Grant Morrison

As someone who is pretty new to Batman (I've read a bunch of single issues as a kid and other stories in the DC world) I knew there was going to be some disconnect on my end going into this, but even considering that I thought this volume was a mess. The writing, the plot, the characters: none of it clicked with me.
The plot overall just seems erratic and disjointed, bouncing around from one villain to another to another to ANOTHER - seriously, why are there so many villains in here? They're also BIZARRE, even for a comic book world. Pyg is downright abhorrent, and Red Hood literally looks like a red tampon applicator. Whoever designed that costume needs to be fired. This huge cast is overwhelming and leaves so little time to breathe, or develop other things that are brought up, such as Dick's struggle to feel comfortable with the Batman mantle (the Batmantle?) and find his footing with Damian. Dick and Alfred were the only characters in this I enjoyed reading. Damian could have been cool, but I just struggle believing a 10-year-old could handle himself for a second in any of these fight scenes. He also uses "gay" as an insult and isn't corrected for it, which sucks.
The extreme violence against women was also just off the walls. It felt like it was also used primarily for shock value and never offered up any narrative/dialogue on that. Sasha's character ~almost~ went there, but it lasted for like 1 page and then was abandoned. Breadcrumbs, people, breadcrumbs. There is also not a single female character in this volume who is mentioned without being characterized in terms of her relation to/interactions with a man. So that was disappointing, especially when, again, Sasha could have been used in a much more dynamic way!
I'm looking forward to reading OTHER Batman stories my friends recommend because I know they can be told better than this. But honestly most stuff is written better than this, sooooo ¯_(ツ)_/¯… (more)