Review/Analysis: James Owsley's "Faces" from BATMAN ANNUAL #13, and the state of Batman in 1989
1989, from what I can tell, was a weird year of transition for DC Comics. Post-Crisis, Post-Watchmen, Post-Dark Knight Returns/Batman: Year One... they had entered a new era, but it seems like they weren't exactly sure what the hell that MEANT. Batman especially seemed to be affected, and we'll get to that in a moment, but he wasn't the only one.
Take Green Lantern, for instance. After the main series Green Lantern Corps was canceled, the adventures of Hal Jordan were moved over to Action Comics Weekly (itself a misbegotten attempt at an anthology series filled with such fascinatingly flawed and oddball stories such as Wild Dog and the Secret Six team that nobody remembers, alongside more standard heroes like Deadman and Nightwing), and Hal's new adventures were immediately off to a rocky start. This is truly the most ignominious and forgotten period of Green Lantern history, featuring such career lows for Hal such as Star Sapphire deciding to just up and slaughter Katma Tui for no good fucking reason, the revelation that Hal is fearless because he was LOBOTOMIZED by the power ring, and lowest of all, a story which can only be described best as "Hal Jordan Has No Friends," in which everyone--from Green Arrow to Clark Kent to frickin' ALFRED--pretty much just tell Hal to fuck off.
The the first and third instances were written by James Owsley (later to become Christopher Priest), who, in 1989, wrote a story in Batman Annual #13 which inadvertently served as a companion piece to "Hal Jordan Has No Friends." Think of this story, Faces, best described as, "Batman, I Don't Even KNOW You Anymore." It's set in the period where Batman just began his transition into becoming an aggressive jerkwad and everyone is disappointed in him, especially Jim Gordon and even Harvey Dent.
Oh, and another thing about 1989? The quality of printing and coloring for DC Comics seemed to be at an all-time low. The scanner actually does these pages some favors, but by and large, be prepared for subpar quality throughout. I'd love to see this one remastered down the line, even if it's less of a brilliant story and more of an interesting character study for a Batman in transition.
The story's prologue is set in the recent past, as evidenced by the breathing Jason Todd and a mobile Barbara Gordon, who was even drawn exactly the way she appeared in The Killing Joke. I can't include any images of her due to scan limitations, but suffice it to say, the effects of The Killing Joke and A Death in the Family weigh heavily in this opening scene, as Batman investigates the murder of a police officer.
Oh Jason, it's not nice to pick on Vash the Stampede like that!
I love that they actually came up with something practical for Jason to wear. I imagine that few things would suck like a chain-mail speedo in a Gotham winter.
Regardless of what Jeph Loeb would try to have us believe, a .22 is hardly the most threatening of firearms. There's a reason why even the most obsessed Two-Face in comics tends to favor .45 automatics instead.
Now that's a great introduction to a well-written Two-Face. "I never cheat" should be the mantra for anyone writing Two-Face. He's the only character whose alignment could be considered both Lawful and Chaotic, but too many writers would just have had him cheat without a second thought. A Two-Face with a warped sense of fairness is far more interesting than a snarling sadist with a fixation on the number two.
I do find it odd that Owsley doesn't touch upon the fact that Jason never entirely resolved his issues with Harvey over the latter killing the former's father. Why has no one ever really had Jason confront Harvey in an emotionally satisfying manner?
Erm, Harvey, perhaps you should break the news to Freddie before you flip to decide what you're going to do. Also, that's the second time I've wondered if the artist has ever actually seen someone flip a coin in real life, because it sure as hell ain't done that way. Henchgirl suspects that the script read, "Two-Face tosses the coin," and Michael Bair just took it literally.
There's something poignant about Harvey acknowledging their past partnership/friendship and seeing them both as casualties of the war on crime. That "war" is one of the issue's biggest themes (something focused on more directly in scans I can't include), and even though Harvey went to the other side, he still plays up to the idea that there ARE sides, and that he can still respect Batman as his opponent.
I'm a sucker for any story that acklowledges the dark mirror relationship that Bruce and Harvey have to one another, and how easily Bruce could have ended up the same if it weren't for Alfred, Dick, and Jim. So that makes the main story--set in modern day, after Jason's death--all the more meaningful, following his failure to save Jason. This is the point where Batman starts looking a little too closely into that mirror, especially once a certain piece of news comes to his attention:
In this story, we learn that Barbara Gordon (Jim's wife from Batman: Year One) had been dead for six years. How did she die? We don't know. But it's certainly clear that Scott Snyder didn't read this story when he brought Barbara back for The Black Mirror a few months ago in Detective Comics. I can't blame him, since this seems to be a lost period for comics continuity that most have forgotten or just ignore outright.
It also doesn't help that many attempts by writers to built upon the foundations of Batman: Year One were subsequently ignored by Jeph Loeb, who used them to his own ends in The Long Halloween and Dark Victory. Stories like this are the obsolete early attempts at world-building, but while the details may have been lost, the same can't be said for the effects on Batman's character and his relationships to those around him. I'd argue that what happens next kicks off implications for the rift in Batman and Jim's partnership that carries on directly into No Man's Land.
Great timing, Bruce. Well done. Gold star. Banana sticker.
So, without Jim's help, Bruce decides to do something entirely reasonable and seek out the help of his other old ally, whether that ex-ally wants to help him or not.
"I know a false face when I see one." Hello there, canon evidence to support my fan theory that Harvey--on one level, at least--knows that Bruce is Batman!
Although wait, when did Harvey's blue eyes turn brown? IMPOSTOR! Or just colorist fail. Whatever.
Man, Batman doesn't even bother trying to deal with Harvey, offering him no incentives to help, nor even attempting to appeal to Harvey's sense of justice and decency! No, instead, he tells him, "This is what we're doing now," and while Harvey doesn't question or fight Batman, it clear that he has no choice in the matter. Hell, he doesn't even flip to see if he'll agree to help, just whether or not to kill Batman!
Maybe he just knows that there's no point. This is Batman stripped down to pure dickholish action, and Harvey has no choice but to comply.
Geez, someone was reeeeally fond of Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns, enough to make not one but two direct references. Not only is this entire scene a lift of the Mutant Leader's escape to the mud pit, but Batman's line in the second panel references something he said in the arial fight with Bandaged!Harvey: "Thoughts like that keep me warm at night." This issue really does bear the markings of a Batman story directly after Miller redefined the character for the 80's, when other writers attempted to follow suit while still trying to reconcile the character with his Pre-Miller stories.
Man, when Harvey wants to get away from Gotham for awhile, he really is able to hide out in style! That said, I have a hard time ever imagining Two-Face outside of Gotham. He's rooted to that city, for better or worse. I was just rereading Gotham Central: Half a Life, and Rucka has Crispus Allen mention something about how Two-Face never leaves Gotham, which sounds about right to me. But that idea is contradicted not just by this story but also Matt Wagner's Faces (same title, with the same idea? COINCIDENCE?! Yes.), so take that how you will.
Be warned, we're headings towards some major exposition dumpage.
Wells just stood right there for the cameras while Ryder interviewed his pal? What an idiot.
Dick. Move.
I know I'm biased and all, but between the manipulation and the bullying, I'm far more sympathetic to Harvey here than I am to Bruce.
When Batman wakes up, he finds himself tied up in the back of a van, still in the makeup he wore when he was shot. Harvey is there, telling him, "We've removed your utility belt and that body armor you wore beneath your disguise." I find it... interesting... that Harvey stripped Batman of his weapons, yet left the makeup and disguise on.
Harvey's actual deathtrap plan is, as usual, one of "double jeopardy": stick him in a van with two starving pit bulls, and roll the whole shebang off the cliff. Oh Harvey, always so needlessly complicated! "And while you're busy dying, Batman..."
I love that monologue from Harvey so much. The sentiments are similar to Neil Gaiman's "origin" for the Riddler, "When Is A Door?" from Secret Origins Special (which also came out that same year), where even the villains don't like the nasty, darker, crueler direction that the world is taking. Harvey's a killer and a maniac, but at least he knows that he plays the game fair and square, whereas Batman's become a ruthless cheating dick. Two-Face takes no pleasure in this particular deathtrap, I'm sure.
Of course, Batman escapes and manages to apprehend both Harvey and Wells, dragging them both off to the airport.
"... And hope I can live with myself later," Batman thinks, as he snags Wells with the Batarang, as Two-Face gets away.
That's an ending we almost never see in superhero comics, one which ends in a land of unanswerable questions and moral grayness. It's a story ahead of its time in that regard, although most "moral ambiguity" these days comes in form of stories like Identity Crisis and Civil War, the less said of which, the better.
Ultimately, I like my heroes being heroes, and I don't like seeing Batman depicted as a manipulative dick in the name of justice. It would have probably helped if he, y'know, told Jim Gordon than Wells was still alive rather than showing up at Barbara's grave and say, "Hey, I want to go pal around with Two-Face. Make it happen, mustache-man." It's honestly depressing to see that rift getting formed between Batman and Jim, but it makes perfect sense for this story, since it actually explores the dynamic of Batman and Two-Face in a way that speaks to both characters, and the methods they'll use to find justice for motives of their own.
Later that same year, Batman's relentlessness would reach its climax when he'd re-clash with Two-Face in A Lonely Place of Dying (which acknowledges this story, even though Jim Gordon is fine with Batman again, and that apparently Harvey briefly went sane at some point before going insane again, what?), a story which further played with Batman and Harvey mirroring each other. More importantly, it's also the story that introduced Tim Drake, which I would argue was the very moment when this weird transitionary period finally kicked into progress.
Finally, after all the deconstruction and tearing down, Batman now had somewhere to go, and the Batman creative teams finally found their footing. And a few months later, the next Batman Annual was released: issue #14, Eye of the Beholder, the definitive Two-Face origin. The 90's were here, and a new era had begun. But Batman's decent into being a manipulative dick would carry on, for better or worse, and would prove increasingly difficult to shake despite the best efforts of many great writers to come.
Take Green Lantern, for instance. After the main series Green Lantern Corps was canceled, the adventures of Hal Jordan were moved over to Action Comics Weekly (itself a misbegotten attempt at an anthology series filled with such fascinatingly flawed and oddball stories such as Wild Dog and the Secret Six team that nobody remembers, alongside more standard heroes like Deadman and Nightwing), and Hal's new adventures were immediately off to a rocky start. This is truly the most ignominious and forgotten period of Green Lantern history, featuring such career lows for Hal such as Star Sapphire deciding to just up and slaughter Katma Tui for no good fucking reason, the revelation that Hal is fearless because he was LOBOTOMIZED by the power ring, and lowest of all, a story which can only be described best as "Hal Jordan Has No Friends," in which everyone--from Green Arrow to Clark Kent to frickin' ALFRED--pretty much just tell Hal to fuck off.
The the first and third instances were written by James Owsley (later to become Christopher Priest), who, in 1989, wrote a story in Batman Annual #13 which inadvertently served as a companion piece to "Hal Jordan Has No Friends." Think of this story, Faces, best described as, "Batman, I Don't Even KNOW You Anymore." It's set in the period where Batman just began his transition into becoming an aggressive jerkwad and everyone is disappointed in him, especially Jim Gordon and even Harvey Dent.
Oh, and another thing about 1989? The quality of printing and coloring for DC Comics seemed to be at an all-time low. The scanner actually does these pages some favors, but by and large, be prepared for subpar quality throughout. I'd love to see this one remastered down the line, even if it's less of a brilliant story and more of an interesting character study for a Batman in transition.
The story's prologue is set in the recent past, as evidenced by the breathing Jason Todd and a mobile Barbara Gordon, who was even drawn exactly the way she appeared in The Killing Joke. I can't include any images of her due to scan limitations, but suffice it to say, the effects of The Killing Joke and A Death in the Family weigh heavily in this opening scene, as Batman investigates the murder of a police officer.
Oh Jason, it's not nice to pick on Vash the Stampede like that!
I love that they actually came up with something practical for Jason to wear. I imagine that few things would suck like a chain-mail speedo in a Gotham winter.
Regardless of what Jeph Loeb would try to have us believe, a .22 is hardly the most threatening of firearms. There's a reason why even the most obsessed Two-Face in comics tends to favor .45 automatics instead.
Now that's a great introduction to a well-written Two-Face. "I never cheat" should be the mantra for anyone writing Two-Face. He's the only character whose alignment could be considered both Lawful and Chaotic, but too many writers would just have had him cheat without a second thought. A Two-Face with a warped sense of fairness is far more interesting than a snarling sadist with a fixation on the number two.
I do find it odd that Owsley doesn't touch upon the fact that Jason never entirely resolved his issues with Harvey over the latter killing the former's father. Why has no one ever really had Jason confront Harvey in an emotionally satisfying manner?
Erm, Harvey, perhaps you should break the news to Freddie before you flip to decide what you're going to do. Also, that's the second time I've wondered if the artist has ever actually seen someone flip a coin in real life, because it sure as hell ain't done that way. Henchgirl suspects that the script read, "Two-Face tosses the coin," and Michael Bair just took it literally.
There's something poignant about Harvey acknowledging their past partnership/friendship and seeing them both as casualties of the war on crime. That "war" is one of the issue's biggest themes (something focused on more directly in scans I can't include), and even though Harvey went to the other side, he still plays up to the idea that there ARE sides, and that he can still respect Batman as his opponent.
I'm a sucker for any story that acklowledges the dark mirror relationship that Bruce and Harvey have to one another, and how easily Bruce could have ended up the same if it weren't for Alfred, Dick, and Jim. So that makes the main story--set in modern day, after Jason's death--all the more meaningful, following his failure to save Jason. This is the point where Batman starts looking a little too closely into that mirror, especially once a certain piece of news comes to his attention:
In this story, we learn that Barbara Gordon (Jim's wife from Batman: Year One) had been dead for six years. How did she die? We don't know. But it's certainly clear that Scott Snyder didn't read this story when he brought Barbara back for The Black Mirror a few months ago in Detective Comics. I can't blame him, since this seems to be a lost period for comics continuity that most have forgotten or just ignore outright.
It also doesn't help that many attempts by writers to built upon the foundations of Batman: Year One were subsequently ignored by Jeph Loeb, who used them to his own ends in The Long Halloween and Dark Victory. Stories like this are the obsolete early attempts at world-building, but while the details may have been lost, the same can't be said for the effects on Batman's character and his relationships to those around him. I'd argue that what happens next kicks off implications for the rift in Batman and Jim's partnership that carries on directly into No Man's Land.
Great timing, Bruce. Well done. Gold star. Banana sticker.
So, without Jim's help, Bruce decides to do something entirely reasonable and seek out the help of his other old ally, whether that ex-ally wants to help him or not.
"I know a false face when I see one." Hello there, canon evidence to support my fan theory that Harvey--on one level, at least--knows that Bruce is Batman!
Although wait, when did Harvey's blue eyes turn brown? IMPOSTOR! Or just colorist fail. Whatever.
Man, Batman doesn't even bother trying to deal with Harvey, offering him no incentives to help, nor even attempting to appeal to Harvey's sense of justice and decency! No, instead, he tells him, "This is what we're doing now," and while Harvey doesn't question or fight Batman, it clear that he has no choice in the matter. Hell, he doesn't even flip to see if he'll agree to help, just whether or not to kill Batman!
Maybe he just knows that there's no point. This is Batman stripped down to pure dickholish action, and Harvey has no choice but to comply.
Geez, someone was reeeeally fond of Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns, enough to make not one but two direct references. Not only is this entire scene a lift of the Mutant Leader's escape to the mud pit, but Batman's line in the second panel references something he said in the arial fight with Bandaged!Harvey: "Thoughts like that keep me warm at night." This issue really does bear the markings of a Batman story directly after Miller redefined the character for the 80's, when other writers attempted to follow suit while still trying to reconcile the character with his Pre-Miller stories.
Man, when Harvey wants to get away from Gotham for awhile, he really is able to hide out in style! That said, I have a hard time ever imagining Two-Face outside of Gotham. He's rooted to that city, for better or worse. I was just rereading Gotham Central: Half a Life, and Rucka has Crispus Allen mention something about how Two-Face never leaves Gotham, which sounds about right to me. But that idea is contradicted not just by this story but also Matt Wagner's Faces (same title, with the same idea? COINCIDENCE?! Yes.), so take that how you will.
Be warned, we're headings towards some major exposition dumpage.
Wells just stood right there for the cameras while Ryder interviewed his pal? What an idiot.
Dick. Move.
I know I'm biased and all, but between the manipulation and the bullying, I'm far more sympathetic to Harvey here than I am to Bruce.
When Batman wakes up, he finds himself tied up in the back of a van, still in the makeup he wore when he was shot. Harvey is there, telling him, "We've removed your utility belt and that body armor you wore beneath your disguise." I find it... interesting... that Harvey stripped Batman of his weapons, yet left the makeup and disguise on.
Harvey's actual deathtrap plan is, as usual, one of "double jeopardy": stick him in a van with two starving pit bulls, and roll the whole shebang off the cliff. Oh Harvey, always so needlessly complicated! "And while you're busy dying, Batman..."
I love that monologue from Harvey so much. The sentiments are similar to Neil Gaiman's "origin" for the Riddler, "When Is A Door?" from Secret Origins Special (which also came out that same year), where even the villains don't like the nasty, darker, crueler direction that the world is taking. Harvey's a killer and a maniac, but at least he knows that he plays the game fair and square, whereas Batman's become a ruthless cheating dick. Two-Face takes no pleasure in this particular deathtrap, I'm sure.
Of course, Batman escapes and manages to apprehend both Harvey and Wells, dragging them both off to the airport.
"... And hope I can live with myself later," Batman thinks, as he snags Wells with the Batarang, as Two-Face gets away.
That's an ending we almost never see in superhero comics, one which ends in a land of unanswerable questions and moral grayness. It's a story ahead of its time in that regard, although most "moral ambiguity" these days comes in form of stories like Identity Crisis and Civil War, the less said of which, the better.
Ultimately, I like my heroes being heroes, and I don't like seeing Batman depicted as a manipulative dick in the name of justice. It would have probably helped if he, y'know, told Jim Gordon than Wells was still alive rather than showing up at Barbara's grave and say, "Hey, I want to go pal around with Two-Face. Make it happen, mustache-man." It's honestly depressing to see that rift getting formed between Batman and Jim, but it makes perfect sense for this story, since it actually explores the dynamic of Batman and Two-Face in a way that speaks to both characters, and the methods they'll use to find justice for motives of their own.
Later that same year, Batman's relentlessness would reach its climax when he'd re-clash with Two-Face in A Lonely Place of Dying (which acknowledges this story, even though Jim Gordon is fine with Batman again, and that apparently Harvey briefly went sane at some point before going insane again, what?), a story which further played with Batman and Harvey mirroring each other. More importantly, it's also the story that introduced Tim Drake, which I would argue was the very moment when this weird transitionary period finally kicked into progress.
Finally, after all the deconstruction and tearing down, Batman now had somewhere to go, and the Batman creative teams finally found their footing. And a few months later, the next Batman Annual was released: issue #14, Eye of the Beholder, the definitive Two-Face origin. The 90's were here, and a new era had begun. But Batman's decent into being a manipulative dick would carry on, for better or worse, and would prove increasingly difficult to shake despite the best efforts of many great writers to come.