What Were You Thinking DC?

There are so many horrific moments in A.J. Lieberman’s “Batman: Hush Returns” graphic novel that you’ll often find yourself scratching your head in simultaneous shock and disbelief.

While the story starts off interesting enough, with Hush hunting not only the Batman, but Riddler as well, the trade soon falls off the wagon as it blatantly begins to steal material straight from the Alan Moore classic “The Killing Joke,” as it needs the story from there to help fuel its mediocre setting and flat lining drama.

Focusing much more on the Joker than anyone else, you’ll wonder what exactly Lieberman was trying to accomplish in this throw-away tale. Simply put, even if you loved Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee’s “Hush” series, you’ll find little to enjoy here in this pitiful attempt to cash in on a successful character that didn’t have the legs DC originally thought it did.

The fact that the trade jumps over 10 issues after a major moment in the trade [many of the standard issues of the series are impossible to find as well, forcing you to go on Wikipedia to find out what eventually happened] is proof enough that someone dropped the ball big time on this one.

Feeling as if Lieberman was trying to throw in as many characters into the tale as possible, the plot of “Hush Returns” is an absolute mess. There’s little to no development here either, as Batman seems terrified of the thought of fighting his former childhood friend, but is given so few opportunities to speak that you’ll wonder what it is your missing. The small conflict between the Dark Knight

Just when things start to get good, another character, whether it be the Penguin, Green Arrow, Prometheus, the Joker or Poison Ivy, someone jumps in and the atmosphere is gone.

It’s like getting ready to eat at a gourmet restaurant and closing your eyes right before the spoon hits your mouth- to only find your feast replaced by a White Castle slider.

Ironically, the best parts of the book are the ones where Lieberman has an opportunity to show just how devious and cruel Hush can be, but these are too few and far between to make the book remotely enjoyable.

Luckily, the pencils of Al Barrionuevo and Javier Pina are off-beat and original, as splash pages galore capture the action in dramatic fashion. Nonetheless, it’s not enough to warrant a purchase of this lackluster tale.

Like a good-looking woman with toilet paper on her shoe, you can’t help but laugh when she asks to be taken seriously, parading about unknowingly.

Rather than rip-off one of the best one-shots in the company’s history, DC wasted what could have been an interesting tale by allowing Lieberman to depend on the tales of the past, rather than continue a decent enough storyline provided by Loeb and Lee, in the end creating a mess of a story that belongs anywhere but in your personal comic book collection.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14225 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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