On the eve of Batman: Joker War Zone #1 let's take a look at Batgirl Vol. 2: Redemption.

I have to confess I still don't know what to think of this mini. It is the Schrödinger's Cassandra Cain story. There is a lot of bad in it, and there is a lot of good in it. I do enjoy the story more than I did when it originally came out.

Let's start with the good this opening page wish a gorgeously scary Cass from Jim Calafiore and is that a Laura Kinney homage with the batarangs?

The "redemption road" of the story could be interpreted as two-fold: both in Beechen redeeming not only Cassandra in the eyes of the Bat-Family but redeeming himself with readers for well turning her heel back in Robin #150 and Titans East. Cause let's face it-- Ugh.

I remember DiDio saying at a Wizardworld Chicago '08 panel that Beechen bugged him for pitches on this mini. That Adam was the only one pitching stories on Cass (which was a half-lie, we know Chuck Dixon had a fill-in issue of Tec ready to go telling how Cass/Bruce mended).

Course, by this time period Dixon was exiting Robin and Batman & the Outsiders so, yeah it was a half-truth.

That made me angry back then, but now I see the why, and I'm okay with it. In his original ways of writing Cass, Beechen's attempts were-- not good. This was his chance to show readers he had really looked into the character's history and fix these issues that he himself put in.

Think about it we came from this in Robin #152...

To this. Beechen calling out the grand problem within the Bat-books (even now). Cass is important in the Bat-Family, TREAT HER AS SUCH. Which he does having Alfred (of course) pointing these things out.

But Alfred isn't the only one being meta here. I didn't even realize it, until this year, but there is one other character playing a meta part in this comic, Nightwing.

If there's one HUGE gripe with this particular volume it is the relationship of Cass/Dick in it. We went to them being brother/sister to well. We have Dick literally acting like a dick to her.

Then it hit me.

Who was writing Nightwing at the time period? Who treated the character of Cassandra like what Alfred says? Then suddenly Dick's characterization here began making sense much more sense (when you have this going on later on in Batman & Robin by same said writer.

So these meta calling out throughout the series does make it a much more fascinating take because you realize Beechen is showing on the why Cassandra should be up there. As Screenrant pointed out a few days ago. https://screenrant.com/batgirl-cassandra-cain-nightwing-unwelcome-batfamily/

Because this mini does have Cass go thru a journey that explores the limits of the Bat-Family's underlying culture of vengeance. And she reaches a natural conclusion to this (more on that later).

So let's talk about the downright awful of the first issue. A wall of text that would make even Brian Michael Bendis blush. This is only one page of it in the issue. We got TWO.

Until this issue, we never really got a "defined" timeline of Cass's EVIL period. We just figured OYL, Supergirl #14, Robin #161-162, and Titans East was how it happened. Turns out we were WRONG. Did we really need to see these pages of text? Not really.

In all honesty, I think a simpler solution would have been just tiny panels of Cass seeing the various people she killed when drugged up. At the very least, it would put faces on those Cass was forced to do. You could feel her rage on why she's hunting Slade/David Cain then.

Plus it feels like we're missing something as Tim was basically like Dick in Titans East. But now he's changed. Why? There could have been panels of Tim showing care for Cass in this. Instead, he just feels muted throughout this mini.

The first issue ends with Cass confronting another mystery lady murdering some of Slade/David Cain's assassins. And again, a problem I have with this mini.

These "children of Cain" feel so nameless save for Marque, who is the opposite of Cass. She embraces the violence that she was taught and is David Cain's own Frankenstein Monster. Throughout the mini she just comes off as superfluous and edgy. Really edgy...

I really think Beechen missed a prime chance here in having Cass trying to save someone like herself. Someone unlike Cass, didn't realize life as much as she did. That finally, Cain cracked the code (with help from the Slade juice). And Cass could try to redeem her.

So this whole theme of redemption could be all over the place then. Marque throughout this just feels, meh. Speaking of meh say hello to meaningless love interest #3.

This subplot just feels pretty meh. I get the why Beechen tried it. The writer from Batman: City of Light attempted this. Horrocks with Black Wind during his run on Vol. 1, Gabrych attempted this in his run with Zero (and let's face it we only remember his name because he died).

The whole love subplot just feels so unnecessary here. Again we could have more stuff with Tim helping her. Something. Instead, we get someone we care little about. Because A.) we've seen it before and are so over it.