Absolute Catwoman #2:
did Scott Snyder
drop the ball?

Okay, genuine question for you, because I'm a bit confused with myself here.

I loved Absolute Catwoman #1. Scott Snyder's writing it, and I rate him massively. I love Catwoman as a character. All the ingredients were there. And #2 just left me kind of cold, and I don't fully know why, so bear with me while I think out loud.

Quick recap

Issue one ends with Selina getting attacked, her friend Holly taken, and she's left holding a mystery sphere that's clearly worth a fortune to somebody. Issue two, she auctions it off to draw out whoever wants it. Dark web, invite only, a mountain in Switzerland.

Alongside that we get a big flashback to Selina's old crew from years back, two new characters, Helena and Victoria. DC fans will recognise those names, this universe's version of Huntress and the Question. Helena's the dark-haired one, the "silver spoon from the east side," daughter of a rich Gotham family whose insider knowledge got the crew into their first heist nine years ago. Victoria's the redhead, the tech genius of the group.

The reveal

Fast forward, the auction happens, and it turns out Helena and Victoria are the buyers. The whole old crew ends up back together, Cassandra Cain shows up again for another fight, and the place comes down around them. Then right at the end, the reveal: the sphere isn't a weapon, it's a key to something called the Yarn. Some kind of synthetic intelligence powerful enough to rewrite reality itself.

So why didn't it land for me?

On paper, that all sounds good. But reading it, I just didn't feel the pull I had with issue one. I think it's because issue one was so tight, just Selina, Holly, one mystery threat. This one throws two new characters at me, a flashback, and a whole auction sequence, and I didn't feel like I'd earned a reason to care yet before being asked to invest in all of it.

So genuinely, am I missing something here? Did anyone else feel this, or is it just me?