The Lovely Vicki Vale

DC Comics

Frank Miller redefined Batman in the late 80s with two acclaimed mini-series: The Dark Knight Returns (dealing an older Batman coming out of retirement to save Gotham yet again) and Batman: Year One (which fine-tuned Batman’s origin). While the character from the 60s television show hadn’t been as campy as the public perceived him to be for quite some time, it was Miller’s stories that brought mainstream attention to the “Dark Knight.”

Joined by Jim Lee, one of the most popular artists of the past couple decades, Miller returned to Batman for this new All Star series, which was another fresh start for the character. I don’t know if I was expecting some sort of de facto sequel to Year One or a prequel to The Dark Knight Returns, but Miller threw us all for a loop with this latest series.

The Batman presented in ASBaR is extremely confident and he enjoys what he’s doing, almost to the point of being maniacal about it. We’re introduced to this Batman through the eyes of young Dick Grayson, who would eventually become Robin, Batman’s sidekick. After attending a circus where he witnesses Grayson’s parents murdered, Batman takes the youth under his wing. That’s pretty much where the similarities to the regular story end. This Batman is scaring the hell out of Grayson. Grayson doesn’t really want to go along with Batman and is out of his wits as Batman mows through police who are chasing them, gets insulted by the person who is supposed to be saving him and is pretty much dumped off in the Bat Cave to fend for himself while Batman goes on patrol. If not for Alfred the butler, young Grayson would be forced to feed himself by eating the rats in the cave (Batman’s idea). Continue reading “All Star Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder #5”

“What would the Gotham City of 100 years ago have been like?” The back cover begs the question. Flip to the front cover … it doesn’t look that much different from the typical modern Batman: heartbroken, a lonesome pose among the skyscrapers. This image evokes both the classic figure of Spawn and the color palette of the interior art, composed of muddy burnt siennas, navy blues, blacks and the impure yellow or orange of a dirty gas lamp.

The art team, featuring future Hellboy creator Mignola, use complementary styles that lead to visual uniformity throughout the book. Representative of the title, the color palette brings alive the look of the alternate late nineteenth-century settings of London, England and Gotham as dominated by the lack of clean electric lighting.

In the frequent shadows lurks not only Batman but also Jack the Ripper. They have similar cravings for the darkness and seem to thrive in it; Batman would be a bit harder to see in a world that had, by today’s standards, highly inadequate lighting and a society that lived in an age of superstition. Gaslight serves as part murder mystery with a case of severe mistaken identity and part origin story for the Dark Knight. Continue reading “Gotham by Gaslight: A Tale of the Batman”

In continuing my theme from last month, with my focus on Elseworlds Superman stories, this month I will be reviewing Superman: Speeding Bullets. The premise of the story should make any Superman or Batman fan salivate with its endless possibilities, as the plot twines itself around the notion that the Wayne parents find Kal-El’s rocket, resulting in the Last Son of Krypton becoming Bruce Wayne, not Clark Kent; thus, Kal-El becomes the Batman, the ultimate-powered superhero crossed with perhaps the smartest hero (in this ’verse, anyway). I was thoroughly primed and motivated to read this book.

Now all I had to do was hunt down a copy. That should be easy enough, or so I thought. I remember fondly flipping through copies of Superman: Speeding Bullets at the local Border’s Bookstore when I was in middle school. Ten years later, it was out of print, which was the reason why Amazon did not stock it in their warehouse, though they had third-party sellers schilling it for $18.99. OUCH! That was too rich for my blood. Next, I hopped on Ebay, only to snooze through the first auction and lose it for around twelve bucks. I was pretty pissed about that. As luck would have it, I won a copy of it and Gotham by Gaslight for around nine bucks, including shipping. Sweet! About a week after the auction, my envelope arrived from Texas with my eagerly awaited books. As I took Speeding Bullets from its packaging, I was let down by how slim it was; it was only 50 pages and as I flipped through it, it didn’t look as dense as, say, Superman: Red Son, which I reviewed last month. However, after reading through it, it is pretty good, I must say. Continue reading “Superman: Speeding Bullets”

If you’re the kind of person who thinks comic books are for kids, you’re like most people who missed one of the most significant literary releases of the 1980’s.

Alan Moore’s Watchmen is a classic among graphic novels. Originally published in 12 issues from 1986 to 1987 by DC Comics, it’s now available in its entirety as a trade paperback.

The story revolves around a group of superheroes who have (mostly) retired from heroics and find themselves dealing with life without the mask while the world crumbles around them. Watchmen takes place in the fall of 1985, although it is a 1985 with a partially different past. In the world that Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons have created, superheroes first show up after World War II. That’s where things start to get a little different. In their world of superheroes the Vietnam War is won due to their influence, and technology takes a leap forward due to the advanced mind of one of these heroes. Continue reading “Watchmen: Superheroes in Dystopia”

His tights had been drained from the cheery blue, yellow and red to a dishwater-dull gray, with the exception of the violent crimson that fills the mechanical pentagon on his chest, the entirety of his cape and his belt buckle. Cold and determined, his eyes bear an eternal stare; his body is torqued and wound for action. He grips a silver pole with the scarlet banner of the former Soviet Union that bears a hammer and sickle similar to the one emblazoned across the top half of his torso. This was my first introduction to the world of Superman: Red Son, through the expertly crafted figure made by DC Direct.

Although it was released more than a fifteen years after the end of the Cold War, the effect of seeing Superman in that costume is still staggering. Always a huge fan of both Superman and controversy, I knew I had to tear through Red Son, and finally got the opportunity to do it after I realized how easy it would be to work graphic novels into my budget. Continue reading “Superman: Red Son”