay with a magic lasso.

Now, the BoP unlocks the magical urn in the hope that its power will draw Megaera out of Sin and trap the beast permanently. The plan mostly works when the urn draws out enough to severely weaken Megaera, but the BoP holds off going all the way because the urn could trap Sin as well. In the end, Sin and a weakened Megaera agree to coexist in one body and live peacefully on Earth, and all is right with the world… until Map shows up later with another prophecy requiring a new team.

“What’s the problem, Mr. Grumpy Reviewer Guy? That sounds like a win,” you’d rightly wonder. That’s fair, but promises made are not promises kept, and Thompson made a sloppy job of it. Let’s review.

Why is Harley on the team? Thompson explained away the bold choice to put a murderous villain on the team by implying Harley brings a sort of unpredictability that their opponents could not anticipate or counteract. Ultimately, Harley played no part in the conclusion, and her fighting prowess against trained Amazonian warriors leading up to the finale is patently ridiculous. In short, our prediction that Harley was added to the team for nothing more than popularity’s sake proved correct, and the story suffered for it.

Why isn’t Barbara Gordon/Batgirl or any other traditional member on the team besides Dinah? Maps come in at the end with an exposition-heavy explanation that waves away the question with an answer about dire timelines. Thompson could have saved herself the criticism by bringing in Maps in the first issue to lay out the rules, which further highlights the poor execution of the first issue.

Why didn’t Dinah go to Wonder Woman in the beginning to prevent the needless violence and destruction? Thompson explains the question away with a “What if she says ‘no’,” but that explanation holds no water given Wonder Woman’s character and is even proven false in the finale when Wonder Woman proves pivotal to capturing Megaera.

Why did Megaera specifically choose Sin? No satisfactory explanation was given, and we’ll probably never know.

In short, Thompson and DC Editorial dreamed up a different sort of team and a scenario to bring the BoP back to life, but the result suffers from lazy plotting, poor character choices, and sub-par execution.

About The Reviewer: Gabriel Hernandez is the Publisher & EIC of ComicalOpinions.com, a comics review site dedicated to indie, small, and mid-sized publishers.

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Bits and Pieces:

Birds Of Prey #6 ends the first arc with a big action moment, a new status quo for at least one character, and the groundwork for the title’s future. That said, many of the plot points that didn’t sit right in the beginning resulted in too many plot holes that are either ignored or lazily explained away, suggesting the Birds of Prey is NOT in capable hands.

4.5/10