Batman #444

"Crimesmith and Punishment"
writer: Marv Wolfman
pencils: Jim Aparo
inks: Mike DeCarlo
letters: John Costanza
colors: Adrienne Roy
assoc. editor: Dan Raspler
editor: Denny O'Neil
creator: Bob Kane

grade: A-

Once again, I feel that Wolfman is spending most of this storyline working to "rebuild" the post-Crisis Batman, attempting to define who he is and how he does what he does.

In terms of who he is, Wolfman is careful to define this character as being different from Frank Miller's sociopathic hero and having grown/healed since being the sadistic, vengeance driven character Starlin gave us. This is most apparent when we see Batman take his unintended role in the death of the criminal from the previous issue quite hard; so hard, in fact, that the detective who arrives on the scene feels the need to reassure him, and we're then given a panel of him simply standing and staring in the Batcave before the main action resumes. Finally, the clearest signal we're given that healing has begun for this character is that he starts taking an active role in training Tim, even going so far as to attempt to offer comfort after learning that Tim's parents are having marital difficulties. This is no longer the dark, hardened, aloof Batman we've been served for the past several years. Instead, just as with the new focus on Waynetech, Wolfman is taking Batman back to his Bronze Age roots, putting the character back where he arguably thrived best. Of course, DKR, Year One, and Lonely Place of Dying made a lot more waves and got a lot more attention than this story will, and so later writers will largely miss this revision and continue with the darker Batman on the edge approach. Oh well. I really enjoyed Wolfman's efforts here, just the same.

And, in terms of defining how Batman does what he does, I found this little narrative, taking us through Batman's preparations for going out on patrol, immensely rewarding:

"The shirt is reinforced with an armor plate sewn beneath the golden shield. He slips it on and feels at home now.

The cowl is both soft and solid to his touch, its crown and back reinforced, it's face form-fitting and tight.

He exhales smoothly as it fits into place and locks under his chin. His breathing quiets with anticipation.

The utility belt has its rope, medical kit and radio already in place. He studies the shelves to determine what else he might need.

The ritual is somber, never broken. Preparation must be thorough. There must not be a single mistake. And it is over.

He takes one long deep breath.

He's ready


Great snapshot of the character.

Beyond that, this was a fun issue, full of solid detective work, intense action that Batman must think his way through, and while the enemy ended up being the very same scientific consultant working for him (what a coincidence, as well as a disturbing replay of what's happening in Legends of the Dark Knight right now), I liked the surprise reversal of having his secretary/assistant be the true mastermind who was calling the shots.


Minor details:

- We now learn that Tim's parents are often away for long periods of time, but this doesn't explain how Alfred is able to continuously get Tim out of his boarding school without consent/knowledge from his parents.

- Wolfman gives such attention to Batman meticulously selecting what goes into his utility belt, but then where did that mirror come from that he used to deflect the lasers at the last moment? Surely, the evidence at hand never suggested that he'd be dealing with lasers on this mission, and the mirror was never mentioned nor shown (even from a distance) when Batman was equipping the belt.

- This is the first appearance of Detective Dana Hanrahan. No idea if she'll end up playing any kind of important role down the road.

- Roy's use of color on page 11 is striking. Bathing Batman in muted purples to capture darkness illuminated by faint lighting is gorgeous.

- On the other hand, Aparo's depiction of a mad Bruce Wayne on page 9 looks ridiculous. Who uses lines coming out of someone's head to depict shock in 1990?

- Great letter published in the letter column this month:

"Dear Batman,

I love you. I wish that I can see you in real life. I saw you in the movie. I think that you are cute. I had a dream of you. It was when you were my dad and you came back from a place and hugged me. I could not marry you because I'm only 8.

Love,
Sarah Heller


I seriously want to look this girl up and meet her now.



Plot synopsis in one ridiculously long sentence: Batman gets a wallet from the criminal who spontaneously exploded last issue while feeling responsible for his death, Detective Hanrahan tells him it's not his fault, Jeffrey Fraser is hired as the media consultant to Wayne Tech, the GCPD crime lab determines that the spontaneous combustion was caused by a remote trigger in the criminal's neck and that it only could have been developed by someone adept in explosives, micro-circuitry, chemistry, and physics, Bruce spends some time training Tim, they pull up a list of scientists capable of having created the remote explosive and find Jeffrey Fraser on the list, Bruce compares a map generated by the Crimesmith that was in the criminal's wallet to a printout Fraser gave to Bruce Wayne and finds the same smearing/ink laserjet ink signature on both papers, he becomes Batman and goes after the Crimesmith, the Crimesmith ends up being both Fraser and Maya, his assistant, who also turns out to be his cold-hearted lover, as it becomes clear that Batman is going to capture them, Maya runs to save herself and shoots Fraser dead before he can give up any information; she gets away for the time being.


All in all, another solid issue with its priorities in the right place in terms of establishing Batman's persona and premise for the post-Crisis readership. Unfortunately, in spite of all his efforts, it won't be enough to turn Batman away from the path that the fans are craving -- dark anti-hero teetering on the edge.

Legends of the Dark Knight #4

"Shaman, Book Four"
writer: Dennis O'Neil
pencils: Edward Hannigan
inks: John Beatty
letters: John Costanza
colors: Richmond Lewis
asst. editor: Kevin Dooley
editor: Andrew Helfer
Batman created by Bob Kane

grade: C-


I've gotten to a point where I just don't care. When I last had the patience to put up with a chapter in this story (two and a half months ago), I noted that it felt like a massive orgy of decompression, obnoxiously stretching a one or two part story into five chapters. This is still the case, but, worse yet, we're now starting to see that the basic story, itself, isn't all that well done.

This is the chapter in which Bruce starts connecting all the dots and unraveling all the mysteries, and it's pretty disappointing. We knew the key details two issues ago -- who the true bad guy would be and how the story would end. But, as the minor connections are worked out in this issue, they are 1)confusing and 2)arbitrary/impossible for anyone (including Bruce) to have deducted. For example, Bruce is told that one person other than he heard the story of the Bat two years back, and he automatically deducts that it MUST have been the killer he'd been tracking at the time (who must have survived his fall off the mountain, and even the story describes this as a "one in a million chance") and that said killer MUST have assisted the true bad guy of this story (Dr. Spurlock) and MUST have turned against him to become the mysterious assassin killing him and his associates.

So what's revealed is pretty absurd, we called the ending ages ago, and (let's not forget) the chief antagonist has been dead since the third chapter; all that's left is a random crazy guy thinking he can kill Batman, and I think we all know where that's going, especially as he so obviously misjudges Bruce at the end of the issue, assuming he's ignorant to the murderer's presence and will obliviously walk up to the front door.

All that's keeping this book going at this point is the stunning art (great use of the Baxter Paper format) and O'Neil's amusing characterization of Alfred. Beyond that, this story has grown both tedious and stupid at this point.

minor details: Why did Batman go through the elaborate ruse of getting himself caught in the banker's office so that he could return to infiltrate the office as a security specialist the next day? HE WAS ALREADY IN THE OFFICE undetected; now the banker is more likely to suspect the security specialist that he never hired!

minor details:

Bruce references the training he received by both Willie Doggett (LotDK #1) and Harvey Harris (Detective Comics Annual #2). O'Neil seems dead set on continuing to give attention to this aspect of Batman's post-crisis continuity, even while so much of the rest of his continuity (including time frames, as complicated by the Year 3 storyline) remains in shambles.


plot synopsis in one ridiculously long sentence: Bruce survives the car crash and rescues the shaman and his daughter, the shaman tells him that he must tell the girl the story of the bat in order to save her, he does so and somehow finds new purpose/identity by wearing the Batman cowl as he does so, he visits the daughter in the hospital and quickly/arbitrarily pieces together the details of the mystery, we learn that the guy who ran them off the road last issue was just a reckless driver (who is arbitrarily given far too much attention in this issue), Bruce visits an office presumably belonging to the banker we met in an earlier chapter (this is intentionally kept obnoxiously vague), finds their secret hiding space where he keeps the shaman costume (revealing that this is presumably the leader of the Santa Prisca drug cartel), gets himself caught so that he can return disguised as a security expert, sabotages the costume, visits the random careless driver from earlier in the issue and scares him into confessing, reflects on how lonely he is around Christmas time, and comes home, fully aware that the insane guy who's been killing everyone is inside with Alfred tied up at knife point, presuming to catch Bruce unaware.

Batman #445

"When the Earth DIES! Chapter One: Red Square! Bloody Square!"
writer: Marv Wolfman
pencils: Jim Aparo
inks: Mike DeCarlo
letters: John Costanza
colors: Adrienne Roy
assoc. editor: Dan Raspler
editor: Denny O'Neil
creator: Bob Kane

grade: B

It seems that there were at least three good reasons to tell this story, which is essentially a sequel to the Ten Nights of the Beast storyline depicted in Batman #417-420:

1. Though it's easy to forget now, all eyes were on the USSR back in 1990. A series of revolutions had recently toppled most of the Eastern European Communist nations, and we saw increasing reforms towards a more democratic approach in the country (Vicki Vale even mentions glasnost in this issue) leading us to wonder if the Cold War might be coming to a close after half a century of hostilities. It would be hard for a socially/politically conscious writer like Wolfman to ignore such a subect.

2. Ten Nights of the Beast was one of the more popular Batman stories in recent history, partially because it was well written and surprisingly enmeshed in real-world politics, and partially because it was one of the first multi-part Batman stories that O'Neil named and created cool cover logos for, making it look more important.

3. Ten Nights of the Beast was a hot collector's item at the time, being a major Batman story arc that had been published just before everyone and their mom started buying Batman comics after Jason Todd's death and the 1989 film. As a result, a lot of very stupid kids that O'Neil was explicitly marketing to (including myself) rushed out to buy this follow-up series, assuming it would be equally collectible.

So, did we really need another "Batman enters the Cold War" story? Probably not, but Wolfman still does an excellent job with it. Once again, he makes me wish that he'd been the one to first write Batman's post-crisis adventures since what he's essentially doing here is finally constructing the post-crisis Batman mythos in a way that's more thorough and more respectful to Batman's past than what has been done before. So, while Batman is clearly focused on his present mission in this issue, we're also learning more about the multi-facets of Bruce Wayne, seeing the reintroduction of Viki Vale (not utilized since Max Allen Collins' largely ignored run), and watching Wolfman try to do more with Tim Drake than just throw him into a Robin costume and pretend it's Dick Grayson again.

The Bruce Wayne aspect is what fascinates me most. In the previous Crimesmith storyline, Wolfman spent time reintroducing us to WayneTech and Bruce Wayne's work life. But, whereas the Bronze Age Batman stories largely stopped there, with Bruce Wayne as a socially conscious captain of industry, Wolfman attempts to marry this idea with the more traditional perception of Bruce Wayne as the careless socialite, creating a more complex alter-ego that attempts to promote justice through WayneTech as well as through Batman, but who does so with a careful facade of carelessness, keeping him beyond suspicion and also adding more dimensions to the character. If even Bruce Wayne is a dual identity, who IS Batman?

As for Tim Drake, Wolfman is suddenly casting suspicions on his parents being out of the country so often, and he also attempts to depict Tim's life at school, away from Wayne Manor (though this attempt ends up feeling lame and entirely unnecessary). I still don't like Tim yet, but I'm glad to see Wolfman trying to get away from the Gary Stu approach he originally took in Year 3.

And, speaking of Year 3, Nightwing explicitly told us in Batman #437 that the KGBeast had escaped from the trap Batman left him to die in at the end of Ten Nights of the Beast, so why isn't Wolfman using that excuse to bring The Beast back? I assumed that was why Wolfman wrote that information into that story (beyond just preventing Batman from becoming a de facto killer). Will The Beast make a surprise return at the end of this storyline, or does Wolfman feel he has something new to say with this NKVDemon replacing him in this story?


Artwise, I feel Aparo slipping in this issue. The penciling is mostly solid, but the layouts are clumsy, with several odd jumps in time that are not depicted in the art at all. At one point, Bruce is on the other side of a crowded airport corridor and turned away from a woman and, in the next, is in mid conversation with her. At another, they are in one restaurant dining and then apparently in another, though the visuals indicate no movement/change. He also makes Batman look waaay too cowardly in the final moments of this story, though Batman knows the trap is about to be sprung on The Demon. I suppose this might have been at Wolfman's request, who also felt the need to make Batman so desperate that he kneed the Demon in the crotch. Definitely not a level of desperation I'm happy watching Batman resort to, particularly in a scenerio that he planned!


Minor Details:

- Bruce explains that he and Vicki met "a year or so ago when she took some photographs of my home." Certainly, more than a year of time has gone by in Post-Crisis continuity by this point, and yet we never saw their first meeting. Also, if the "on-and-off" relationship between them described in the Who's Who section of Batman Annual #13 is still in continuity, when has Bruce had time for this? The last time he saw Vicki at all in this comic was Batman #411, which almost certainly took place more than a year ago at this point (we know from the continuity I pieced together that a year of time spanned between Batman #408 and #416, and let's not forget that Jason continued to be Robin for anywhere between several months and three years after that point, and that several months have passed since his death.) This is almost certainly a continuity glitch unless we're all-out ignoring Max Allen Collins' run at this point, which is fine since Starlin totally ignored/revised the most significant aspects of it in his run anyway.

- When Batman meets with the Soviet Chief of Police, the Chief tells him:

"Hmmm, yes, there are those you might be able to PERSUADE. We police are sometimes...restrained by, eh, procedure."

This is delivered without any sense of irony on Wolfman's part, and yet it sounds disturbingly like the very same kind of policies that we were trying so hard to overturn in the Soviet Union (and that the man Batman was seeking would have supported).

- No idea what the title of this story is about.


plot synopsis in one ridiculously long sentence: Batman takes down a villain named "The Slashes" in Gotham, the Soviets are tracking a murderer with a list much like that of the KGBeast, their Chief of Police comes to Gotham to ask Gordon to send Batman to help them once again, he explains that the NKVDemon is the desciple of the KGBeast, Bruce mentions to Alfred that he's suspicious of Tim's parents before leaving, Bruce is shadowed by two people from the office of Economic Development while in Russia, he runs into Vikki Vale and is happy to see her, we randomly get a snapshot of Tim's exciting life at boarding school (which includes telling a young girl she's in the wrong building and our seeing two severely lame looking kids walking down the hallway -- what the heck was the point of this?), Tim grows suspicious of his parents' activities too, Batman lures the NKVDemon into a trap, and The Demon gets out.

Legends of the Dark #5

"Shaman, Book Five"
writer: Dennis O'Neil
pencils: Edward Hannigan
inks: John Beatty
letters: John Costanza
colors: Richmond Lewis
assist editor: Kevin Dooley
editor: Andrew Heffer
Batman created by Bob Kane
special thanks to Dick Giordano

grade: B+


To be fair, this story ended a lot better than it should have. The action was well paced, the developments were intelligent, and the theme resolved neatly, with Bruce gaining a greater understanding of who he must be as The Batman. Really, the biggest problem was how O'Neil decompressed the story. Carl Fisk, for example, who appeared exactly ONCE previously in this story, is now the main antagonist who needs to be brought down. Prior to this issue, both Fisk and the drug cartel he was apparently leading were background noise in this story, not a central focus.

And the whole reintroduction of Tom Woodley as the assassin trying to kill Wayne ended up being for naught. His struggle with Bruce was relatively uninteresting, and when Bruce finds him again later, he's already defeated, dying from a knife wound he accidentally received during their struggle. This character served absolutely no purpose beyond stretching out the story.

So what was the true focus of this story -- the question of what Spurlock had done with the secrets of the Native American tribe, or the Santa Prisca drug cartel? As much as O'Neil tried to connect the two in the previous issue (Fisk was inspired to pose as a shaman after reading about Spurlock's expedition) there truly is no connection between the two plot lines. These are two unrelated conflicts that O'Neil fails to connect on even a thematic level. We're essentially just thrown those two conflicts, as well as the whole Tom Woodley subplot, while two Native Americans get to comment on Bruce's second identity from the sidelines in a religious context. Not great storytelling by any stretch, even if this wrap-up to the Santa Prisca conflict (the Spurlock one essentially ended two issues ago) was quite satisfying.

The problem, really, is that O'Neil thinks he's god's gift to writing. Really -- how full of yourself do you have to be to make yourself the writer of the five part storyline launching the first new Batman non-team-up title since 1940? Better yet, he goes on to usurp the most famous Batman story in recent history (Year One), rewriting it, the characterization of Bruce Wayne, the most famous moment in that story (the bat crashing through the window), and Batman's origin in general in order to have his own mark on all three. Best yet, we get this little blurb in the letter column that pretty much says it all:

"We have resolved to have only the best writers and artists on BATMAN: LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT telling the most unusual and captivating stories. Please do not send creative team suggestions. We have things tentatively planned through 1992 (at least every other story will be scripted by Mr. O'Neil)."

And my point, really, is that O'Neil isn't GOOD ENOUGH to be given such privileged access to the character. He was a solid Batman writer back in the day and is actually too good at selling Batman like a used car to the readers of the 1990s, but that doesn't mean he should be given total control in writing these self-indulgent multi-part stories, checked only by some puppet editor I've never heard of before who ultimately answers back to him.


minor details / aka -- lots of little reasons why O'Neil isn't God's gift to writing:

- O'Neil's narration in the second panel outright tells us that Bruce is "unaware that the renegade Indian Tom Woodley waits" which is a misleading lie, designed to create suspense where there really isn't any. That's a dirty cheat.

- If Woodley is looking out the window while Bruce is going up the walk-way, how does he NOT see him go around to the back of the mansion?

- Bruce's entire reason for sneaking around back was that Alfred hadn't picked up the phone AND hadn't left the house? Maybe he's enjoying a nice bath or an extra good read while on the toilet?

- While fighting Woodley, an insane hunter/tracker with no stated combat training, Bruce gets stabbed three times and saved only by the padding he happened to be wearing from his stint in the previous issue. I think O'Neil is trying to make the points that 1) Bruce is still new at this and 2) he's going to have to win with his mind more than impossible physical stunts, but this just comes off as sloppy convenience writing and, besides, according to the training continuity that O'Neil himself pushed writers to implement, Bruce has already completed all of his training by this point, having studied under at least five combat specialists at the top of their field, including three martial arts masters, one of whom even taught him the "vibrating palm."

- Alfred calls Bruce "Bruce" on page 7. I think O'Neil was going for intimacy there, but it absolutely rubbed me the wrong way, especially as Alfred is talking about the need to recover his dignity. His formality is a critical part of who he is as a character, not some socially-imposed barricade that distances him from Bruce.

- On the one hand, this story attempts to make its readers respect tribal culture more. On the other, it positively delights in having Batman pose as a tribal god to an entire group of believers. Will we see a follow-up story in which Batman impersonates Jesus in front of a bunch of Catholics?

- Batman tells Gordon where Fisk hid all his evidence, and Gordon passes this on to his police force. If I were a well-paid lawyer representing a wealthy banker on trial, I'd pose the question of how Gordon can be sure Batman didn't plant that evidence? After all, this is still one of Batman's first cases. He's hardly won the public's trust by this point.

- So are we to believe that every time Bruce ever puts on the mask and becomes Batman, he is inspired by and thinking of this story we just read? Wow, O'Neil. Get over yourself.

Nice quote from the end of this issue:


"Something marked you, wounded you, when you were a child. You have a choice...either let go of it or use it...it means BECOMING the mask. But the choice was made years ago. You know that."


Very good issue, but not a very good story, and not a writer/editor who should be left unchecked to do whatever he feels like doing to further aggrandize himself within the Batman pop culture franchise.



plot synopsis in one ridiculously long sentence; Bruce fights Tom Weedley, Woodley escapes, Alfred feels humiliated by having been captured, Bruce reveals he knows it's Fisk (the banker) who is the shaman leading the Santa Prisca drug cartel, he executes his plan against Fisk, making himself look like a superior god to the Santa Prisca followers, he makes Fisk confess and passes the info to Gordon, he finds Woodley already dying, he flies back to the daughter of the shaman (he has died since the previous issue), and she tells him he must become the bat.

The Post-Crisis Batman Continuity (as of Secret Origins tpb [1990])


Please note: Denny O'Neil was not the most vigilant of continuity editors, and so this list attempts to resolve a number of seeming contradictions, most notably made in Year 3, at which point O'Neil seemed to be intentionally making changes to continuity.

________________________________________________

22-28 years prior to Year 1 -- Bruce Wayne is born to Thomas and Martha Wayne (Secret Origins tpb indicates he is 8 years old when his parents died, Detective Comics #578 and Batman #404 indicate his parents died 18 to 20 years prior to Year 1, Secret Origins tpb also includes the problematic detail that he is "in his early twenties" when he concludes his training and returns to Gotham prior to Year 1 -- thus the range of years in which this event could have occurred. Based on the other events shown/listed in the Secret Origins tpb, Bruce had to be at least 22 when he became Batman, having begun his training at 20, studied under Kirigi for almost a year, studied with Ducard for six months (Detective Comics #600) and sought out at least 16 other mentors in that time(various sources, all compiled here).

19-25 years prior to Year 1 -- A young Bruce Wayne falls through a hole into a cave on the Wayne Manor property (presumed, Bruce is at least three years old here and his parents have not yet died (Secret Origins tpb) (they die when he is 8, and that was 19 years prior to Year One, as stated in Batman #404).

19 years prior to Year 1 -- The Reaper retires after a career of protecting Gotham through murderous vigilantism (stated as having occurred 20 years prior to Year 2 in Detective Comics #575).

18-19 years prior to Year 1 -- Alfred Pennyworth's father dies; Alfred takes his place as butler to the Waynes (all immediately prior to the deaths of Thomas and Martha Wayne, Batman Annual #13). Thomas and Martha Wayne are murdered (20 years prior to Year 2, as stated in Detective Comics #578, 18 years prior to Year 1, as stated in Batman #404). Bruce is 8 years old (Secret Origins tpb)(1). Bruce is taken in by Dr. Leslie Thompson. Alfred watches over Wayne manor and remains involved in Bruce's upbringing (Detective Comics #574 and Batman Annual #13).

12 to 13 Years prior to Year 1 -- Bruce attends various colleges from ages 14 to 20, in search of information to aid him in his war against crime (Detective Comics #574 and Secret Origins tpb).

6 to 7 Years prior to Year 1 -- Bruce begins his training.(2)

Just prior to Year 1 -- Bruce studies under his final trainer (Willy Doggett), is nearly killed while pursuing a murderer in the Alaskan wilderness, and is saved by a Shaman who tells him the story of The Bat (Legends of the Dark Knight #1, Secret Origins tpb).

Year 1 -- Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham. Jim Gordon moves to Gotham and rises to the rank of Captain. Batman begins his career. James Gordon Jr. is born. Catwoman begins her career. Batman forms informal partnerships/friendships with Gordon and Harvey Dent. (Batman #404-407).

Between Year 1 and Year 2 -- The events of the "Shaman" storyline (Legends of the Dark Knight #1-5)

Between Year 1 and Year 2-- Batman switches to the yellow chest symbol (Presumed since he has it in Detective Comics #575, the beginning of Year 2). The Joker begins his career (presumed from the end of Year One in Batman #408, though this jibes uneasily with the events of Year 2, which suggest the Reaper is Batman's first major villain) after falling into a vat of chemicals while pursued by Batman as The Red Hood (assuming the Joker is telling the truth in The Killing Joke, though even he casts doubts on this). Jim Gordon is promoted to commissioner (Batman #575).

Sometime after Year 1 -- Jim Gordon begins to foster his niece, Barbara Gordon, after her parents die. Jim Gordon's wife divorces him and moves to Chicago with James Jr. at some point afterward (Secret Origins #20).

Year 2 -- The Wayne Foundation building is constructed. Batman fights The Reaper, who is implied to be the first major villain he has fought (Detective Comics #575-578).

Between Year 2 and 3 -- Batman returns to the original chest symbol, at least temporarily (as seen in flashback in Batman #436).

Year 3 -- Dick Grayson's parents are murdered by Anthony Zucco. He is initially sent to St. Jude's orphanage under the care of Sister Mary Elizabeth (Batman #426). He is taken in by Bruce at age 12, becomes Robin at age 13 (presumed, working backwards from Batman #416). Tim Drake witnesses the death of Dick Grayson's parents at the age of 2 and follows Batman and Robin's adventures from that point forward (Batman #441).

Year 3-8 -- Most of Batman's rogues gallery is active for some time prior to Dick's retirement, but presumably not until after the events of Year Two (since it's implied that Reaper is Batman's first majro villain), including Two Face, Penguin, and Joker (Batman #408 and Detective comics #575-578)

Year 8 -- The first Robin is retired at age 19 and presumed dead by the general public (assuming Year 3 counts as a full first year when Dick tells Bruce he fought by his side for six years in Batman #416).

Year 9 -- Bruce takes in Jason Todd. Dick attends one year of college, leads the Teen Titans, drops out, becomes Nightwing, and "started a new life as leader of" the New Teen Titans (presumed from the timeline provided in Batman #416, which seems to imply that Dick formed the New Teen Titans after becoming Nightwing and never led it as Robin, yet Batman Annual #13 indicates that he did initially lead it as Robin).

Year 9.5 -- Jason becomes Robin six months after Bruce takes him in (Dick confronts Batman about Jason being the new Robin 18 months after his retirement in Batman #416; the preface for Death in the Family states that Jason became Robin 18 months after Dick retired). The general public believes it's the return of the same Robin (Batman Annual #13).

Between Years 9.5 and 10.5 - The Mike W. Barr run, featuring a younger, less jaded/impulsive Jason Todd (Presumed, though it is debatable whether this run counts in Post-Crisis continuity at all, especially since it includes a clearly pre-crisis Catwoman)

Year 10.5 -- the events of Batman #416 (takes place one year after the confrontation between Dick and Bruce over Jason becoming Robin, which occurred 18 months after Dick retired), the events of "The Cult" (indicates that Batman has been active for 10 years, presumably takes place after Batman #416).

Between Years 10.5 and 14 - Never revealed, presumed to occur between Batman #416 and #425(3)

Year 14 - Batgirl retires and is paralyzed by the Joker (occurred in The Killing Joke prior to Jason Todd's death in Batman #426), Jason Todd is killed, the present day events of Year 3 occur only a few weeks later (Batman #436 occurred ten years after Year 3, Nightwing indicates Jason has only been dead a few weeks). A Lonely Place of Dying. (Tim Drake is 13 and confirms he was 2 during Year 3 in Batman #441) Depending upon how you interpret some conflicting information provided in the Secret Origins tpb and Batman #404, Bruce is anywhere from 35 to 42 years old at this point.



__________________________________________________ _____

(1) According to the Secret Origins tpb, Bruce is 8 when his parents died. According to Batman #404, this occurred 18 years prior to year one (making Bruce 26 in Year One). Yet the Secret Origins tpb also shows that Bruce was "in his early twenties" when his training concluded, and we know from Legends of the Dark #1 that Bruce became Batman a very short time after. Thus, the idea that Bruce was 8 years old when his parents were murdered AND that this took place 18-19 years prior to Year 1 is up for debate. However, much of the timeline I have constructed is based upon this assumption.

(2) Batman #431 stated that Bruce began his training ten years prior to Batman #431, and Batman #433-435 seemed to concur, indicating that he'd done all of his training in one year, but Detective Comics #600 stated that he'd trained for more than ten years before becoming Batman. None of these statements appear to be correct. However, the final assertion is close to true if you count college.

(3) At no point is it suggested that a gap of time has occurred between Batman #416 and #425. However, references to time in Year 3 indicate that an extra 3.5 years occurred somewhere, and this is pretty much the only place those 3.5 years could go without conflicting with previous references made to the post-crisis timeline. Meanwhile, "The Cult," written by Starlin at the same time, MUST occur in Year 10 because it mentions that Batman has been active for ten years within it. At the time, O'Neil had intended the present day to be Year 10, which is why this mention was made, but Year 3 later required the present day to be changed to Year 14; thus "The Cult" remains in Year 10 while Starlin's regular run advances to Year 14.

Batman: Digital Justice

Plot and art: Pepe Moreno
dialogue: Doug Murray
additional design: Javier Romero
art assistant: Bob Fingerman
editor: Denny O'Neil
asst. editor: Dan Raspler

grade: D+

I can clearly remember seeing ads for this volume at the age of nine and, even then, being smart enough to realize there was going to be no content. Denny O'Neil had already built an editorial empire upon overselling mediocre concepts, and if all that could be said in advance of this volume was that it would be using state of the art computer graphics, then you pretty much knew what to expect from the story. Sure enough, Digital Justice proves to be an impressive feat in software application, but there's little else worthy of note here.


The Art

Not quite the harbinger of the future of comics that it was supposed to be (if you bother to read the introduction), but the merging of software and art at this early early stage is both jarring and impressive, all at the same time. It's hard to tell when Moreno is trying to give things a more bumpy digitized look and when this is actually a limitation of the medium back in 1989, but I'd say the visuals are still more impressive to look at than not if you consider the historical context. Beyond that, really, all that makes this comic anything more than an F in my book is the rich tone generated by the visuals. Moreno clearly gave primary attention to the tone of this work, and so a fun, moody homage to Blade Runner and other such Dystopian future punk/noir works (along with a hint of Tron) is clearly exuded from the page. But don't expect any particularly striking images nor visual concepts foretelling the future (either real or imagined). This is definitely Sci-Fi Lite, with no true visual substance to it beyond the borrowed tone.

The Writing

Yikes. Not only is the story insultingly simple and almost entirely devoid of character, but it's barely a Batman story. By that, I don't just mean that Batman doesn't even appear until the very last panel of the second of four chapters, but rather that there's nothing particularly Batman about that Batman. Sure enough, it seems like Moreno has only the most basic understanding of any of the characters, and so we see Batman, Joker, a new Robin, a descendant of Jim Gordon, and a new Catwoman, but we don't truly recognize any of them other than in name. One could actually argue that the Batman depicted in this work more closely resembles V for Vendetta than any incarnation of the Dark Knight.


The Legacy

Beyond the fact that, through some odd twist of fate, the character of "Gata" bears a striking resemblance to Lady "Gaga," in her influence and visual style (and no, I don't think she as closely resembles Madonna, the 1980s equivalent of Gaga), I can only find two aspects of this comic that may have been influential upon anything that followed this volume:

1. Batman having retired and yet having made preparations to aid a new Batman in the not so distant future is the basic premise of the Batman Beyond animated series (and, later, comic book), though none of the details are the same.

2. In a few panels, Robin's wild "future" hair seems like a prototype for Tim Drake's distinct hair style in the '90s (and, if you'll recall, his hair was still looking pretty traditional and boring in the pages of Batman at this point).



Beyond that, this was a pretty forgettable story, more noteworthy for its experimentation with technology than for anything inherent in its quality. Very skippable.


plot synopsis: In a dystopian future, a virus created by the Joker has taken over the net and used society's governing structures to oppress mankind, Jim Gordan's grandson gets wise to some of this and tries to fight against it, he is ultimately aided by software created by Batman before he died so that the two can work in conjunction as a virtual and physical Batman-Batman team to take society back, there's a new Robin, a wanna-be Lady Gaga turned Catwoman gets in the way, and the rest is just pretty damn forgettable.