Home Is Where The Terror Is — Reviewing ‘Nightwing’ #128

What once stood as a potential symbol of hope within the darkness of Blüdhaven has been become a terrifying nightmare. Titans Tower is warped beyond all belief as Nightwing dives ever deeper into the twisted halls.

Betrayal and not so good dogs await in Nightwing #128 from Dan Watters, Dexter Soy, Veronica Gandini, and Wes Abbott.

There are many beautiful things about ongoing series. There’s more room to tell stories but also to really tell a variety of story types with the same characters. While many ongoing runs have a particular overall story to tell with a specific endpoint, that doesn’t mean there can’t be tonal changes.

Watters walks that line so well in this run of Nightwing so far. We have the overall story with Spheric and the mysterious Zanni as well as the still bubbling gang war. In between, though, we’re getting a few stories that delve into horror or the bizarre. Each maintains momentum and development, but each also lets us get other views of Nightwing, his allies, his enemies, and Blüdhaven itself.

There is a really nice slow build to this issue that I like. We’re still no closer to answers to some of what is happening. Yet, it doesn’t really matter. What Watters presents here with the cool fake Kryptonian Nightwing, our Nightwing’s journey through the tower, and more gives us enough. It’s just the right amount to chew on and come away feeling like the meal was sufficiently unexpectedly filling.

Also walking a fine line is the work that Soy is delivering here. There is still that very dense sort of rougher edge that has been present the whole time. It keeps the tone of being a generally street-level hero series that steps into the supernatural and fantastical at times. This is where the lighter whimsy that is also in the artwork comes into play. Giving things a simultaneously smoother sort of appearance.

Tons of deep details are on every page as the paneling choices are top notch. It sprawls from very epic wide shots to silly things like child colorings coming to life to visual body horror by the end.

This helps set that tone even more are the color stylings of Gandini. They too have a softer smoother side to them that is rife with the same rougher textures of the pencils, keeping things in a more familiar space with overall colors that are toned-down or more natural in feeling. This is paired with the bursts of vibrant flashy splashes of color for the bigger and out of this world sort of stuff.

A perfect sprinkle of shadows and darker surroundings lend their support to the story tone and to balance out the colorful aspects.

Much of what was already said can be said about the lettering as well. It’s rife with emotional energy as Abbott knows this character and his world intimately at this point. This allows it all to flow around and finding the ways to still bring some visual flair to the party, like the color and tonal shift that comes with the captions of the Kryptonian Nightwing. They feel stiffer and more akin to classic heroes, which fit for this very old-school kind of driven character.

Nightwing #128 is now available from DC Comics.