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For Batman’s 70th anniversary, this is what readers get?
Take a piece of paper and photocopy it. Then take the resulting photocopy and use that to produce yet another copy. Repeat this process enough times and you'll end up with a blotchy and unintelligible document. That's what Batman & Robin #1 feels like.
Writer Grant Morrison has produced something that manages to combine different elements of the Batman mythos in the worst possible way. It has extremely unrealistic comic book elements with attempts at horrific seriousness—for example, oscillating between half-serious amphibian villains and disgusting scenes of torture. Quitely’s artwork is very wispy and although this conveys a certain realism, it makes the book seem limp and weak, a far cry from the strong lines of Mark Bagley or Ed McGuinness.
For a comic that is clearly meant to have major sales (there’s a special 1 in 250 variant and lots of promotion), the entire concept of a new Batman and Robin is never clearly explained for readers who have no foreknowledge of current goings-on in the Batman Family. The book would have benefited from a few introductory paragraphs before the tale begins.
One of my major dislikes of this book is the new Robin. He is a total pest—an arrogant child who is the most irritating character I’ve had the misfortune of meeting in a long, long time. Although I didn’t grieve the death of Jason Todd, I would be even less mournful if the Joker were to terminate Damian Wayne—the kid is an absolute nightmare. He’s what my dad used to call “a snot-nosed brat”.
The only thing I appreciated about the book was the honest exchanges between Dick Grayson and Alfred where we see the new Batman earnestly expressing how his greatest fear had been realized—having to don the cowl in place of Bruce Wayne.
This issue seems like a custom-made dream team gone awry. On paper it seems attractive. Someone, somewhere, surely didn’t have any trouble pitching the idea. However, the issue is an example of the whole being much less than the sum of its parts. Sorry folks, but I prefer my Batman to be a campy Adam West or Frank Miller’s broody Dark Knight… but not both at the same time!
6/10
Adam P.
Review Co-Editor
1 comment:
Thank you for these comments. You bring up a lot of excellent points and your review is one of the few I've seen that say, at least to me, that the emperor has no clothes.
I quite agree about the torture comment. Many reviews I've said say hey this is fun. No Dick Sprang is fun. This has some poor soul have a mask seared to his face. Not fun. Kind of sick as a matter of fact.
Also what I hate about Damien isn't so much that he's a snotty character. That's fine, you're not supposed to like every character. What I hate about his is his mere existence. Having Damien be Bruce's son opens a whole can of worms that is ignored. By having Bruce do absolutely nothing to connect with his "real blood son" makes him a deadbeat dad. For a guy who is Batman because of loss of family, ignoring a son really makes Batman look bad.
Additionally, it reflects a bad trend in Batman books that's been going on for the past few years. The total ignoring of Bruce Wayne. One of my favorite lines from Batman Begins is uttered by Alfred when Bruce says he doesn't give a damn about his name. Alfred says it's not just your name, it's your father's name and it's all that's left of him, don't destroy it.
By removing Bruce Wayne from the equation, they've destroyed half the character and reduced the story-telling engine.
As for Frank's art, I'm going to say too European. It doesn't look American in that Gotham doesn't look like an American city, but rather a European idea of an outsized American city. Interesting but lacking a certain authenticity needed to sell Batman. But that's just an opinion.
As for Pyg, just another mass murderer villain. Batman has enough of those. I prefer bat villains who are smart, not brutal. I mean what's the big deal of Zzazz. Just shoot him with a taser.
Bringing back 1950s-style villains with a Morrison twist is just not a good idea. I don't like the way Morrison uses them, they're silly killer, a concept I don't like, but usually when a writer creates an unusual character, he's the only one that can write it. Others just make a hash of it. See Hush, a one-shot character if there ever was one.
But I could be wrong.
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