Brian Apthorp

Access a version of the below that includes illustrations on my blog.

This is a Poison Ivy one-shot that reunites the same art team as the excellent "Poison Ivy: Year One" story included in Four of a Kind. Poison Ivy is not as good, mostly because there's just not very much Poison Ivy in it. Brian Apthorp and Stan Woch are at their best when drawing her, but they don't get a lot of opportunity to do so here, as she drops out through the middle of the story in favor of some Batman investigations into a perfume manufacturer.

Of course, it all turns out to be related, but one would expect a story subtitled "Poison Ivy" to be about her, not to merely include her. The "Year One" story they illustrated really played up the sexual tension between Ivy and Batman, but that's largely absent here, too: Ivy claims that Batman is in love with her, but it just comes across as a delusion on her part, as Batman never seems tempted by her. Apthorp and Woch's artwork is great, but John Francis Moore's script just doesn't give them much of interest to do.

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