As he proved while writing Batman the Animated Series, Paul Dini is a great storyteller, even when not writing Batman specifically. This issue is part one of a Hush two-part story and follows the fall and rise of Hush. For those who do not know, Hush is Dr. Tommy Elliot former childhood friend of Bruce Wayne, who has discovered his secret and is jealous that Bruce’s parents died and left him with all of the money, while his parents held him to Bruce’s standards. When we last saw Hush

he had plastic surgery to look like Bruce Wayne and tried to kill Catwoman by cutting out her heart. He blew up trying to escape the Batcave and Catwoman stole all of his money as revenge. This issue starts with Hush at his lowest point, penniless, homeless, and injured. He tries to kill himself by jumping off a bridge in Gotham, but is fished out by two local guys. One of them recognizes him as Bruce Wayne and from that point on Hush, uses that to his advantage to take as much of Wayne’s money as possible. He first shows up at an exclusive club, where he takes advantage of an old widower and gets her to sail out to sea on her yacht with him. After murdering her and ditching the body he sells the yacht and equips himself with weapons. He then moves on to Australia where Wayne owns a large share of a business and gets a cash advance from the head of the company. He then tries to move on to Vietnam, but things just do not work out and he takes off into the jungle. He is then run off the road and captured by a group of mercenaries. It is then revealed that Catwoman is the one in charge and she knows that he is not Bruce Wayne. Overall the artwork while a little muddy and blocky works well for this story. The writing is superb and leaves the reader wanting to see the conclusion. Overall it gets 4 out of 5 Batmen.

   Also this post is the introduction of a secondary rating system. 3 categories ranging from

 Put It on the Stack: for books that should definitely be bought that week.

If you need to cut Back: for books that are only marginally interesting and not required reading.

and

Leave it on the Rack: for books that should be left behind.

This book definitely gets a Put It on the Stack rating.