"Well, Who Expects to See a Blockbuster These Days?" in Batgirl (vol. 1) #58, by Andersen Gabrych (writer), Ale Garza (penciler), Jesse Delperdang (inker), Wildstorm FX (colorist), Rob Leigh (letterer)
Andersen Gabrych took over as writer from Dylan Horrocks (whose run I only own a few issues of, and it's notable mostly for Batman's attempts to keep boys away from Cass) around the time of the abysmal War Games storyline. I didn't start buying Batgirl until immediately after that, when it crossed over with Robin. Both characters were moving to Bludhaven to take over protecting it for the injured Nightwing. That was my first introduction to the character, and I liked her, liked Garza' art well enough (especially compared to Scott's work on Robin, which had gotten exaggerated to the point it was difficult to follow at times), so I kept buying it post-crossover. Right up through its cancelation at issue 73.
I think the initial idea for this run was pretty solid. Put Cass in an unfamiliar territory, with no consistent back-up. Tim's got his own shit going on, Batsy is Gotham, Cass and Oracle had a falling out over a few different things. She's really on her own, trying to figure out how to be more of a crimefighter and less of someone who patrols randomly and busts the skulls of any crook she happens across. She gets herself a snitch, has to tangle with supervillains, tries to process some of her grief over Spoiler's death, tries to take an interest in the neighborhood she lives in. She rarely showed much interest in things like that before, but she's growing as a person, and she sees it as important to trying to be more like Batman.
Garza handles the art chores for most of the issues. His art is less expressive than Daimon Scott's was, not nearly as exaggerated. Cass seems to spend a lot of time scowling or looking intense. She's really trying to be like Batman. He keeps her as this sort of slim, wiry figure she was when Scott drew her. There's also a lot of times he'll draw her and this small shadow, lurking and flitting about during fights. Really playing up how she can use her quickness to frighten and unnerve criminals in a different way from Batman. Instead of a dark presence looming, she's the indistinct bit of movement you only catch a glimpse of in the corner of your eye.
Eventually, the build to Infinite Crisis intervened and things went to shit. Deathstroke shows up, wanting to use Cass as a test for his daughter Rose. Cass comes to the (ultimately correct) conclusion Lady Shiva is her mother, which sends her on a road trip. She gets briefly tangled up with an OMAC, and then with the League of Assassins, who are using Mr. Freeze for something, by promising he can give Nora a dip in the Lazarus Pit. That didn't exactly end well. Once Infinite Crisis ended, Geoff Johns and Adam Beechen gave us crazy, murdering, possibly-hot-for-Tim Drake Cassandra Cain, running the League of Assassins and just generally doing the "I make the world better by killing evil people" shtick.
It took a couple of years to fix that mess, and Cass never did regain her spot in the Bat-family hierarchy. They gave her a mini-series to try address things, but let Beechen, the last person anyCass fan wanted anywhere near the character, write it. It was a mess, but at least it got her back in circulation on the good guys' side. Still, it wasn't long before Steph took over as Batgirl, and Grant Morrison had already introduced Damian Wayne as another character raised to be a killer, and he had the advantage of being Batsy's biological kid. It seemed to buy him a lot more wiggle room than Steph or Cass ever got for their mistakes, considering he was an unrepentant killer. Nepotism strikes again!
It could have been worse. They could have left Cass in Bludhaven for when Deathstroke dropped Chemo on the city like a bomb. Wouldn't have put that past Dan Didio or Geoff Johns.
But for the first 6-8 months of Gabrych's run I read, I was really enjoying it, and it got me to track the earlier stuff down, so that's something.
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