Batman/The Flash: The Button

Couldn't wait to read this, as this is the first major story since DC Universe: Rebirth #1 to further the main arc of this launch.Story: There's actually not a lot going on here. I mean, it's action packed for sure, but there's a basic story here. It's not too in depth, although I'd be mistaken if I said it wasn't deep in its implications and consequences. Batman starts to work on the button, and contacts Barry to come over to the cave. Barry in the mean time is fighting some robot samurais. In the minute between Bruce telling Barry to come over and him arriving, Bruce is attacked by an apparently resurrected Eobard Thawne, and is savagely beaten. Batman does manage to get in a few good shots, but Thawne with his super speed and smart fighting prevails over Batman. He takes the button into his possession and disappears. He quickly reappears seconds later, but disintegrates! Barry arrives, gets Bruce wrapped up in bandages, and begins the investigation. After detecting some of the Speed Force on Thawne, Barry decides to trace the path that Thawne took to see what or who killed him. Barry goes up to the watchtower, takes the sheet off of the cosmic treadmill, and prepares to travel through the time stream. Bruce, in costume, follows Barry and insist on accompanying him. What transpires next is a journey to an alternate timeline that shouldn't exist any longer, seeing past histories of the DC Universe, meeting up with Thawne as he traveled through the Speed Force and trying to prevent his death, and seeing the death of Eobard Thawne by an unseen force. C'mon, we all know who it is! As Batman and Flash tumble through this time stream, someone calls out to Flash. Flash says the guy's name, and he bursts forth from his captivity in this place, and manages to get Batman and Flash back home. He is unfortunately pulled back, as Barry cannot remember him as he did Wally. Being back at the beginning and with no way to travel back into the time stream, Bruce and Barry talk about why they were allowed to see and experience all the things they did. The only lead they have now is that Thawne was killed by "God". Bruce, after his experiences starts to question whether he should be Batman any longer. In the place where the trail of the button ended, where the button sits on a rocky surface in space, where Thawne was killed, a glowing blue hand picks the button up and briefly talks about everyone being puppets of preordained actions. It's just that he's the only one who can see the strings. Counting down to Doomsday Clock!Art: Jason Fabok never messes up anything. He's one of DC's top artists, as well as one of the best in the world. His art here is phenomenal, but I already knew it was going to be. Howard Porter is a comics legend and I think this might be my first book with him as a featured artist. He does a great job as well, and I can't wait to see him on the main Flash title. I really like the way Porter draws the after images or speed trails of the Flash in motion. It's quite nice. His art here did look a little "sketchy", but I'm not worried. This book is also colored very well. The issues drawn by Fabok tend to be darker in visual tone, but that's pretty appropriate for his style, and what he's drawing. A lot of the scenes he draws takes place in a Batcave, so expect it to be kinda dark. The issues done by Porter are brighter as he seems to be doing the cosmic and timestream scenes. Those are expected to be brighter, and the colors really pop out there. The covers by Jason Fabok are amazing, as well as the variants by Mikel Janin. I think Janin might go down as one of my favorite artists in the near future. I'm waiting for "The War of Jokes and Riddles" to come out. The variants by Tim Sale only show that he's a shadow of his former self. I mean, the guy just isn't what he used to be! His variants look like a 5 year old's drawings that mommy puts up on the refrigerator.Overall: In a sense, this is a murder mystery that still leaves our heroes perplexed by the end. Even though they're brought back to the beginning, with the only lead being that it was "God", there are still some lasting consequences. Bruce is now struggling with the advice he received on finding happiness and whether to continue being Batman or not. Barry wonders who the stranger that saved them is. This was a cool, action packed story. It's easy to follow. I'm giving it five stars. The story itself would only garner 4 stars from me because of its simplicity and I felt that not enough was moved forward. But, the fantastic art raises the rating up for me to a full 5 stars. This is definitely worth reading. It's beautiful to look at as well. I'm looking forward to seeing the aftermath of what happened to Bruce and Barry. I can't wait for Doomsday Clock!

I grabbed the Rebirth Deluxe Hardback awhile ago, so as to hopefully see if DC was going to return some of the characters - or should I say characterisations of characters that resulted in my stopping subscribing a few years back. Whilst I did enjoy the story, I was dismayed how long this "rebirth" seemed to be taking. However when I saw this Deluxe edition of "the Button" was coming out - and I had seen some snatched of the fight between Batman and the Reverse Flash, I thought that it would be a good read and a worthwhile "peak" to see how the rebirth saga is going...Well I was not disappointed - this collection of 4 issues (2 x Batman, 2 x Flash) is quite nicely collected and presented, and I did enjoy the story. In fact though I think a year or so has passed since the contents (issues) of the Rebirth Deluxe were released and those contained here, for me at least it works as a nice sequel. Best of all both Batman (Bruce) and Flash (Barry) were portrayed in ways that I enjoyed.I fully understand that characters have to grow and adapt to new audiences / cultures / times etc - but the downside is that you often end of with characterisations you can no longer relate to or don't enjoy reading. Maybe I am just getting old - but being a big fan of the Golden Age, this book did make me happy but I won't spoil why ;-)Doomsday Clock is coming out - so I probably will grab a collection of that to see where all this goes...

I have mixed feelings about this particular volume. Overall it is a solid story with some very good art, but on the other hand I felt that it had very little point to it. I mostly bought this volume as a continuation of Tom King's excellent Batman: Rebirth series but I also wanted to see more about the impending crossover between the DC and Watchmen universes teased back in the DC Rebirth special. As a continuation of King's Batman it's great, with lots of call back to previous events in that series. I assume it's the same case with Joshua Williamson's The Flash series, which this volume is a crossover with but I haven't read it. This collection does expect you to know quite a bit about DC Comics' recent stories like Flashpoint and the New 52, so if you are behind on those stories you will feel lost. I don't want to spoil the story as it is very good but amounts to very little. This seems like a story whose purpose is to remind you of big things that have been teased to come in the future then anything to further unravel the mystery behind DC Rebirth. Calling this a Deluxe Edition is no lie though because not only does the collection come with bonus material and sketches, but also has a cool 3D slip cover though mine had a funny smell. I still recommend for those who have been enjoying the DC Rebirth initiative like I have.

A surprisingly enjoyable read before jumping into doomsday clock, and a powerful moment between Batman and the one man that might convince him to do the impossible. Even if you know he’ll never be able to do what he’s asked at the end of the day.

This is an amazing continuation of the Rebirth one-shot and prelude to Doomsday Clock as well as Flashpoint for that matter. People will complain about the whole Watchmen thing and say "Leave it alone!" but the fact is, its a profitable property, its an anniversary and if Geoff Johns has a good story to tell why would you want to stop him? That's the point. A good story trumps all fanboy rage. And Geoff (I know this is written by Tom King and Joshua Williamson but Geoff Johns is the Dr Manhattan of this story, pulling all the strings) is weaving a great mystery with a lot of heart. Batman gets an incredible moment in this story that you don't want to miss.I'm sure Alan Moore is furious and let him be, the guys stories have transcended beyond him as a person and exist as their own amazing entities.Buy this book if not for a fun Flash/Batman team-up. Two detectives solving a universal mystery. Thats what comics are all about.

great comic

Great story and builds up to the Doomsday Clock storyline.

Excelente história, desenhos incríveis! Não acrescenta muito na construção da estrada para Doomsday Clock, mas é uma ótima leitura.Principalmente para quem também lê The Flash Rebirth, pois todo o lance com o Reverso, continua no título do velocista.

Excelente historia en la que Batman y Flash unen sus habilidades detectivescas/forenses para dar los primeros pasos hacia la gran revelación a la que se dirige Rebirth. Además, tenemos a Reverse Flash recordando al lector porque es uno de los villanos más peligrosos e interesantes del universo DC. El arte y la narrativa son excelentes, y junto a la increíble cubierta lenticular, hacen de ésta edición un elemento que no puede faltar dentro de la colección de todo fan de DC.El producto llegó al día siguiente, perfectamente empacado y en excelentes condiciones.

Edición original en inglés. Recomendable haber leído Flashpoint y Rebirth, o al menos saber un poco de la historia antes de leer este cómic. Se trata de una historia intermedia, que si bien puedes leer de forma independiente, el final queda abierto para los que vendrá en el próximo evento DC "Doomsday Clock".La edición es muy buena. El papel es de calidad y viene con una cubierta con portada lenticular que según la gires, ves a Batman o a Flash sujetando la chapa.Como curiosidad, decir que si compras la edición española no encontrarás la portada original, ya que por tema de derechos de imagen en España no puede aparecer el smiley.

Réception rapide en 5 jours ouvrés dans un emballage nickel et un produit sans aucun défaut.Je ne m'attendais pas à ce que cette édition soit jolie. La jaquette est impressionnante et sa texture (due au lenticulaire) est excellente ! C'est assez inédit dans ma collection donc forcément j'ai tout de suite accroché. Je tiens quand même à préciser que je n'arrive pas à voir correctement les deux couvertures séparées dans le lenticulaire, alors que c'est tout à fait possible sur la version kiosque US que j'avais manipulée. Peut-être que le lenticulaire a été abîmé sur mon exemplaire ? Genre un écrasement qui aurait détériorée l'effet de celui-ci ? Dans tous les cas c'est quand même assez léger mais je m'attendais vraiment à une qualité visuelle similaire à la version kisque.Concernant le récit, ça reste très bon pour les fans qui connaissent les événements ayant mené à cette histoire (surtout pour les fans de Flashpoint dont je fais partie), mais pour les autres, ils auront simplement l'impression d'avoir un prequel à DOOMSDAY CLOCK sans forcément avoir quoique ce soit à se mettre sous la dent. Et attention, c'est très court !Le récit est imaginé par Jason Fabok que j'adore et je trouve qu'il brille dans les pages du bouquin. Côté écriture, c'est du bon aussi. D'ailleurs, une belle leçon de storytelling nous est donnée à un moment de l'histoire, les case se suivent et s'entremêlent d'une façon royale et on sent notre cœur battre au rythme des événements, assez impressionnant. Il faudra tout de même attendre DOOMSDAY CLOCK pour une relecture, car seul, le récit semble un peu égaré. Je ne doute pas qu'un an après la sortie de DOOMSDAY CLOCK, une sorte d'Omnibus sortira avec THE BUTTON en prelude, c'est acté.Côté édition elle est magnifique, je n'ai parlé que de la jaquette mais le reste du livre est joli et de très bonne qualité, avec des bonus à la fin.