Review: Nightwing #142

In this review of Nightwing #142, a personal attack on Gotham requires Nightwing to act. He has to leave Blüdhaven to do so.

NIGHTWING #142
Written by DAN WATTERS
Art by DAVID LAPHAM
Main Cover: JORGE FORNÉS
Variant Covers: JEROME OPEÑA, GERALD PAREL, DAN PANOSIAN
Page Count: 32 pages
Release Date: 9/16/26

This review contains spoilers

If one theme has carried through several Batman and Batman-adjacent comics throughout the decades, it’s been grief and how to handle/process it.

It was the case in some of the early Batman comics 80+ years ago, and it’s the case again in 2026 with Nightwing #142.  Gotham is under attack by spores that, once breathed in, cause people to go crazy and get extremely violent. Those spores are now blowing over to nearby Bludhaven. Nightwing is detecting this when an explosion at a warehouse goes off. He wants to ignore due to the rampant corruption of Mayor Bisogni, but jumps into action when he realizes workers may be trapped that need help.

We find out that one truck of dynamite was detonated at a construction yard and another one was stolen by the foreman. It’s headed towards Gotham, and that’s where the emotional heart of the story starts. Nightwing is able to get through on the radio to the driver of the truck and we get a surprisingly personal story when there’s such a large scale crisis taking place.

We learn the driver’s son was a victim of the spore attack, but we also learn the foreman helped build a tower at Arkham leading to a tremendous sense of regret mixed with grief for for a father who lost his son. He thought taking that job would allow him and his son to leave Gotham so he took the job. Unfortunately,he feels Gotham took his son from him.

So he’s going to try and undo what he calls a mistake and destroy Arkham Tower.

Analysis

It was a refreshing turn to get what I’d considered a one-on-one story when so much is going to hell across Bludhaven and Gotham. When the heroes can connect with everyday people, ones the reader can truly connect with, it makes the story so much more real and impactful. This issue does that even with an extraordinary event happening around them with the spore attacks.

Nightwing trying to dissuade Ben James from driving driving his truck into the tower really pulls at your heartstrings. We’ve all dealt with grief at one point or another, and if you’ve lost someone unexpectedly or worse at the hand of someone else, you might feel a natural instinct to seek revenge. Sometimes that thirst for vengeance can be so strong it pushes you to do something extreme. Thankfully many people can pull themselves back but when it comes to a loss of a child, like what happened for Ben Peters? It’s a little harder to do, especially when you live in a place as rotten as Gotham City.

In these kinds of stories, we usually see the hero succeed in talking the person out of whatever heinous act they’re about to commit. We get the happy ending and the hero gets the satisfaction they saved lives without having to use violence to do it. It’s a story we’ve all seen countless times before.

Unfortunately, this is Gotham City. Mayor Vandal Savage has a bounty on anyone connected to Batman so Nightwing gets slowed down by a gang  just as he’s catching up to James’ truck.  The gang is stopped quickly, but now we realize Nightwing has no chance of getting to the tower before James does and we await the inevitable explosion from the truck hitting Arkham Tower.

Except that explosion never comes. James waited for Nightwing so he could die with him. That twist just shows how much grief can twist a loving father into something truly terrifying and dangerous. He thinks he’s helping Nightwing by removing him from the evil in Gotham.

The hero has failed and James is about to detonate the truck and we see through his eyes that he thinks he sees his son in a white light. Except it’s actually Robin, who stops him from blowing up the truck.

This is the first Nightwing issue I’ve read in a long time and I loved it. The grounded, personal story and beautiful artwork kept me engaged from start to finish.