I really do need to read more of The Spirit. My belief that O'Neil was inspired specifically by A Contract With God is based mostly on the fact this was late 1979.


The problem with my posting out of context scans. He is wedged between two buildings. Dumb as this story was, it didn't quite hit that level.

Detective Comics #489 (April 1980)



Batman: "Creatures of The Night!"

Script: J. M. DeMatteis
Pencils: Irv Novick
Inks: Vince Colletta
Colors: Adrienne Roy
Letters: Ben Oda

Grade: D

It's interesting how much the scope of this title has changed. Whereas it once featured every member of the Batman Family except Batman, and focused on a goofier, more throwback approach to storytelling, we've now got a title that primarily features Batman stories, and wow is this lead story extra dark.



Heck, the dude even goes on to prey upon a woman who is clearly implied to be a prostitute.



Holy hookers, Batman!


Now, to be clear, dark does not necessarily mean good. One thing every plot in this issue has in common is that they are all pretty nonsensical and terrible, and so the solution to this mystery, in which a once great magician has somehow been prompted by emotional shock to subconsciously believe he becomes a vampire at night...because he finds out his assistant is a vampire...is pretty ridiculous and horrendously executed.



And really, DeMatteis seems to think it's somehow exciting and different to have Batman fight a nemesis like this...



but a part man, part bat (who doesn't actually end up being half bat, by the way) is really just another Man-Bat, someone we'd already seen plenty of in the Batman Family title.



Tales of Gotham City: "When the Inmates Run the Madhouse!"

Script: Paul Kupperberg
Pencils: Irv Novick
Inks: Steve Mitchell
Colors: Adrienne Roy
Letters: Milt Snapinn

Grade: C+

I'm really not sure what makes this a "Tale of Gotham City". Whereas the last such Tales of Gotham City was a grounded, realistic tale about an average person living in the city, this is a Commissioner Gordon adventure, and unlike the Tale of Gotham we saw last time around, the very point of this one seems to be that James Gordon is anything but ordinary.





I'm used to Gordon being a good guy, but also being a little useless in order to necessitate Batman's involvement. Admittedly, my knowledge of Pre-1980 Batman is sorely lacking, but this certainly seems like a different depiction of Gordon, and I like it. In another life, this guy could have been Batman.

The plot is ridiculous, the writing and characterization second rate, but I really like this take on Gordon.




Batgirl and Robin: "The Mind Warp Mystery"

Script: Jack C. Harris
Pencils: Don Heck
Inks: Vince Colletta
Colors: Gene D'Angelo
Letters: Ben Oda

Grade: F--

The announcement last issue that Babs and Dick would finally be teaming up again had me so excited that I gave a pass to Jack C. Harris removing Babs from the Senate off-panel. After all, the Babs and Dick team-ups were the very best aspect of the Batman Family series, and I doubt many loyal fans still following this book had forgotten that.

And yet, Paul Levitz lays out his plans for the series going forward in this issue's letter page, and future Batgirl and Robin teamups are not a part of it:




Sure enough,



The entire purpose of this story is to make Batgirl lose her memory and then regain all of her knowledge except for one key piece:




I've argued previously about the very explicit and purposeful de-powering of previously strong female characters in this title. Kathy Kane was killed without purpose, Batgirl lost her role as a senator, and now the very relationship between Babs and Dick is fundamentally altered. Whereas the very point used to be Dick and the reader having to come to terms with Babs being above Dick's level


from Batman Family #1

now Dick holds all the cards, knowing full well who Batgirl is while she has no clue who he is. Heck, the very point of their big iconic moment in Batman Family #3 was that Dick tried to hold knowledge of Batgirl's secret identity over her, and her also knowing his secret identity leveled the playing field:



Well screw that, I guess.

She's lost her career, and she's lost her equal status with Robin. We have now completely and utterly depowered Batgirl.

I'm furious.


And the rest of the story is worthless. Lots and lots of logic lapses and lazy conveniences masquerading as a complex mystery:



and I'm still kind of amazed how little Commissioner Gordon cares that a law-abiding citizen attempting to aid their pursuit of a drug dealer dies in his custody, outside of his jurisdiction, because The Commissioner had him take an unapproved experimental drug to regain his memory.



Oh well. Now back to stopping the drugs!


When Jack C. Harris first took over for Bob Rozakis, I figured the Batgirl and Robin stories could only get better. Little did I know.




Alfred: "The Bogus Butlers"

Script: Bob Rozakis
Pencils: Jose Delbo
Inks: Bob Smith
Colors: Bob LeRose
Letters; Todd Klein

Grade: C+

Amazing to think that a Rozakis story isn't the worst piece of crap in this issue. Sure it's an Alfred story where the payoff makes no sense (Alfred has been trying to find out WHY he looks identical to a butler that Batman arrested. Surprise! It was really Robin...), and sure Alfred functions like a well-honed action hero



but watching Alfred try to talk like a thug was passably funny, and Delbo and Smith did a nice job on the art.




Batman: "Where Strike the Assassins"

Script: Denny O'Neil
Pencils: Don Newton
Inks: Dan Adkins
Colors: Adrienne Roy
Letters: Ben Oda

Grade: D

It only took seven months and four issues to finally get a second part to this storyline, not that O'Neil nor Levitz bother to mention this for the sake of confused readers. It doesn't even really acknowledge that it's the second part of a story, and it mostly functions on its own, setting up the next conflict between Batman and the Sensei. I've suspected in these reviews that the cause of the delays was conflicting vision between O'Neil and Levitz over the tone of the lead Batman feature. O'Neil is writing more realistic, grounded stuff that's also deeply enmeshed in the Kung Fu genre, whereas Levitz is pushing for colorful costumed villains and stories geared to kids.

We seem to have an uneasy balance between these visions here, with Batman still fighting the League of Assassins, but the story is far far more corny,



and the action is more colorful and ridiculous, and certainly not Kung fu:




Oh, and to further my whole thing about the tactless depowering of women in this title, I love that we still don't get an explanation as to why Kathy Kane was even murdered (by low level thugs...off panel):



Are we ever going to get an answer to this?

Does O'Neil even know the answer at this point?


So damn infuriating.



Final observation about this issue: I'm always a sucker for Statements of Ownership



but, if I'm reading this one correctly, nearly half of the copies printed and distributed were being marked as unsold/returned??

Maybe that explains why the "Batman Family" aspect of Detective Comics is being further diminished on each ensuing cover at this point, with the title returning to its old format six issues from now. Honestly, much as I really loved this series at the start, good riddance at this point. You're not pleasing Batman Family fans by undoing all that we loved about those early issues, and you're not pleasing Bronze Age Batman fans by making O'Neil write like it's the Atom Age again, so it seems like the only folks winning out here are fans of Alfred solo stories, or maybe The Human Target (who returns next issue).

The way I read it, the returns from newsagents were more than half of the distributed copies. The most recent issue had a print run of 250,316 and returns of 159,992.

Oh lawd did I discuss that in the early reviews, especially when Robin throws his cable around the top of the Washington Monument.

Boy, do I remember reading about that. DC still doesn't seem to be done screwing with Babs Gordon. The audacity of being a powerful and intimidating female superhero for five hot minutes. She's still paying for it five decades later.

Joking aside, the physics of something of similar is... interesting...

She should throw a batrang which weights at least as much as she does?