I really enjoyed reading Batman The Wedding. It had a surprise beginning, and the story only got more interesting from there. The Joker has his own plans for this event, and finds ways to make it harder on both of them. The ending was a little unexpected, and made me eager to see what happens next.

Honesty first - I plan just didn’t like this. I just recently started reading the recent Batman comics and was anticipating a whole different comic when its entitled “The Wedding”. The first story with Booster Gold made no sense to me. I should explain, I don’t even know who he is, so that might have been my difficulty.
The second story line was more palatable for me. The best man as Joker was interesting. And I like Tom King’s take on Joker too.
The last pages get muddled as they are a hodge podge of scenes that were shown in the prior volume. I will say the artwork is breathtaking… but not many new pages that I haven’t seen before.
Thank you NetGalley and publisher, DC Comics, for the opportunity to read this ARC.

A totally out of character Booster Gold gives Batman a wedding present by saving his parents setting up a Bat version of Flashpoint where everything is WAY worse. I had a hard time getting past the fact that Booster would never muck with time that way. Maybe Booster and Beetle would back in their wacky JLI days, but the Geoff Johns and Dan Jurgens penned versions of Booster over the last 15 years? No way. He secretly corrects time. Hell, at the same time these issues were coming out Booster was over in Action Comics stopping Superman from going back to the past and saving Jor-El. Tony Daniel does make the book sing though.

Then the Joker shows up to be Batman's Best man whether he likes it or not. King has a fantastic, menacing, off-kilter take on the Joker I really liked. The second half of this with Catwoman and the Joker may be the best issue King's ever written.

Last up is the 50th issue where the Bat and the Cat are finally going to tie the knot. It's one of those anniversary issues with guest artists contributing splash pages throughout the story. I always find those distracting and it makes the issue feel like a clip episode of a sitcom to me. Ultimately, this ended exactly the way I expected it too when I heard the two were getting married. That last page though was killer and shows King may just have this whole thing planned out for another 50 issues like he says.

I truly hated this. I went in knowing nothing, having not read a single Batman comic in over a decade...and if this is the kind of story being told in that universe, I may never come back. First of all, Booster Gold is one of the most annoying characters to grace a comic. I couldn't deal with him. I skipped whole chunks, where he was concerned. And they dragged on the alternate world story way too long. So after reading about 50 pages, I skipped to the final "issue", and I'm glad I did, because if I had read the entire thing just to get to THAT ending? I'd be throwing my computer across the room. (SPOILER: The title is VERY misleading!!!!!) So no, I will not be recommending this one to anyone, and I may just stick to memories of old Batman stories of yore to keep my happy memories intact.

This was a collection of stories and a history of catwoman and Batman. If somone is not up to date on comics they will have no clue what is going on in this issue. I myself had a hard time following the stories featured. Not of these accept the one at the end have anything to do with the wedding as it is more of a lead up to that point. So I see rhis as moot since this is not the actual wedding issue so I cant recommend it.

Batman Volume 7 brings us the head of an issue many fans have been anticipating for ages, and definitely doesn't drop the ball with this one. I spent the entire time reading this wondering where it was going to turn next and being surprised each time, all the while enjoying the ride as it went. Offering a unique take on what could be considered an overused trope, I definitely think this collection provides a concise breakdown of what's happening during this turbulent time in Batman history.

Librarian: Let's be straight here: basically every library with a decent Batman graphic novel collection will be buying this one. Nothing much else to say.
Reader: On that note, as a reader, I wouldn't buy this one. The arcs make very little sense, and the writer's particular vision for the character is even more cruel and depressing then most (and that's saying something). Not to mention the highly confusing (and highly spoiled) ending. Can we just pretend this whole thing never happened?

Batman Vol. 7: The Wedding had me gritting my teeth in frustration. If I had an actually paperback copy of this book, it would have flown across the room as I flew off the handle. Alas, I had and iPad and there is absolutely nothing satisfying about laying it gently down because those things are expensive. Let's just start with Booster Gold sucks and this comic just proves the point. After you make it past Booster Gold's sashay through getting a wedding present (think bull in a china store), Joker continues his quest to get an invitation to the wedding while questioning can Bruce Wayne be happy and Batman. The dialogue between the Cat and the Joker is on point. The end tells how the Bat and the Cat fell in love while displaying the many different incarnations drawn by some impressive artists. The story goes about like I figured it would but anything that leaves that level of emotion is definitely worth four stars, even if the emotions are not always positive. I cannot wait to get my hands on the next chapter in the Bat and Cat saga since this one ran me through the mill. My voluntary, unbiased review is based upon a review copy from Netgalley.

Man, I knew Booster Gold was like, lame, but this was just dumb. Also, Joker's terrible as always and WHYYYYYYYY why would you do this to me.

The lead-up to this was so great that the actual "wedding" can't help but fall short by comparison. Three issues devoted to a Booster Gold-Flashpoint kind of timeline, where Bruce's parents weren't killed, yet everything still goes to hell in Gotham. Then two issues of the Joker blathering on about how he's going to make it without Batman. And then the wedding issue itself (already somewhat ruined by its inclusion in The Wedding Album collection, which was released before all of this). I like Tom King's take on Batman and there are a few really touching moments here (like the hug between Alfred and Bruce--long time coming, that), but on the whole, it just doesn't live up to the stellar build-up. The art is great throughout and it was nice to have a whole stable of past artists contributing pin-up work to issue 50. On the whole, though, this collection is really unsatisfying.

There are problems with this collection.
First, a lot of this has been collected in a bunch of other volumes-- The Wedding Gallery, Preludes to the Wedding, even bits in volume 6, Bride or Burglar. But that set aside, it just wasn't a great arc, for the most part.
First, the Booster Gold mini-arc that makes up the beginning was bad. For starters, I felt like it was a weirdly watered-down version of Flashpoint, but in a way that was much less interesting and worn-out. Look, we've seen alternate histories where the Waynes live, or Bruce is the one who dies, or whatever. We don't need it for the fiftieth time. Plus, Booster is supposed to be the greatest hero you've never heard of, which means that for many readers, this might be the first time coming across him. Maybe show him in a way that makes him seem less sloppy and useless, eh?
Then we have the Joker in the cathedral section. That was pretty solid, I liked it a lot.
And then we get to the wedding itself. First, it's something that's been built up to for a good bit, and they obviously went all-in, with a ton of guest artists and the like, which is cool. Except, [SPOILERS] they don't actually have the wedding. Screw that. I was ready for the wedding. I was ready for a little growth and character change in Batman and Catwoman. Frankly, the changes and developments that led to this were refreshing and interesting and a lot of fun, and it fit the characters and the arc of Batman in some of the other books (like Detective Comics) as well. I feel like everybody was set for this, but then they wimped out on actually pulling the trigger on something that would change Batman as a person on a permanent basis. Also, just a little bit ago we had a flash-forward to right after Bruce's death and Selina was there as his widow, so let the even be what it promises to be, instead of pulling back so you can have a future volume titled The ACTUAL Wedding. [/SPOILERS]

Multiple ratings would be appropriate for this one.

The first part with a suicidal Green Lantern and Booster Gold was just weird and I really had no idea what was going on. Two stars.

The second part was better, and starred Catwoman and the Joker. During a fight they mortally wound each other and simply talk to each other while bleeding out. The dialogue was very good. Five stars.

The third part was Batman and Catwoman getting set for their wedding: gathering a judge to officiate and a couple of friends to witness. This part was already published in the Deluxe Wedding album, so it was a rehash. Four stars, simply for the re-do.

I am really curious where Tom King is going to take this. I anticipate that Batman is going to be facing some extremely difficult times ahead.