Review #33: CROSSOVERS "Batman & Spiderman: Disordered Minds"
Writer: J.M DeMatteis
Penciller: Mark Bagley
Inkers: Scott Hanna & Mark Farmer
Colourist: Electric Crayon
Crossovers are every geek's wet dream. ZOMG! CHARACTERS WHO NORMALLY DON'T INTERACT BECAUSE THEY ARE FROM DIFFERENT UNIVERSES ARE INTERACTING! ZOMG! IT'S JUST LIKE IT IS IN FANFICTION! EXCEPT I CAN PAY MONEY FOR IT!
To be honest, I am a very limited-capacity geek. Oh sure, I have other vague interests that are geeky. There are movies and shows from my childhood I remain unreasonably and unobjectively attached to. There are other elements of popculture I take a middling interest in, or am even fairly dedicated to. But in terms of great passion and commitment and active involvement, I am willingly constrained to the world of Gotham. My knowledge of other verses is vague and sketchy. I have almost no interest in the world of Marvel - asides from a brief flirtation with the X-Men whilst in my teens - beyond whatever glossy, shiny movies they bring out.
I loved the first Spiderman film. Me and my flatmate of the time both loved it - except, while she wanted to kiss Spidey in the rain, I wanted to BE Spidey, swinging from rooftop to rooftop by a single thread of web. This lead to a longstanding joke between us in which the scenario would be Louise dangling trapped from a crane somewhere, screaming desperately for Spiderman to save her, only for me to swing up and sing: “Hiiiii Louisssseee!” Or her jab on our oft-delayed nights-out-on-the-town in which “no one would ever get saved because you'd spend hours and hours putting every single strand of your hair carefully up underneath the cowl only to finally proclaim 'oh it just looks better out anyway!'” (I may have taken a while to get ready on occasion and my hair may have been a factor in this).
Anyhoo. Spiderman. Cool guy. Hero. Funny, too. Folks seem to like him.
And in this comic he teams up with Batman to stop the united forces of Carnage and the Joker!!
Afterall, what kinda superhero teamup is complete without a supervillaim teamup to oppose? What, Spidey and Bats are just gonna hang out one night to go smack down some dealers? What a flimsy premise to base a comic book on! Comic book stories must be epic! They must resonate across our collective consciousness like the thunder of Mighty Thor!
Or something. I'm being somewhat fascetious as I've procrastinated in even writing this review and I am at this very second sitting on a plane on my way to merry old BrisVegas in order to attend a geekcon in cosplay as Harley. I didn't bring a book with me so I figured I may as well make some flabby stab at productivity and try and spew something out in order to attempt to keep my promise of two reviews a month.
ANYWAY. Focus, Bee, focus!
This crossover was another one of the very early ones I bought. 1997, I think the year was and we were all wearing apples on our belts (it was the fashion at the time), rickrolling was still a few more years away and the internet was largely dominated by porn and Star Trek slash fanfiction. It was a magical time. A time when every trip to the comic book store was a slightly nerve-wracking experience; a lone girl glanced askance at by the geekboys, frantically searching through the backbins in the hopes of unearthing something Joker or Harley related in this first flush of her new obsession.
I'm still procrasting on actually writing the review, can you tell?
I loved it. I loved this comic. What can I say? I thought it was wonderful.
And I still love it pretty much a whole damn lot.
The dynamic between both Bats and Spidey and Joker and Carnage works beautifully. They contrast fantastically against each other and provide for some fabulously hilarious moments. There's even symmetry - Spidey is the funnyman to Bats' straight, as is Joker to Carnage.
This story was written by a Marvel staffer, which makes it even cuter that both Carnage and Spiderman get all fan-gushy over Joker and Batman. They say you are either a Marvel or a DC girl and I'm DC all the way and my snobby little DC heart believes the Batverse is the superior and so it is only fitting and just that the Spideyverse thinks so too! They know their place!
The basic set-up is this: some upstart of a know-it-all Doc has decided to implant the world's most dangerous criminals' brains with a behaviour modification chip. The first to go under the knife is Carnage.
The operation is deemed a success - with Carnage now a slobbering, slack-jawed, blank-eyed vegetable - and so the same operation is performed on the Joker (noooooo!).
Of course, Carnage is faking the whole time - the symbiote shorted out the chip - and he wastes no time in unleashing mayhem, tearing a few heads off and kidnapping the Joker, all because...
… he wanted to meet Mistah J!
Yes, Carnage is Mistah J's fanboy and it's almost kinda cute. He shorts out Joker's own chip, returning the Clown Prince to his full homicial glory and the two team-up with the intent of taking over the very world... or at least of wreaking some havoc.
Meanwhile, Spidey has come after them of course, only to bump into Batman and... proceed to fanboy Batman! Yes, it's hilarious. Oh, and they start tracking down Joker and Carnage, of course.
The beautiful thing in this comic for me is how Mistah J shines as a stand-out villain. Villain team-ups will always fall apart, usually over how they're going to kill the hero or whatnot. And it's similar here - except the major clash comes because Carnage lacks style. His approach, his attitude, his intent - it all just lacks STYLE. Carnage is a callous youth, with no delicacy, no nuance, no panache. All brute force and no skill.
As is further emphasised when Joker easily gets the drop on him, despite being outclassed in sheer brute strength. But that's par for the course with our Uncle Joker, isn't it? It's why we love him so! ;)
But particularly, I always liked the climax of this story for getting to the heart of the Joker in a fairly simple and rather delightful way.
Should I give it away? No. I don't think I will. But I will say I am glad this is one of the first stories I read, one of the stories that helped form and develop my understanding of who and what Joker is. It's a very nicely done little story in which all the key characters are beautifully captured.
But for my money, it's Joker who shines here and, in my opinion, that's as it should be! XD
And with DeMatteis writing, we can't expect more - he is a writer who simply 'got' the Joker in a way not many ever did and it's a shame he was never appreciated more for it - and still isn't, in many ways.
But he is a generally skilled comic writer, with a deft hand at character, who treats the characters he writes about with respect and authenticity. All of the characterisations and subsequent interactions in this book feel spot-on, beautiful and he even puts in a little nuance, having the worlds of Batman and Spidey mirror each other in several key ways, leading to final confrontations with the other's arch-enemy in which they both face their personal demons.
I am a shallow, shallow girl. I can excuse comic book art almost anything if it fills one critical criteria: sexy Joker.
And this one fulfills.
BUT apart from that, I do like the art in this book. There is a certain stiffness and flatness to it, which I think has a fair bit to do with the inking, but you can follow the purdy pictures to make sense of what's going on and that's kinda critical in comic book reading. I'm doing that whole staring stupidly at the screen trying to figure out what else to say about the art and failing cos i'm no kinda artist so maybe I should just leave it at that? It's not the greatest comic book art ever, but it's far, far from the worst and on the whole it's bright and pretty and reasonably dynamic and well-laid out. Oh yeah, and schmexy Joker. Win!
I've got a bit of a soft-spot for this one, seeing as how we have such a long history but if I'm to be ruthlessly objective, I would say this isn't an absolutely-zomg-must-have-or-die comic but if you come across it, yes I would highly recommend picking it up!
Penciller: Mark Bagley
Inkers: Scott Hanna & Mark Farmer
Colourist: Electric Crayon
Crossovers are every geek's wet dream. ZOMG! CHARACTERS WHO NORMALLY DON'T INTERACT BECAUSE THEY ARE FROM DIFFERENT UNIVERSES ARE INTERACTING! ZOMG! IT'S JUST LIKE IT IS IN FANFICTION! EXCEPT I CAN PAY MONEY FOR IT!
To be honest, I am a very limited-capacity geek. Oh sure, I have other vague interests that are geeky. There are movies and shows from my childhood I remain unreasonably and unobjectively attached to. There are other elements of popculture I take a middling interest in, or am even fairly dedicated to. But in terms of great passion and commitment and active involvement, I am willingly constrained to the world of Gotham. My knowledge of other verses is vague and sketchy. I have almost no interest in the world of Marvel - asides from a brief flirtation with the X-Men whilst in my teens - beyond whatever glossy, shiny movies they bring out.
I loved the first Spiderman film. Me and my flatmate of the time both loved it - except, while she wanted to kiss Spidey in the rain, I wanted to BE Spidey, swinging from rooftop to rooftop by a single thread of web. This lead to a longstanding joke between us in which the scenario would be Louise dangling trapped from a crane somewhere, screaming desperately for Spiderman to save her, only for me to swing up and sing: “Hiiiii Louisssseee!” Or her jab on our oft-delayed nights-out-on-the-town in which “no one would ever get saved because you'd spend hours and hours putting every single strand of your hair carefully up underneath the cowl only to finally proclaim 'oh it just looks better out anyway!'” (I may have taken a while to get ready on occasion and my hair may have been a factor in this).
Anyhoo. Spiderman. Cool guy. Hero. Funny, too. Folks seem to like him.
And in this comic he teams up with Batman to stop the united forces of Carnage and the Joker!!
Afterall, what kinda superhero teamup is complete without a supervillaim teamup to oppose? What, Spidey and Bats are just gonna hang out one night to go smack down some dealers? What a flimsy premise to base a comic book on! Comic book stories must be epic! They must resonate across our collective consciousness like the thunder of Mighty Thor!
Or something. I'm being somewhat fascetious as I've procrastinated in even writing this review and I am at this very second sitting on a plane on my way to merry old BrisVegas in order to attend a geekcon in cosplay as Harley. I didn't bring a book with me so I figured I may as well make some flabby stab at productivity and try and spew something out in order to attempt to keep my promise of two reviews a month.
ANYWAY. Focus, Bee, focus!
This crossover was another one of the very early ones I bought. 1997, I think the year was and we were all wearing apples on our belts (it was the fashion at the time), rickrolling was still a few more years away and the internet was largely dominated by porn and Star Trek slash fanfiction. It was a magical time. A time when every trip to the comic book store was a slightly nerve-wracking experience; a lone girl glanced askance at by the geekboys, frantically searching through the backbins in the hopes of unearthing something Joker or Harley related in this first flush of her new obsession.
I'm still procrasting on actually writing the review, can you tell?
I loved it. I loved this comic. What can I say? I thought it was wonderful.
And I still love it pretty much a whole damn lot.
The dynamic between both Bats and Spidey and Joker and Carnage works beautifully. They contrast fantastically against each other and provide for some fabulously hilarious moments. There's even symmetry - Spidey is the funnyman to Bats' straight, as is Joker to Carnage.
This story was written by a Marvel staffer, which makes it even cuter that both Carnage and Spiderman get all fan-gushy over Joker and Batman. They say you are either a Marvel or a DC girl and I'm DC all the way and my snobby little DC heart believes the Batverse is the superior and so it is only fitting and just that the Spideyverse thinks so too! They know their place!
The basic set-up is this: some upstart of a know-it-all Doc has decided to implant the world's most dangerous criminals' brains with a behaviour modification chip. The first to go under the knife is Carnage.
The operation is deemed a success - with Carnage now a slobbering, slack-jawed, blank-eyed vegetable - and so the same operation is performed on the Joker (noooooo!).
Of course, Carnage is faking the whole time - the symbiote shorted out the chip - and he wastes no time in unleashing mayhem, tearing a few heads off and kidnapping the Joker, all because...
… he wanted to meet Mistah J!
Yes, Carnage is Mistah J's fanboy and it's almost kinda cute. He shorts out Joker's own chip, returning the Clown Prince to his full homicial glory and the two team-up with the intent of taking over the very world... or at least of wreaking some havoc.
Meanwhile, Spidey has come after them of course, only to bump into Batman and... proceed to fanboy Batman! Yes, it's hilarious. Oh, and they start tracking down Joker and Carnage, of course.
The beautiful thing in this comic for me is how Mistah J shines as a stand-out villain. Villain team-ups will always fall apart, usually over how they're going to kill the hero or whatnot. And it's similar here - except the major clash comes because Carnage lacks style. His approach, his attitude, his intent - it all just lacks STYLE. Carnage is a callous youth, with no delicacy, no nuance, no panache. All brute force and no skill.
As is further emphasised when Joker easily gets the drop on him, despite being outclassed in sheer brute strength. But that's par for the course with our Uncle Joker, isn't it? It's why we love him so! ;)
But particularly, I always liked the climax of this story for getting to the heart of the Joker in a fairly simple and rather delightful way.
Should I give it away? No. I don't think I will. But I will say I am glad this is one of the first stories I read, one of the stories that helped form and develop my understanding of who and what Joker is. It's a very nicely done little story in which all the key characters are beautifully captured.
But for my money, it's Joker who shines here and, in my opinion, that's as it should be! XD
And with DeMatteis writing, we can't expect more - he is a writer who simply 'got' the Joker in a way not many ever did and it's a shame he was never appreciated more for it - and still isn't, in many ways.
But he is a generally skilled comic writer, with a deft hand at character, who treats the characters he writes about with respect and authenticity. All of the characterisations and subsequent interactions in this book feel spot-on, beautiful and he even puts in a little nuance, having the worlds of Batman and Spidey mirror each other in several key ways, leading to final confrontations with the other's arch-enemy in which they both face their personal demons.
I am a shallow, shallow girl. I can excuse comic book art almost anything if it fills one critical criteria: sexy Joker.
And this one fulfills.
BUT apart from that, I do like the art in this book. There is a certain stiffness and flatness to it, which I think has a fair bit to do with the inking, but you can follow the purdy pictures to make sense of what's going on and that's kinda critical in comic book reading. I'm doing that whole staring stupidly at the screen trying to figure out what else to say about the art and failing cos i'm no kinda artist so maybe I should just leave it at that? It's not the greatest comic book art ever, but it's far, far from the worst and on the whole it's bright and pretty and reasonably dynamic and well-laid out. Oh yeah, and schmexy Joker. Win!
I've got a bit of a soft-spot for this one, seeing as how we have such a long history but if I'm to be ruthlessly objective, I would say this isn't an absolutely-zomg-must-have-or-die comic but if you come across it, yes I would highly recommend picking it up!