New Comics! A quick review of Snyder/Capullo's BATMAN #1, and the WTF ending of TDK #1 (SPOILERS!)
I know it's a week late, but I figured that I would be remiss in not giving a quick look at the opening pages of Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo's Batman #1, which is being hailed by some as the very best comic to come out of the DCnU so far.
My own reaction: it's good. Not brilliant, but good. It doesn't punch me in the gut, nor does it blow my socks off, or move me to tears, paint my house, pay off my car payments, or taste like bacon. It's just good. I suppose that in the sea of mediocrity that is most popular fiction these days, that should be remarkable in of itself. But even in that case, how sad is that? Shouldn't we hold comics to a higher standard so that stories like Batman #1 are the AVERAGE quality, not the EXCEPTION?
The issue itself is a solid introduction for new readers that also flows seamlessly from Snyder's work in Detective Comics: The Black Mirror and The Golden Gates of Gotham, as he works to create an overarching epic that is clearly shaping up to be Batman versus Gotham City itself (presumably as a living entity ala Milligan's Dark Knight, Dark City).
Hell, that's exactly what Snyder has said in interviews, where he posited the ludicrous theory that Gotham has literally been "Batman's best friend," lol wut. No, no, no, if Gotham is sentient at all (and what's with this fascination some writers have for envisioning cities as actual entities?), it's hardly EVER been Batman's bosom pal.
Based on his two previous Batman stories, I suspect that Snyder is probably continuing the Morrisonian trope of evil secret societies of cult-like evil evilness (and if Newbie McMayorChin isn't revealed to be involved, I'll be damn surprised). As you may have guessed, this type of story fills me with aggressive apathy, but as long as Snyder keeps a focus on characters, I'll keep reading. He writes a fine Jim Gordon, and I'm glad to see Bullock prominently featured, even if Snyder's Bullock sounds a lot more like Slam Bradley. As for the rest of the issue, it's pretty much all set-up, with an empty cliffhanger ending we've seen before countless times. I look forward to reading the story as a whole, but there's not much to especially recommend about this one chapter, which is a common problem in this day and age of wait-for-the-trade.
What I do want is just quickly look at the opening pages, featuring the Rumble In Arkham that we've seen in previews:
Capullo draws a great Gotham, I'll give him that. Although if that building is Wayne Enterprises, I get the impression that people are going to figure out that Bruce is Batman. Just saying, where ELSE would he work?
But I guess the whole "Batman Inc" thing has him covered in that regard, which still just goes to show how big Bruce's bat-balls... be. /truebeliever.
Okay, even now that this is colored, I have no idea who the hell the pink dude is supposed to be. The skull-faced one is Jeremiah Arkham as Black Mask II, which, okay, so they're not retconning that, whatever. I'm glad to see Croc back to being more like his old self, so that's good, but the Riddler looks so goddamn stupid that I just I just I can't even. Mr. Freeze looks like he's completely bypassed every single ounce of character development he's gotten since TAS and gone right back to being the boring-ass one-note "second rate Captain Cold," as Joker called him before killing Freeze originally. As for Harvey, the coloring is better here, but even still, it looks like he fell in chewing gum.
And then there's Professor Pyg. Fuck Professor Pyg. That's all.
Now, as for Scarecrow, I have to credit IFuckingLoveBatman for catching just why Scarecrow looks so stupid. Everyone assumed it was to make him look more like the Nolanverse Squishy, but that didn't explain the button eyes. You know what does, though? David Cronenberg's Dr. Decker from Clive Barker's Nightbreed:
God, it all makes so much sense now. I mean, it's still stupid as hell, but as least I see Capullo's logic, especially considering that Cronenberg's character is an insane psychologist who even LOOKS like Jonathan Crane:
So at least now I can see the logic for why he gave Squishy button-eyes, even if that doesn't make it any less ridiculous, impractical, and illogical for someone who's he Scarecrow, not the Ragdoll. Sorry to have gone off-topic like that. Go back and skim the narration to get back into the flow for a bit, because Snyder does go somewhere with all this:
I wish writers and fans alike would stop seeing Croc himself as "little more than a cannibalistic monster," when he USED to be a non-cannibalistic and brilliant mob boss. Who started the idea of Croc being a cannibal, I wonder? I think it only must have happened within the last decade or so.
I have to admit, I like the idea of people seeing Gotham in terms of being reflected in the rogues, which thus leads to Batman himself later offering his own optimistic spin, before the story shows us that Gotham is more complex than any of that. Nothing new to us, but even still, I like that Snyder actually plays with such themes, to contextualize who these characters are, what they represent to the city, and in doing so, showing the various facets to Gotham's "personality." That's more what I'd like to see rather than the city itself becoming sentient and choosing its own champion or something, but eh, we'll see what Snyder actually does.
Of course, me, I mainly see Gotham in terms of Harvey Dent, as I'm not sure if there's any other character who has lived (and still lives) in both extremes of what Gotham has to offer. While I have my problems with Nolan's The Dark Knight, I like how Harvey was virtually the living symbol of Gotham itself, and that the battle for its soul hinged on him. Man, again with cities as being their own beings.
That's all I'm gonna post, so if you'd like to read the rest, you can either head to your local comic shop or buy it digitally from DC's Comixology app, which is what I did.
One more word about the fight itself, which is the part I most care about: Chris Sims citied it in his above-linked review as yet another reason why he loved this story: "It's a pretty great way to kick off the book... More than that, though, it illustrates the theme that Snyder's working to build -- namely, that this is Batman at the top of his game. After all, a battle against a gauntlet of enemies after a mass breakout at Arkham Asylum was the exact thing that ran Batman so ragged in the past that he got his back broken in KNIGHTFALL. Here? Seven pages. This is Batman at his prime, a guy who's already dealt with those enemies and emerged triumphant -- so by page eight, we already know that whatever shows up next, whatever can challenge him, must be something truly fearsome. And we know all this without Snyder ever having to say it. He and Capullo shows us, and they do it in the most exciting way possible."
Ah yes, very impressive, yes. Batman battling through a gauntlet of his foes all at once, emerging triumphant and ready for more, top of his game, indeed, that's something that we've never seen before! Oh wait, no, we actually DID, in Shadow of the Bat #4 by Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle, which predated Knightfall by about a year:
I don't have the last page, but in it, he stand triumphant and defiantly challenging Jeremiah Arkham to send down more. What both scenes have in common is that, unlike Knightfall, it's Batman taking them all down at once, rather than running a gauntlet of each villain, one at a time, with various henchmen, hostages, and deathtraps in the way. Only difference was that Grant and Breyfogle's had the fucking JOKER in it too. And here, Batman did it in THREE PAGES.
I'm just saying, praise Snyder and Capullo's Batman all you want, but don't treat this as them making Batman even more of a competent badass than he already was. Few things bother me about fandom quite like praising a writer for doing something seemingly creative and innovative when, y'know, it's actually been done before. I expected an uber-fan like Sims to know this.
Oh. One more thing... /uncle
In comic news about something which actually DID come out today, I give you the spoiler-tastic final page for The Dark Knight #1, which features the first look at whatever the fuck it is they're doing with Harvey. Go. Go read it. Seriously.
Back? Okay. WOW that's dumb. Kind of delightfully so! I mean, seriously, "One-Face?" What the fuck does that even MEAN? He still has the scarred and unscarred sides! Was there a miscommunication between writer and artists here? Is it supposed to indicate that Harvey's bad side has completely taken over when he became Hulk!Harv? Honestly, that breaks my brain more than the Venom/Titan/whatever he's hopped up on!
Oh, Paul Jenkins, you're the gift that keeps on giving... ridiculously overblown Two-Face stories. Which reminds me, I still need to summon up the courage to review Batman: Jekyll and Hyde. You poor people, you.
My own reaction: it's good. Not brilliant, but good. It doesn't punch me in the gut, nor does it blow my socks off, or move me to tears, paint my house, pay off my car payments, or taste like bacon. It's just good. I suppose that in the sea of mediocrity that is most popular fiction these days, that should be remarkable in of itself. But even in that case, how sad is that? Shouldn't we hold comics to a higher standard so that stories like Batman #1 are the AVERAGE quality, not the EXCEPTION?
The issue itself is a solid introduction for new readers that also flows seamlessly from Snyder's work in Detective Comics: The Black Mirror and The Golden Gates of Gotham, as he works to create an overarching epic that is clearly shaping up to be Batman versus Gotham City itself (presumably as a living entity ala Milligan's Dark Knight, Dark City).
Hell, that's exactly what Snyder has said in interviews, where he posited the ludicrous theory that Gotham has literally been "Batman's best friend," lol wut. No, no, no, if Gotham is sentient at all (and what's with this fascination some writers have for envisioning cities as actual entities?), it's hardly EVER been Batman's bosom pal.
Based on his two previous Batman stories, I suspect that Snyder is probably continuing the Morrisonian trope of evil secret societies of cult-like evil evilness (and if Newbie McMayorChin isn't revealed to be involved, I'll be damn surprised). As you may have guessed, this type of story fills me with aggressive apathy, but as long as Snyder keeps a focus on characters, I'll keep reading. He writes a fine Jim Gordon, and I'm glad to see Bullock prominently featured, even if Snyder's Bullock sounds a lot more like Slam Bradley. As for the rest of the issue, it's pretty much all set-up, with an empty cliffhanger ending we've seen before countless times. I look forward to reading the story as a whole, but there's not much to especially recommend about this one chapter, which is a common problem in this day and age of wait-for-the-trade.
What I do want is just quickly look at the opening pages, featuring the Rumble In Arkham that we've seen in previews:
Capullo draws a great Gotham, I'll give him that. Although if that building is Wayne Enterprises, I get the impression that people are going to figure out that Bruce is Batman. Just saying, where ELSE would he work?
But I guess the whole "Batman Inc" thing has him covered in that regard, which still just goes to show how big Bruce's bat-balls... be. /truebeliever.
Okay, even now that this is colored, I have no idea who the hell the pink dude is supposed to be. The skull-faced one is Jeremiah Arkham as Black Mask II, which, okay, so they're not retconning that, whatever. I'm glad to see Croc back to being more like his old self, so that's good, but the Riddler looks so goddamn stupid that I just I just I can't even. Mr. Freeze looks like he's completely bypassed every single ounce of character development he's gotten since TAS and gone right back to being the boring-ass one-note "second rate Captain Cold," as Joker called him before killing Freeze originally. As for Harvey, the coloring is better here, but even still, it looks like he fell in chewing gum.
And then there's Professor Pyg. Fuck Professor Pyg. That's all.
Now, as for Scarecrow, I have to credit IFuckingLoveBatman for catching just why Scarecrow looks so stupid. Everyone assumed it was to make him look more like the Nolanverse Squishy, but that didn't explain the button eyes. You know what does, though? David Cronenberg's Dr. Decker from Clive Barker's Nightbreed:
God, it all makes so much sense now. I mean, it's still stupid as hell, but as least I see Capullo's logic, especially considering that Cronenberg's character is an insane psychologist who even LOOKS like Jonathan Crane:
So at least now I can see the logic for why he gave Squishy button-eyes, even if that doesn't make it any less ridiculous, impractical, and illogical for someone who's he Scarecrow, not the Ragdoll. Sorry to have gone off-topic like that. Go back and skim the narration to get back into the flow for a bit, because Snyder does go somewhere with all this:
I wish writers and fans alike would stop seeing Croc himself as "little more than a cannibalistic monster," when he USED to be a non-cannibalistic and brilliant mob boss. Who started the idea of Croc being a cannibal, I wonder? I think it only must have happened within the last decade or so.
I have to admit, I like the idea of people seeing Gotham in terms of being reflected in the rogues, which thus leads to Batman himself later offering his own optimistic spin, before the story shows us that Gotham is more complex than any of that. Nothing new to us, but even still, I like that Snyder actually plays with such themes, to contextualize who these characters are, what they represent to the city, and in doing so, showing the various facets to Gotham's "personality." That's more what I'd like to see rather than the city itself becoming sentient and choosing its own champion or something, but eh, we'll see what Snyder actually does.
Of course, me, I mainly see Gotham in terms of Harvey Dent, as I'm not sure if there's any other character who has lived (and still lives) in both extremes of what Gotham has to offer. While I have my problems with Nolan's The Dark Knight, I like how Harvey was virtually the living symbol of Gotham itself, and that the battle for its soul hinged on him. Man, again with cities as being their own beings.
That's all I'm gonna post, so if you'd like to read the rest, you can either head to your local comic shop or buy it digitally from DC's Comixology app, which is what I did.
One more word about the fight itself, which is the part I most care about: Chris Sims citied it in his above-linked review as yet another reason why he loved this story: "It's a pretty great way to kick off the book... More than that, though, it illustrates the theme that Snyder's working to build -- namely, that this is Batman at the top of his game. After all, a battle against a gauntlet of enemies after a mass breakout at Arkham Asylum was the exact thing that ran Batman so ragged in the past that he got his back broken in KNIGHTFALL. Here? Seven pages. This is Batman at his prime, a guy who's already dealt with those enemies and emerged triumphant -- so by page eight, we already know that whatever shows up next, whatever can challenge him, must be something truly fearsome. And we know all this without Snyder ever having to say it. He and Capullo shows us, and they do it in the most exciting way possible."
Ah yes, very impressive, yes. Batman battling through a gauntlet of his foes all at once, emerging triumphant and ready for more, top of his game, indeed, that's something that we've never seen before! Oh wait, no, we actually DID, in Shadow of the Bat #4 by Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle, which predated Knightfall by about a year:
I don't have the last page, but in it, he stand triumphant and defiantly challenging Jeremiah Arkham to send down more. What both scenes have in common is that, unlike Knightfall, it's Batman taking them all down at once, rather than running a gauntlet of each villain, one at a time, with various henchmen, hostages, and deathtraps in the way. Only difference was that Grant and Breyfogle's had the fucking JOKER in it too. And here, Batman did it in THREE PAGES.
I'm just saying, praise Snyder and Capullo's Batman all you want, but don't treat this as them making Batman even more of a competent badass than he already was. Few things bother me about fandom quite like praising a writer for doing something seemingly creative and innovative when, y'know, it's actually been done before. I expected an uber-fan like Sims to know this.
Oh. One more thing... /uncle
In comic news about something which actually DID come out today, I give you the spoiler-tastic final page for The Dark Knight #1, which features the first look at whatever the fuck it is they're doing with Harvey. Go. Go read it. Seriously.
Back? Okay. WOW that's dumb. Kind of delightfully so! I mean, seriously, "One-Face?" What the fuck does that even MEAN? He still has the scarred and unscarred sides! Was there a miscommunication between writer and artists here? Is it supposed to indicate that Harvey's bad side has completely taken over when he became Hulk!Harv? Honestly, that breaks my brain more than the Venom/Titan/whatever he's hopped up on!
Oh, Paul Jenkins, you're the gift that keeps on giving... ridiculously overblown Two-Face stories. Which reminds me, I still need to summon up the courage to review Batman: Jekyll and Hyde. You poor people, you.