The Batman Scooby-Doo Mysteries #4

The Batman Scooby-Doo Mysteries #4

DC Comics 2021

Written by Sholly Fisch

Illustrated by Dario Brizuela

Coloured by Franco Riesco

Lettered by Saida Temofonte

One or two monster masks might just mean there’s a smuggler or crooked real estate developer in town. But when Gotham City is terrorized by an army of thugs in monster masks, it can only mean one thing: a citywide crime spree by Black Mask and his gang, the False Face Society! With Batman mysteriously missing, and Nightwing and Batgirl up against a horde of crooked creatures, it’s lucky that the heroes have help from Scooby and the gang. After all, who has more experience in pulling the masks off bad guys?

Still one of the best books on stands right now. The world needs this series to continue past issue twelve it’s just too good not to and besides Gotham has a lot more heroes and villains than most folks realise so this needs to keep selling out, go buy all the issues make sure it sells out of stores and out of Diamond. If you don’t like Scooby-Doo, ya crazy freak who doesn’t like Scooby?, buy em anyway and donate them to a children’s hospital just make sure the series sells out of Diamond.

Nightwing and Batgirl take centre stage this issue as the kids all have to fend off Black Mask and his henchmen who are wearing monster masks. It really is the perfect scenario as the the Scooby gang get to unmask folks and Nightwing & Batgirl get to fight a supervillain. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceptionally well. The character development we see through the dialogue, the character interaction and how they act and react to the situations and circumstances which they encounter continually flesh them out. The pacing is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing the story we’re caught up in having such a good time.

I like how this is being structured and how the layers within the story continue to grow, evolve and strengthen. The layers contains the characterisation, the twists & turns and more which adds the depth, dimension and complexity to the story. How we see everything working together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is achieved extremely well.

The interiors here are perfect. This is the kind of work that makes it feel exactly like an animated series and how that whole look, tone and feel should be. It is almost like reading a book of animation cels it’s that close. The linework is exceptional and how the varying weights are utilised to create the detail work is sublime stuff. That we see backgrounds utilised here to enhance the moments as well as how they work within the composition of the panels to bring out the depth perception, sense of scale and the overall sense of size and scope to the story is beautifully rendered. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a remarkably talented eye for storytelling. The colour work is brilliantly rendered and how we see the various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work is sensational.

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This is a perfect all-ages book that can be passed around the house and then talked about over a device free meal. It has elements that kids will love, adults will love those too but see extra moments that will not register as much with the kids. It has that perfect tightrope balance to it that straddles the adult/kids line and it is so extremely impressive. With the writing, characterisation and interior artwork this is one of the most solid offerings on stands at the moment.