Batman #1
By Scott Snyder, Greg Capullo and Jonathan Glapion
It’s another trip to the grimy crime-ridden streets of Gotham City in Batman #1. A fresh start for new readers, the issue explodes with a break-out in Arkham Asylum (strangely mirrored in Batman Dark Knight #1). Fighting an army of his deadliest foes, Batman is joined in battle by the most unlikely of cohorts, the Joker.
The sequence of the Joker and Batman fighting side by side was definitely arranged for shock value, to get readers screaming ‘Howe dare they!!?’ at their comics. While Batman is depicted as a public enemy in Detective Comics, in this series hew is accepted by the police when he arrives on the scene to take control of the situation. It’s very odd that editorially there has been so little consistency in the DCU. Characters seem to be living in different iterations of the same universe rather than a unified one. In the case of Batman, there are four separate ongoing books this month and they barely jive with one another. It’s a little quibble, but it is hardly the best way to start a new line of comics.
Aide from a lack of consistency, another common thread in the new DC Comics is an over-reliance of extreme violence. From the dismembered infants in Swamp Thing to the serial killers in Batgirl, Nightwing, Detective Comics and here in Batman it seems that the new DCU is a far more violent world than ever before. In most cases, I don’t have a real problem with this but as Warner Bros. as been heavily marketing their brand more than ever before, why include a scene where Batman inspects a corpse pinned to the wall by throwing knives?
Interviewed by Newsarama, Snyder hints that things are going get darker and morte interconnected with the rest of the Bat-family:
Newsarama: Scott, how does it feel to have the #1 comic for the month of September?
Scott Snyder:I can’t even believe it! I woke up to that news that day and it was insane. I feel like the luckiest guy. I can’t believe how supportive everyone’s been. And I’m extremely grateful to the fans for picking this up.
Nrama: One of the most noticeable changes to Bruce Wayne in the relaunch is that he’s very much a mentor, particularly in this comic, and is much more engaging with Gotham and his supporting cast. Was that an agreed-upon direction for Bruce in the relaunch? Or was it something that just served this story well?
Snyder:We were all talking a little bit about it. I think the idea is that Bruce’s time as the devil-may-care playboy who has no investment in the city beyond it being a kind of playground feels a little bit dated to most of us in the Bat-world — not only because of what Grant was doing, but also because of the times. I think it’s OK now to make him a bit more civic minded and invested in Gotham, and invested in the idea that he has a responsibility as someone who cares about making it a better place both in and outside the mask.
In that way, we wanted him to be a stronger character as Bruce Wayne as well, a character who has goals that are separate from Batman in some ways, and an agenda that is sometimes separate from Batman — someone who is a formidable person in his own right, and not just a disguise for Batman.
A lot of the time, you get the sense that “Bruce” is just Batman’s disguise, and that Batman is who Bruce is in his core. I agree with that in a lot of ways, that he’s very much Batman. It’s contrasted with how, a lot of time, Superman is Clark at heart, and Superman is more his mask.
But I think it’s important to also explore the idea that Bruce, out of the cowl, has a life as a person, that he’s someone who cares about his city and the population. I think maybe that idea of Bruce always having to find some front with beautiful women — that can still be a part of his life, but it doesn’t need to be the only part.
Nrama: The first issue seemed to celebrate the Batman world, with a lot of villains and familiar faces, from Vicki Vale to Leslie Thompkins. Was your idea for this first issue to brush up against different faces from Batman’s world and clearly establish who he is and what his backdrop will be in these stories?
Snyder:Yeah, we wanted a celebration of all the characters who make up Batman’s world, his allies and his contacts and his villains. Even if the issue didn’t introduce people like Leslie to new readers, we wanted to put that whole cast on display.
Batman is going to be not just about Batman and Gotham. The repercussions of what happens to Batman will be felt across the whole Bat-family.
Nrama: Speaking of that “whole Bat-family” idea, as the first issue ended, Dick Grayson was implicated as the perpetrator of a crime. He’s also implicated in his own title, Nightwing by Kyle Higgins. Was that on purpose?
Snyder:Yes. They’re coordinated. It’s not one big mystery that’s going to be in both books, where it’s solved in Batman and begun in Nightwing, or vice versa. It’s just something that we wanted to play up concurrently. There is a mystery that’s going to connect both Nightwing and Batman as we go forward.
The things that Dick Grayson discovers in Nightwing will bleed into Batman, and the things that Bruce discovers will bleed into Nightwing.
In Batman, it’s a story about a villain who has ties to Gotham historically and has manipulated events and has been a huge influence on the shape of Gotham, both physically in its architecture and in its politics and its social geography.
So in that way, we really wanted it to have revelations that had to do with all the families, from the Waynes to the Graysons to the Drakes to the Cobblepots. It’s about all of them.
I don’t want to give readers the sense that they have to read them both to understand what’s going on, because that’s not true. And they are separate mysteries. They’re two strands of the same DNA.
But thematically, it will be similar in Nightwing and Batman, as we play up the tension that exists between Dick Grayson and Bruce. It’s something that’s going to come into play in a big way in Batman, and I think in Nightwing down the line.
They’re extremely close, and Bruce obviously cares a lot about Dick. And Dick cares a lot about Bruce. But they also have a lot of tension between them, and Bruce isn’t very good at showing how he cares for people a lot of the time, and he pushes them away. Part of him wants to be alone as Batman. And all that stuff ebbs and flows with them and becomes something that at times brings them close together, and sometimes brings them at odds.
This story will be about both those things, that they’re really close, but it will also hint about things that can drive them apart as well.
Nrama: Is there anything else coming up in Batman that you want to tell readers about?
Snyder:You’re going to start to see a lot of bad guys soon. Stay tuned for the introduction for our new owl-themed villains in Batman, and for big twists and turns that have to do with the history of Gotham and some surprises about the characters you really like, things that are buried in their history that are going to be brought to bear against them in the present.
And it’s going to get very dark and twisted. There are a lot of fun waters ahead for all of us, I promise. It’s going to be a good ride. We’re really excited about it, so we hope you guys are too. This is the Batman story we’d tell if we only got one chance to do it.
Batman #1 is a traditional superhero/detective series that tries very hard to appeal to longtime readers and bring new ones up to speed. For instance, a pair of contact lenses that allows Batman to interact with the Bat Computer is a neat idea but quickly turns into the most elaborate form of exposition I have ever witnessed. Granted, the fact that he is surrounded by three young dark-haired white guys in tuxedos… maybe he really needs this kind of thing. Like our parents calling us by our sibling’s name from time to time, has Batman ever called Dick ‘Tim’? That would be awkward.
Like Detective Comics, this is another superb Batman book as it depicts our hero as a brilliant inventor and detective as well as an avenging dark creature of the knight kicking villains in the gut. It’s Batman as he should be in a Gotham City more over-run by extreme crime than ever before. On the trail of a killer that has eluded both the police and the Dark Knight, the path seems to lead to the most unlikely of suspects, Nightwing.
The comic looks great with art by Greg Capullo who draws every member of Batman’s rogue’s gallery in superb flair. Likewise, fan favorite Scott Snyder has brought the goods here by delivering an exciting comic that sets the stage for horror, action and mystery all at once. I have high hopes that this series will be the hit that DC Comics has needed for a long time. Based on sales estimates for last month, it looks like my bet is a safe one.
Batman #1 has sold out but a second and third print are both available. If you’d rather read a digital copy, it is available for direct download at Comixology.
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