By Bruno Savill De Jong — Life is Full of Disappointments is an odd storyline. It feels almost purposefully removed from the tapestry of Gotham Central, downplaying the immersive world-building that was central to all the previous issues. Gotham Central might make minimal use of Batman, but Life is Full of Disappointments has zero Batman, nor any ‘freaks’, nor (nearly) anything connected to Gotham’s ‘culture’. Even the recognizable detectives from Gotham Central itself (Montoya, Driver, Josie Mac) are dropped to foreground the underdeveloped police from the Major Crimes Unit, the three issues rotating in a new pair of detectives to examine the case. The pencils from Greg Scott parallels this, as while it is reminiscent of Michael Lark’s noir style, it makes Life is Full of Disappointments displaced from regular proceedings. At first glance, the storyline seems no longer one utilizing its Gotham setting, but rather an ‘ordinary’ detective comic.

Of course, Rucka and Brubaker make even ‘ordinary’ crime-comics compelling, imbued with both human detail and investigative proceedings. Actually, Life is Full of Disappointments is a good place to examine the ‘type’ of crime Gotham Central investigates. Despite sharing the gritty bureaucratic tone as The Wire, Gotham Central mostly ignores ‘street crime’ to focus upon the ‘calculated’ (if maniacal) kind which derives from super-villains. Both In the Line of Duty and Soft Targets have the M.C.U. round-up supervillain’s street-thugs, but both times to no avail. Montoya’s aggravation in “Half a Life” is caused by corrupt cops (who let a rapist walk free) and Two-Face’s orchestrations. Daydreams and Believers’ ‘case’ featured two high-school jocks who stole a missing corpse, similar to how Driver and Chandler chased down two high-school boys in Motive, who alongside “co-opting” African-American slang, stole Bonnie Lewis’ Batarang. Driver and Chandler are pushed to suspect local homeless man ‘Mr. Yancy’ for Bonnie’s murder, but in actuality it was “yuppie” Harlan Combs, aka. Firebug. Repeatedly in Gotham Central, cases that seemingly point to “street-skel” end up as derived from a “higher class” of perps.

The same pattern emerges in Life is Full of Disappointments, as dead accountant Stephanie Becker seemingly looks killed by her immigrant cab-driver Viril. However further testing reveals she was poisoned on an overdose of “Tets”, around the same time a different accountant for the same chemical company, Washburn Pharmaceuticals, dies with the same diagnosis. Inquisitions into Washburn’s financials seem to point towards criminal conspiracy, the accountants being eliminated for what they found. Indeed, the sole tangible connection of Life is Full of Disappointments to the DC Universe is Sgt. Vincent del Arrazio, whose family is ‘connected’ to the mafia, receiving a visit from Huntress (the two on seemingly familiar terms), informing him his cousin Jack Inzerillo “holds major stock in Washburn”. Going to Washburn with his partner Joely Bartlett, Vincent meets with the C.F.O. alone to determine if Washburn’s money laundering for the mafia is connected with the dead accountants. But it turns out they aren’t. In a series of alternating pages, while Vincent is talking with the C.F.O. Joely investigates the accountant’s desk-space, and determines Washburn’s chemist poisoned one accountant’s candy-jar with “Tets” as revenge after their break-up, the other accountant dying by stealing some of her sweets.

In a morbid way, this is the ‘disappointment’ of the case; that there is no grander conspiracy or DC interconnectivity to these murders. Huntress’ cameo, plot-wise, was ultimately pointless. Instead these women are dead for the “old story” of entitled men and petty revenge, another Gotham Central example of sordid crimes originating from outwardly ‘respectable’ sources (paralleling Washburn being used to launder mafia-money). So, Vincent’s backstory is essentially irrelevant to the case’s resolution, an aspect of his life he keeps completely secretive even from his partner. But this also reinforces a theme of attempted compartmentalization throughout Life is Full of Disappointments. While Daydreams and Believers indicates the GCPD’s profession often “seeps through” into the rest of their lives, these issues show the officers attempts to keep them separate.

Life is Full of Disappointments opens on the funeral of Lt. Probson following Soft Targets, and how Sarge subtly struggles to separate his humanistic ‘grief’ at the death of a colleague, and his workplace grievance at being passed over for promotion (“they could have called my Lieutenant Sarge”, he huffs to his partner Crowe). Instead Lt. David Cornwell is transferred in, with Captain Sawyer admitting it was a political move to satisfy the new Mayor, who is friends with Cornwell. Similar to Montoya’s daily routine in Half a Life, we get glimpses of the other M.C.U. officers’ home lives. We observe silent panels of Sarge’s morning routine, Vincent’s affections for his dog before Huntress appears, the house-boat of Joely Bartlett (which includes her estranged family’s photo from an inaugural ball of Lex Luthor – another, minor, reminder of the storyline’s DC status) and the gambling of Tommy Burke. His partner Dagmar Procjnow tells Tommy, “when you’re late you lost. When you’re early you won”.

There is a correlation between personal habits and work-life, one which effects Procjnow herself when she offers to take the case from Sarge and Crowe as a penance for missing her son’s first professional orchestral performance. This particular estranged family results from miscommunication, as Procjnow’s son did not offer her complimentary tickets because she never asked; reasoning, “I’m his mother, I shouldn’t have to ask”. Life is Full of Disappointments is full of the GCPD’s strained relationships, it’s rotational structure allowing multiple perspectives into the inner-lives of Gotham Central’s cast. So while Life is Full of Disappointments is atypical, through its relative mundanity it reinforces the central theme of the series; the autonomy of all citizens within Gotham. Few may have as complicated an inner-life as Batman, or even Montoya in Half a Life, but all these detectives have a private side to them they must balance. They all have full lives, full of hopes and problems and aspirations, and disappointments, too.

Gotham Central: Life is Full of Disappointments (#16 - #18)

Gotham Central #16-18: Life is Full of Disappointments
Writers: Ed Brubaker & Greg Rucka
Artist: Greg Scott
Colorist: Lee Loughride
Letterer: Clem Robins
Editors: Matt Idelson and Nachie Castro
In the wake of the Joker's brutal killing spree, Sarge and Crowe deal with the fallout in the stationhouse and try to solve the murder of a girl found in a dumpster.
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Bruno Savill De Jong is a recent undergraduate of English and freelance writer on films and comics, living in London. His infrequent comics-blog is Panels are Windows and semi-frequent Twitter is BrunoSavillDeJo.