Birds of Prey (2023-) #13

Birds of Prey (2023) (Single Issues) #13

by Kelly Thompson, Gavin Guidry (inker), Jordie Bellaire (cover_art)

With the search for Barbara finally over, Cass leads the Birds of Prey through the portal one final time, and where they end up is a world far too familiar to Cass but strange to everyone else. What here will turn everything on its head…or should we say who?!

Genres: Comics, Dc Comics

23 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 4, 2024

About the author

KELLY THOMPSON has a degree in Sequential Art from The Savannah College of Art & Design. Her love of comics and superheroes have compelled her since she first discovered them as a teenager. Currently living in Portland, Oregon with her boyfriend and the two brilliant cats that run their lives, you can find Kelly all over the Internet where she is generally well liked, except where she's detested.

Kelly has published two novels - THE GIRL WHO WOULD BE KING (2012) and STORYKILLER (2014) and the graphic novel HEART IN A BOX from Dark Horse Comics (2015). She's currently writing ROGUE & GAMBIT, HAWKEYE, and PHASMA for Marvel Comics and GHOSTBUSTERS for IDW. Other major credits include: A-Force, Captain Marvel & The Carol Corps, Jem and The Holograms, Misfits, Power Rangers Pink, and the creator-owned mini-series Mega Princess.

Kelly's ambitions are eclipsed only by her desire to exist entirely in pajamas. Fortunately pajamas and writers go hand in hand (most of the time). Please buy all her stuff so that she can buy (and wear) more pajamas.

Reviews

[Noah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've got your memory… or has it got me? (She’s Got You – Patsy Cline).

Oh boy, another fun comic! Well, I say “fun” in the way that sponsored YouTubers describe video games that were most definitely mid but because they were paid to review it, all of a sudden, it’s fun. Really though, I’m kind of joking because I did find some genuine joy in the few minutes it took for me to flip through this, and I have a slightly different rating scale when it comes to comics as compared to full-length novels. I'm a bit more generous. All it really takes is for something to have a pretty cover and it's all coming up "four-star reads!" Besides, I'm self-aware in the fact that my lower opinion of this comic book is mostly because I picked it up on issue #13, and in my infinite hubris (my superhero name is Icarus Man) I believed that my powers of understanding context clues were so great that reading and comprehending this would be a piece of cake. I went into this in full “pssh, I’m fine! It’s a comic, what’s the worst that could happen!?”-mode. Yeah well, in Birds of Prey (2023-) #13, it looks like there’s a female version of Batman as one of the main characters here and she’s pretty cool. I’m sure there’s some deviations from the source material with this character but I’d rather read a comic book with her than good old Bruce Wayne. Not that I hate him or anything (I love Robert Pattinson’s Doc Marten Batman! You just know his ankles are all messed up after fighting crime in those things), but if I’m picking up a comic book, I tend to lean towards the ones that feature characters I’ve never seen before. Moving on though, we find Batgirl and Black Canary and a bunch of other characters that I only recognize from the art I reblog on Tumblr in some kind of dreamland world created by the villain... who is another character I don’t know. And that’s about it! See, my problem is that to a layman, my knowledge of comic book characters seems vast and unending, but the second I’m hit with a follow-up question, I fold instantly. I do enjoy it whenever a plot includes a "fake dream" scenario that feeds on the character's hopes and dreams or their fears and nostalgia. I can see why it's a popular trope in super hero stories because it works as an easy-to-follow character study on how to make them relatable. Whenever these super powerful beings are forced let go and struggle with all the parts of themselves that make them human, you know you're in for a good time! Otherwise, I’ve been finding that the comic runs that I enjoy the most are the ones that tell one-off stories. You know, read these four issues and you’re done! Because man, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had the urge to “get into comics" before and all of a sudden I'm hit with stacks upon stacks of homework just to get a full narrative arc. I just want to read a Batman comic, why is it so hard to read a Batman comic!? Whatever, I'm okay with just sticking with Birds of Prey for now.

Yeah so~oo, even if this does deviate from what fans know and love and changes a bunch of things that's already been established in the lore (if that’s even what’s happening here. Remember, I don’t know shit), I’m totally fine with that. And since I'm just listing things now, another thing I'm totally fine with is all the people that hate the movie Joker, because... I agree! But man, people have really turned on that movie. Ha ha! My only issue is that I mostly only see people criticize it for being disrespectful for the source material, and yeah, it's pretty shitty for someone who hates comic books to make a comic book movie in the name of "elevating" the material, but in my opinion, Joker the movie Joker isn’t a bad movie because it switches up the canon lore of The Joker …it’s bad because Todd Philips was bitter at the bad reviews for his trash Hangover movies they as they painfully dragged on and on and would rather blame their increasingly poor reception on society being too “woke” (not a real problem, by the way) than accept the fact that he’s a hack director with nothing to say and no artistic vision and the only movie he’s gotten accolades for is derivative of a better movie made by real director, Martin Scorsese... but I digress. Sorry, I’m actually in a pretty good mood (just had pho), that just slipped out for some reason. Even if this story does feel disconnected from some kind of mainline comic universe, that's not the reason why I'd have any complaints. In fact, this stand-alone appeal even came as a relief! See, the key for my enjoyment of this kind of stuff is staying in my lane, and it’s nice when the specific story-lines do too. I saw this one TikTok that somehow got filtered down into my Tumblr feed where this guy, speaking with the same intonation of that one dude in every Socratic Seminar (you know the one, “Piggy-backing off of what [blank] said…”), was talking about how he wanted the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) to encompass literally every form of genre. Mysteries, drama, romantic comedies, all would be cool with him as long as they took place within his little comic book movie cinematic universe. And full offense, but that actually sounds like the worst thing ever! These things are already so damn impenetrable to get into, "miss one and miss them all"-type shit, that I can't even imagine trying to watch normal movies while they constantly try to connect its story to some separate superhero thing! I just watched this movie called The Apartment recently and loved it, but could you imagine how terrible it would have been if the writers constantly had to shoehorn dumb references to other events in the shared universe? What, are we going to be out here like, “Gee, this sure is a fun comedy drama about a man who rents out his apartment for his coworkers to have a place where they can cheat on their spouses, thus allowing him the opportunity to move up the corporate ladder! But it does beg the question of what Captain American is up to. Also, where's Deadpool? I need him so he can look at the camera and tell me which joke to laugh at.” Yuck, is all I’m saying. Must all forms of art be fed into and then diluted through the slop machine!? I mean, I like this stuff a lot, but it's not like I made it my duty to defend it at every opportunity. And I certainly don't want everything to be slop! Anyway, have I said this was fun yet? Because it was! Fun, that is. So much... fun... (#notasponseredreview).

[Cybernex007 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well I have to admit, some people may think that wasn’t the most satisfying conclusion, I know it wasn’t for the BOP, but I had such a great time this issue but with the series coming to an end soonish (at the time I am writing this) I am worried we won’t ever get a proper conclusion. But either way this was still great. As we left off from the last issue we are following Cass’ plan, which involves Megaera capturing Maia and dragging her into the portal as Cass and Clea lead the way, forming the world with their thoughts, and now it seems I will have to go back and read all about Xanthe and Spirit world as the reason Xanthe was asking if our characters were already dead, is because Cass formed the world to look like spirits world…and Clea contributed the memories of her sisters! Immediately upon getting Maia into the world they kept hitting her with everything they had to keep her off balance, to line her up for the perfect position to have the ghosts of her sisters, formed from Clea’s memories, form and attack her! This sent Maia into such a shock that it immediately sent her running for the hills and on her way to open a portal back into the real world in a desperate attempt to get away. This is exactly what Cass wanted to happen and the birds were able to tackle her through the portal before she could close it…crashing right into the very confused team on the outside. But even with Megaera getting Maia back in their grasp, Maia immediately began to use their powers to grow into an uncontrollable large snake…but there is still one problem…two of their party members didn’t pass through. Clea stayed behind and Cass stayed with her, Clea was unsure about going as she felt like she was leaving her sisters behind. But Cass was there to reminder her that they will always remain alive inside of her, and helped to take her hand and walk her thigh the portal to the chaos that met them on the other side. As they came in its utter chaos, Xanthe and Zealot both are hacking away at the ever expanding snake with their swords and Constantine is throwing down everything he has without much sticking. But the chaos finally subsides when Clea cuts through it and sticks a gun in her sister’s face, these two are finally facing each other after a very long time, and it’s time for some honesty. Clea throws it in her sisters face that she has had working time travel for so long and has done nothing to try and stop their mother’s murder, she was never looming to save her only looking for an excuse to become a super villain like their mom. But right as Clea pulls the trigger, seemingly completely ready to kill her sister and absorb her powers, her sister evades it and turns into a hummingbird. But before Dinah can deliver a precise shot to take her down…she vanishes, going through the portal and closing it right behind her. She got away. Barbara asks if there is a way to reopen it, but everyone yells at her there is no way they are doing that again. Barbara is reasonably worried that they will have to watch their backs from such a powerful adversary, but they have to watch their backs all the time anyway. And at the very least Constantine is happy to announce that one of the spells did stick, leaving them with a magical LoJack, which is basically a device that alerts them if a portal ever opens up from her anywhere on earth. So just keep an eye on it and they can prepare. As the issue comes to an end Constantine heads out to get Xanthe home safely, like they need it lol, and Clea heads off to find her own way. But as Dinah checks her phone we lead perfectly into the next issue as her phone immediately begins to blow up with notifications. Hilariously the next issue is where I started this issue, this was so great!

[Nicolo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Leandro Romero is killing it on the covers, particularly this one, but I do miss his work on the interiors. Still, the story is as solid as ever if not for the ending to this arc.

Kelly Thompson has assembled a team that has a roster that calls back the original lineup when Gail Simone was writing an earlier iteration of this title. It is also peppered with a few new members. In fact, two of them have great chemistry together, despite being on the opposite end of tenure on the team. Big Barda is the veteran, and the team's powerhouse, and Cassandra Cain has started to look up to the New God like a mentor. Cain has always been my favorite Batgirl and she is shining in this book.

This issue ends a long arc, and though the team managed to act as a close as a real team as they can, the ending left me wanting. I wanted a more decisive ending rather than this open ended one.

[Yasser Maniram · Rating 2 out of 5]

Might just be my least favourite issue since they changed artists and went all psychedelic several issues ago - which this issue coincidentally has a similar newsprint archie comics art style to it. Story wise the most interesting part is what they were going to order for delivery to eat at the end of the issue. A real snooze with a villain who looks like she just got out of bed and threw on a costumed helm - is that why she has so much cleavage? Slept in too late.

[Alexis Moreno · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not sure if i like how the ending of this run went. it feels very unresolved in some ways and resolved in other ways. I’m hoping Cela comes back and i’m hoping the group is able to get some sorta closure and not just move on but in suspecting that closure isn’t coming soon. I am as engaged in the story as ever.

[RubiGiráldez RubiGiráldez · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vuelve el estilo gráfico más "clásico". Lo cual agradezco. Pero este arco argumental me ha desconectado bastante. Supongo que el cliffhanger final puede que tenga que ver con algo relacionado con Absolute Power (?).

[Jason · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.75

[Abbie · Rating 3 out of 5]

An ending of an arc I didn't really care for.

[rafaela (taylor's version) · Rating 4 out of 5]

4, 25