#chatterboxhead

If it makes you upset that's cause it was meant to. It's purposefully falling into the trope of a woman character making a sacrifice to aid the leading man. Not just that, but Simone takes it a step further by having Barbara make herself the damsel in distress. It reads as "oh this is what you meant by making the character I've been writing do that. So I'm just going to say that out loud so it's clear to everyone else."

Then after the obligatory damage control flashback we get the Birds of Prey all together, Huntress and Black Canary are comforting their leader, teammate, and friend. Here's where Simone twists the knife a bit more, having Barbara talk about the things we don't see when things like this happen in comics. What the characters really lose when they make sacrifices like this: old costumes, family photos, a place to sleep. Memories that are now without their talismans for recall. Now these exist only in the mind and in the past.

And then one more page of group healing and it's back to work. Simone doesn't waste time or pages cleaning up the mess another writer made with her character. She uses exactly as much as she needs while also making those moments linger. She wants you to know how this makes her characters, and herself feel, but she isn't going to give the other writer the satisfaction of making the entire story a reaction issue.