DC spent the past several months using lines like "who dies?" to advertise and market Death of the Family, and even though no one is saying that every story arc needs to end in casualties or with cataclysmic game changers, when lines like that are used to sell a book, one expects characters to actually die. This is my way of saying, "I don't blame Scott Snyder -entirely- for the way this went down."

Had it been left alone, without all the over-exposition, tie-ins, and noise, the story could have actually been fulfilling; however, I can't help but feel cheated when the answer to the question formulated above is "absolutely no one." It turns out that the joke is on the reader, because no one died, and the elaborated subplot with the covered platters that ran through all the bat-titles, was a red herring that ended in nothing. Even the alleged disintegration of the family is no more than a temporary awkwardness that will soon go away. This arc's downfall was the hype machine that overrated it. Beautiful artwork, though; can't compliment it enough.