Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne

ARTISTS

Writer: Grant Morrison
Pencillers: Lee Garbett, Pere Perez
Inkers: Alejandro Sicat, Walden Wong
Colorist: Guy Major
Letterer: Jared K. Fletcher
Editor: Mike Marts

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CHARACTERS & SETTINGS

heroes: Booster Gold, Green Lantern II, Rip Hunter, Superman
supporting: Skeets II

Setting: Last-century Vanishing Point, DCU

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ISSUE SUMMARY

Cover Description: Batman swings recklessly into a gunfire. (No Booster Gold.)

Brief Synopsis: The Time Masters are trapped at the end of time.

Costume Worn: MARK I.v2 power-suit

This story has been reprinted in the following issue:
Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne (2012)

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ISSUE ANNOTATIONS

Page 10, panel 1
This panel picks up with the Green Lantern, Superman, Booster Gold, Rip Hunter, and Skeets trapped in Vanishing Point "2 minutes 3 seconds" (or "123 seconds") from the end of time as seen on page 28 of Batman: the Return of Bruce Wayne #2.

Page 11, panel 3
Rip Hunter stands up against Green Lantern for Booster Gold. At the time, Booster is protected from entropy by his golden force field, and Green Lantern and Rip Hunter are protected by the green energy of the Oan Power Ring. It takes some guts to speak up against the fellow who is keeping you alive (even if Lantern does have it coming). Lantern's complete disrespect for Booster Gold has been a recurring theme in this and the spin-off Time Masters: Vanishing Point mini-series.

Page 12, panel 2
SPOILER WARNING!: Rip Hunter has been using the resources of Vanishing Point for a considerable period of time. As he mentioned earlier in this issue, the archives at Vanishing Point have stored "every event that ever occurred." Why has he never used its resources to create an advanced Time Sphere before? Reveal

Page 13, panel 3
Finally, Superman's presence in this series is explained, as he is required to provide the heat to power Rip Hunter's Time Sphere in the hopes of escaping Vanishing Point before it succumbs to entropy at the end of time. It has long been a popularly accepted scientific theory that the universe will end when maximum entropy is reached; that is, when the energy of all the universe has reached evenly distributed equilibrium. More recent scientific theories estimate that the universe will suffer its final heat death approximately 5 billions years from now.

For more annotations from this issue which occur at a different point in Booster Gold's chronology, click here (for recent-past Booster Gold) or click here (for near-future Booster Gold).

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ISSUE REVIEW

Boosterrific Review: If there's anything to be certain about a Grant Morrison-written series, it is that the story won't make much sense when it's all over. This issue (and in fact this series) wants to be a bigger event than it is. The inevitability of Bruce Wayne's return steals any emotional impact. Batman, a rational detective who focuses on small-time crime, is a poor fit for all of the ridiculous god/time/fifth-world mumbo-jumbo that provides the thin veneer for a typically Morrison bit of meta-fiction (DC Heroes as modern gods/ideas) that suffers from taking itself far too seriously. It's not a terrible book: it's just not everything that it wants to be.

Boosterrific Rating:

• Currently 3.0/5 Stars.

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