Judd Winick

I actually saw (and loved) the direct-to-video animated movie version of this years ago, and have been reading all the comics those movies are based on, so that finally gave me an excuse to check this out. The obvious things working in the story’s favor are that I freaking love Robin, Nightwing, and villains who are either corrupted good guys or evil versions of good guys or whatever. I just always find those kinds of conflicts compelling thematically and because they’re so evenly show more matched.

Jason Todd isn’t my favorite Robin by any stretch of the imagination, but uh, I did write some embarrassing crackship slash fiction of him and Nightwing as a teenager so clearly I found him at least somewhat compelling. (For the record: I wrote Jason as an extremely bratty power bottom and Dick as a very befuddled service top and this is objectively correct I will not be accepting feedback at this time.)

Anyway yeah this story rules. There are parts of it that are emotionally difficult like Jason’s death and his tirade at Bruce for not killing the Joker after he killed him, which really drives the overall drama of both versions. And I feel a lot of empathy for everyone involved even Bruce even though he’s a dumbass and should kill the Joker for so many reasons, but especially for what he did to Jason. There’s just no coming back from that, and he’s shown time and time again that locking him up isn’t going to do shit, he’s just going to escape and murder more people again and again.

Like I said I saw the movie before reading the comics, but yeah the comics kicked ass. The narration, the art, the action, and the dialogue were all top notch. There were a few diversions from the main plot that seemed kind of unnecessary (what was even going on with Mr. Freeze), but I still don’t have any real major complaints. And WOW the fights kicked ass. show less

It has been a long time since a book, especially a graphic... memoir, I guess you'd call it... has moved me to this extent. Judd Winick was a housemate with several others in the San Francisco season of MTV's "The Real World", in which TV cameras show nearly everything as a group of selected people live together for several months. Judd's roommate was Pedro Zamora, a young Latino originally from Cuba, who was gay and HIV positive. Over the months, a fast friendship developed between the two show more roommates, and also Pam Ling, another housemate. Pedro became an AIDS educator, traveling the country giving talks and information wherever he was asked. He also began getting sick. This story unfolds from Pedro's and Judd's beginnings, takes us through their meeting and growing friendship, which would extend to Pam, through Pedro's first signs of illness, his marriage to Sean, his worsening symptoms and death at 22. This is bare-bones, but the book is not. It is honest, emotional and ends with a quiet joy that Pedro did not let AIDS define him, and despite his brief time on Earth, he left it a better place than when he found it. So if Judd Winick can produce something as powerful as this, and as great a comic as "The Adventures of Barry Ween", what is he doing writing mainstream DC comics now? show less

Oddly, in an emotional and intriguing plot about the mysterious new Red Hood and his connection to the Batman, the standout for me is the darkly hilarious Black Mask, recently crowned king of the Gotham City underworld. He's witty, scary, utterly unfeeling, and somehow both irreverent and deadly serious at the same time. Considering the decades of excellent competition, it's hard standing out as a Batman villain, but in these issues, the Black Mask very much does.

The plot itself, though, is show more actually fairly good, even if I would have wished it to be a tad more complex and packing a few more twists and turns. Even so, Batman's growing suspicion and dread at what is happening makes for a stellar slow-burn subplot while the Red Hood wages his war on the Black Mask in the main storyline. And the Red Hood himself is well written, making this a character return from the dead that, unusual for comic book resurrections, actually feels like it enrichens the original death storyline rather than cheapening it. And it helps that the artwork is both exciting and beautiful. show less

Judd Winick has taken a lot of crap from the comics community for his work, some deserved and some undeserved. But for those who only know him from his mainstream work, I highly recommend this book (well, I recommend it even if you don't only know him from his mainstream comics work). It's funny, educational, incredibly heartfelt. I can not read this book without bawling like a baby, yet the book is surprisingly uplifting. It is an amazing story and a great monument to who Pedro Zamora was.