Dick Grayson’s pirate adventure ends in Nightwing #109 from DC Comics, written by Tom Taylor, with art by Stephen Byrne and Sami Basri.
We reviewed the book on the Stack podcast. But in the interest of highlighting more about the title, here’s a summary of the conversation with our thoughts. And if you prefer the longer audio version, that’s below as well!
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Nightwing #109 Review:
Nightwing has been reconnecting with his old life as Ric Grayson, and mixing it up with some pirates. By the end of the issue, he’s finally wrapped up his pirate life and found some key info on the man who killed his parents. He’s also developing a fear of heights! Yikes!
Taking it to the end of the issue, the footage of Tony Zucco causing Dick’s parents’ murder seemed nice, but didn’t so much redefine everything as “define it,” said host Alex Zalben.
On that note, while Justin Tyler did say that he loves the book and “it’s been such a fantastic run,” he added, “This arc has been one of my less favorite runs, it feels a little bit off in some way. And maybe it’s the use of the Ric character that was a strange misstep. This is the character that had amnesia and was like a sort of bad-boy version of Grayson. Bringing that back is a fun idea. But this feels a little not quite where the story has been going. I like the idea that we get to at the end of this Dick is going to be going back and having a reason to really confront Zucco. Now that he has evidence of something that we’ve all talked about as a bad guy for, I want to say, 20 to 30 years.”
Despite all that, Pete LePage “enjoyed this very much… Some great covers… It’ll be interesting to see how [the discovery of Zucco] changes things moving forward, but fun backup as well.”
Zalben shouted out Stephen Byrne’s art in the issue, particularly a sequence where Nightwing tells a pirate “this is an ambush” and reveals an ambush can be one person, if that person is Nightwing. “Really, really well done splash page,” Zalben said.
And wrapping up, Tyler noted, “I was a little critical here, but it’s still a fantastic comic and the way that they marry the storytelling and the visuals in this book is always top-notch.”
Nightwing #109 Official Synopsis:
NIGHTWING’S PIRATE ADVENTURE ENDS HERE! AN ALL-NEW BEAST WORLD BACK UP STORY BEGINS! The dramatic conclusion to Nightwing’s pirate quest! Nightwing learns the truth behind the secret pirate society, and his relationship with Bea Bennett changes forever. Plus, an all-new adventure begins in the backups. What’s going on with Beast Boy, and why is everyone turning into animals? The tie-in to Beast World, the thrilling new event of the season, starts here.
