The retelling of "The Killing Joke" continues in a story written by Gail Simone. Rather than presenting readers with a mere flashback, Simone makes a great effort to build an interesting plot that naturally leads to the remembering of that atrocious night for Barbara Gordon. This is not a light story, or one with funny remarks here and there; this one is dark, personal, and tragic. Without taking much away from the original tale, great strides are made to actually build on it by slightly shifting the focus away from the main players.

Then there is the other big elephant in the room: Babs' mom and her justification for her actions. There is something about it that felt somewhat flat; then again, Barbara's inner thoughts show she feels something is missing; so perhaps it is indeed an intentional move to be elaborated on later. There is a change in Batgirl's cape color that could have waited until next issue, and really bugs the OCD part of me. That last page was creepy to no end and can't wait for what's next!