Batman Vol. 2: The City of Owls

The second half of Scott Snyder's opening Batman story-arc.  The Court of Owls has released their Talons on the city.  City officials are dying left & right, Alfred has sent out a call to all of the Bat-Family.  Wayne Manor itself is under attack as the Talons fight Bruce Wayne in its halls, on the roof & finally in the Bat-Cave.  Batman is able to shut down the Talons he then goes looking for the court itself only to find them all dead in a secret meeting room.  What really makes this story are the little tidbits of mythos that are thrown out from it. 

The first is that after the death of Thomas & Martha Wayne, Bruce went looking for the court.  He felt that the court was in some way responsible for their deaths.  However in all of his searching as a child he was never able to find them.  The the building in which he found the deceased court is the same building that he came up with as their headquarters when he was a child.  The second is the story about Mr. Freeze this is one of the creepiest stories in this book.  In just the annual issue Snyder has crafted an origin tale mixed with the discovery that Freeze unknowingly helped the Court of Owls.  Victor's origin is tragic & it shows just how homicidal he truly is.  The reveal of who Nora is also great.  I still believe that nothing will surpass Batman the Animated Series episode Heart of Ice but this was damn close.  The next story was told through flashbacks involving Alfred's father & Martha Wayne.  Martha was pregnant with a second child Bruce was about three at the time.  She was being threatened by an unknown group.  There was a car accident & the baby was lost.  Jarvis blames himself as he keeps receiving phone calls from this mysterious person.  Jarvis is writing his son to warn him not to come to this cursed city.  But a Talon has come for Jarvis kills him in a burning building.  That reveal also plays with the events that happen in the present.  Lincoln March who was running for Mayor of Gotham City.  Lincoln drops that bombshell that he is Bruce's long lost little brother.  He was taken to the children's orphanage that Martha Wayne funded after the accident.  He killed the court because they began to view him as a liability.  He supposedly dies in an exploding building.  But the damage is done through the reveal or is it.  Bruce does some research & there is evidence that doesn't add up but it is still inconclusive.  Only four other stories come to mind that shake the very core of Bruce Wayne's world,  Batman & Son, Hush, Under the Red Hood & R.I.P.  I like the potential for future stories.  If this was the only Batman story that Snyder was to write that would be enough but I have a feeling that for as long as Snyder is contracted to DC comics that he will have some influence on the Dark Knight.