Book Review: Birds of Prey vol #1 (New 52)

Book: Birds of Prey volume #1: Trouble in Mind (issues #1-7) by Duane Swierczynski with illustrations by Jesus Saiz (issues #1-5 and 7) and Javier Pina (issues #5 and 6)

Edition: I read the single issues

Rating: 3 stars

Review:

The story has the Birds of Prey (Black Canary, Starling, Katana, Poison Ivy with Batgirl assisting from time to time) trying find the mind control villain Choke who is behind this huge mind control conspiracy.

Even though, I still miss the pre-new 52 Birds of Prey, I thought this was good. Especially the first four issues. Now when it comes to issues #5-7 the writing and the story felt rushed and confusing. It seems like a good portion of the story was happening off page somewhere leaving the reader trying to figure out what was going on.

I thought the story relied too much on the fight scenes and action to carry it along instead of focusing on a good story. There was also a lot of information and details missing such as why are these ladies even a team. They don't really work well together or even like each other. And I still don't understand why Poison Ivy who is a villain was added to the team.

As for the characters, Black Canary (Dinah Lance) has lost all her personality and been replaced by a dull watered down version for the new 52. Batgirl (Barbara Gordon) is another character whose personality seems to be nonexistent. Gone are things that made these two characters wonderful, they're just there. Even Poison Ivy was bland and weak.

Katana and Starling were probably the only two that were okay.  At times Starling felt like a poor substitute for Lady Blackhawk and Huntress (Helena Bertinelli) but at least she had a personality. Although, Katana might have been a little sword happy at times, she still had a personality. 

Why give it three stars? Because I did enjoy reading these issues, there was a lot of drama and suspense as well as action. I just wish the story had more character build up and development because you don't really learn much about these characters besides little snippets that's tossed out there from time to time. I also wish the second half of the story didn't seem so rushed.

The new 52 Birds of Prey is one of the series that I have continued reading since it launched and I plan on posting more of my reviews.