Batgirl #12

The Story

Batgirl Rising: The Flood, Part Four of Four: Oracle is trapped in the mind of the Calculator. While Stephanie in the process of saving her, plunges herself through a rainstorm from thirty-five thousand feet. All in the effort  to just  parachute onto Calculator's  secret compound. Very Stephanie of her... 
 

The Good

Let's see... Well first there's Stephanie's continuous, self-disparaging monologues there are always pretty silly, but, in this last issue of this arc, we see a lot more growth in her character. Steph, the rebellious, clutsy, teenager-equivalent, has always had a pretty adversarial friendship with Oracle. This issue turns a corner for Steph and for Oracle and it’s pretty cute in the way it does it. You can really see it in Stephanie's internal monologue like when: “This isn’t about trying to prove anything to anyone…This is about me saving the one person who’s ever given a real crap about me.”  Personal growth occurs for others besides Steph in the issue as well. Everyone in fact seems to experiences some sort of growth, even the bad guy. Oracle’s turn is summed up  with the stereotypical mentor comment of: “I knew I could count on you not to listen to me.” Overall this issue really delivers with the straight-forward superhero adventure story with it's humorous dialog, action and adventure, so all in all it's a very solid read.  
 

The Bad

On the storytelling side, the writing is what really hinders this issue and not really in a negative manor it's just very self contained. I mean it's definitely one of those fun adventure and coming-of-age stories. However, I really think it would fail to peak the interest of anyone who haven't been necessarily been following Stephine's run from the start. Also the art is a bit "average", all though the art serves a purpose. I just feel that it could definitely be improved in comparison to the always consistent covers.
 

The Verdict: 3.5/5

  It's a fun story with some serious growth and change in the characters. It’s for sure worth checking out if your into everything involving the bat-family and especially if your a Batgirl fan. As for new readers I'd really only recommend picking if your in need of something randomly fun and  for other people who are planing to maybe jump on to the title I'd definitely wait till issue #13.