DC's superhero output is deeply frustrating these days.  They've largely driven me away with their policy of shoehorning everything into a megacrossover that doesn't interest me in the slightest.  But every so often, in the interests of fairness, I give them another chance.

Hence, Batman and the Outsiders #1.

Now, what do I know about Batman and the Outsiders?  I know, because I've seen it in a price guide, that such a book existed for a few years between the 1980s.  I know that there was a book called Outsiders more recently, although I didn't read it.  I assume this book to be a relaunch of that series.  And that is, literally, the sum total of everything I know about Batman and the Outsiders.

But that's not a problem, is it?  Because this is a first issue.  And first issues always draw in lots of extra readers.  So it will be accessible.  It will explain the concept.  It will introduce the characters.  It will sell me on what the book is about.

Or maybe not.

Let's be clear about this.  Batman and the Outsiders #1 isn't a bad superhero comic.  It's a heist story, in which the various Outsiders each play their part in infiltrating the villains' lair and carrying out the mission, while Batman gives them all directions.  On the level of introducing individual characters, it's not too bad.  As an extended action sequence, it's actually quite well put together.  You'd expect that from Chuck Dixon, who has always had a solid sense of pace.

Artist Julian Lopez is also a good choice for a Chuck Dixon book.  He's good with action, he's not bad at all with body language, and he's mercifully light on the T&A.  (With one very obvious exception towards the end of the book, which stands out a mile.)  He's working firmly in the DC superhero house style, but he's certainly good at it.

In all these respects, this is a perfectly sound comic.

But, as a first issue, it flounders horribly by failing to explain what the book is actually about.  Dixon seems to take it as read that we all know who the Outsiders are, why they are together, and what marks them out from hundreds of other superhero teams.  Either that, or there's nothing to mark them out from other teams, so he's dodging the question.

Still, would it be too much to ask that issue #1 of a book called Batman and the Outsiders explains who the Outsiders are, why they are together, what purpose the team is meant to serve, and what Batman is doing with them?  Yes, apparently it would, because the book doesn't even try to address - let alone answer - any of those questions. 

The closest it gets is a scene between Batman and Thunder (whoever she may be), which mentions that Thunder is on the team as a favour to her father.  Who is her father?  Why does he want her on the team?  Why does Batman care what her father thinks?  Perhaps these questions were explained in issues leading up to the re-launch.  If so, it is regrettable that nobody saw fit to repeat this apparently vital plot information in issue #1 of the series, which by definition should have sold many thousands of copies more than lead-in issues.

Dixon and Lopez are clearly capable of doing a solid mainstream action comic.  They've even done so here.  But the failure to do anything whatsoever to explain the concept of the comic makes this first issue a real misfire.  Either they can't be bothered explaining the concept to me, or the concept is so lame as not to be worth explaining.  Neither thought particularly entices me to come back next month.

Still, at least it's not a crossover.  I'll give it that.

Rating: B-

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