It All Looks So Good In My Mind

Now that I've read the final issue, I guess I can consider Batgirl canceled. Which is too bad. The book started slow for me, but I thought it really hit its stride the 2nd year. I would have loved to see stories about the things Stephanie saw under the Black Mercy's power.

Not so much her, Damien, and Oracle fighting Blackest Night zombies, but the others, absolutely. Fighting the Queen of Fables in a fairy tale world (I especially like Stargirl with the wizard hat, and Miss Martian as a pixie). Steph did say she hated magic, but her team-up with Klarion didn't go too badly, so perhaps she'd be more comfortable with it. If not, well, placing the hero in situations outside their comfort zone can be fun. Plus, I'd be curious to see who, if anyone, acted as leader of that quintet. None of them have much experience running teams.

Or fending off the Royal Flush Gang in civvies on Graduation Day. Nothing says "Booster Gold guest appearance" like the Royal Flush Gang! Not that they need to team-up to beat the R.F.G., but Booster, Time Master, showing up could segue nicely into the story I'd really like to see: The Batgirls teaming up with the Blackhawks in 1944.

I think there's a lot of potential there. I'd like to see how Miller would write Cassandra when he has more than 3 pages. How would he write a Barbara Gordon who hasn't become Oracle yet? She'd be less experienced obviously, but I think she'd been more cheerful. Not that Oracle is gloomy, but she's definitely more serious, because she's experienced so much more. It's kind of like the difference between Steph as Spoiler and Steph as Batgirl. We could have the first team-up between Barbara Gordon and Lady Blackhawk. Assuming Zinda isn't Queen Killer Shark at this point (which I wouldn't be as interesting).

One thing that could have been interesting is having Cass and Steph defer to Barbara. Even though both of them have faced their fair share of threats alone, they've both also had Oracle guiding them plenty of times as well. They might unconsciously defer to Barbara, which could be interesting if you pull her from early enough in her crimefighting career that she's less experienced than either of them. It'd be neat to see Barbara's reaction when she finds she's spawned a legacy*.

There could be some pitfalls, if the story devolved into whether heroes should kill during a war (like that Brave and the Bold JMS did with Barry Allen and the Blackhawks), which I don't think ever ends well. I'm sure there'd also be some issue of whether Steph and Cass can try to warn Barbara about the Joker. I'm sure Booster would have -grudgingly, and only because Rip made him - told them not to, and I'm equally sure they'd both ignore him. I don't think Miller would have them buy into the "it's predestined, so don't even bother trying to avert it" line of b.s. JMS had in that other issue of Brave and the Bold.

If they could have waited on the reboot, that would have been something. The Batgirls avert The Killing Joke, the timeline shifts, viola! Babs is still Batgirl. DC gets what they want. Maybe make the New DC be the result of multiple alterations made by different folks. The Batgirls change something here, Barry Allen changes something else there, Booster gives something a nudge off to the left, and Bob's yer uncle. Hey, it makes as much sense as "Flashpoint Universe was created because Barry Allen saved his mother."

* I know there was a Bat-Girl before Barbara, but she was the one who handed the mantle to Cass, and Cass gave the costume to Steph, with Barbara eventually giving her approval.