ACW #630 – Black Canary
Action Comics Weekly #630 (Black Canary)
“knock ’em Dead, Part 7”
Writer – Sharon Wright
Pencils – Randy DuBurke
Inks – Pablo Marcos
Letters – Steve Haynie
Colors – Gene D’Angelo
Editor – Robert Greenberger
No time for a preramble today… let’s get into Dinah-day!
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Picking up where we left off last time, Black Canary is looking into that convenient warehouse skylight, where she sees The Deb being held up down below. I’m still not entirely clear if these dudes are police officers conducting a potentially-fatal sting, or just a bunch of guys who dress alike. Whatever the case, they threaten to kill her… and Dinah makes her move. She beats up the maybe-cops, while The Deb beats a hasty retreat.
We shift scenes to a payphone outside a diner, where a short-haired woman, who I initially assumed was Dinah herself, is speaking to somebody about Deborah Tilden’s vanishing act. Inside the diner, this same short-haired woman (Anna?) runs into Cat… ya know, “Peter Pan”. Looks like they’re old friends… both in Seattle “visiting”. Anyhoo, Anna alludes to the fact that a “terrible disease” took someone named Dannie. Gonna go out on a limb and assume the Dannie was Cat’s daughter? Ya know, the one in those pictures?
Cat cuts the convo short when see notices a bus stopping nearby. On it… The Deb!
We shift scenes again to Ken Glazier showing off the latest ransom note he received to a his buddy on the b-ball court. Not totally sure what to make of this… there are allusions made to Ken’s ex-wife… there’s some connection to Rich (from It’s Instrumental) and Walt Sarno… should we go out on that limb one more time, and assume that his ex-wife might be Cat?
Later, over at “a contemporary theatre” called “act”… ya know, the place where the Pan play’s happenin’, Dinah runs into Lieutenant (I actually spelt that right on my first try!) Cameron. They exchange pleasantries, and the daughter of the latter excitedly rushes up to show off her Peter Pan and Hook autographs.
They consider where The Deb might’ve gotten off to… just as the camera pans down to reveal that she is currently bound and gagged among the pipes.
We close out with Glazier putting on a glove… Cat spiking the ever-loving hell out of her hair (when is it spiked enough?), and Dinah striking a pose like she’s modeling for the Sears catalogue… as they all prepare to enter the end-game.
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Stop me if you’ve heard this one…
This was okay, but the art really makes it difficult to follow. Well, the art, and the random introductions of side characters who may-or-may-not be of any consequence. Not sure who Glazier was shooting hoops with… however, they made a point of letting us know he’s gay. Why bother with any details if he ain’t gonna come back? Also, Anna. A lapsed pal of Cat… who knows of some tragedy that (we assume) befell her. It’s cool to include chance meetings in a story, but for Pete’s sake, can we make this character not look exactly like Dinah?! Feels like a red herring… but, like the laziest kind of red herring! I mean, are we supposed to be confused while reading that scene?
Oh well. Let’s look all the way over to the very edge of those limbs we’ve spent the last eight pages creeping down, and make “asses out of u and me”. It’s time to make some predictions!
- Dannie was Cat’s daughter, who tragically passed away from a “terrible disease”
- Cat is Glazier’s ex-wife
- Glazier mentioned he couldn’t give blood last issue… so, perhaps he’s HIV positive?
- Maybe Ken, Deb, and Cat used to be into the drug scene, and did some needle-sharing
- Bada-bing, bada-boom: AIDS… and Cat’s going to exact revenge on anyone she can?
