Sax von Stroheim writes:

I had been hearing good things about the new Batman comics written by Scott Snyder and drawn (mostly) by Greg Capullo. They were offered at a steep discount on one of the read-your-comics-on-an-iPad-apps so I thought I’d give the first dozen issues a try.

Spoiler alert: I really disagree with whoever it was that wrote that blurb at “Complex Magazine”

I’ve been reading superhero comics all of my life, but if I hadn’t been, I might be puzzled at the idea that there are even such things as “new Batman comics”.  That is, there have been Batman comics published just about every month since May 1939 and many months saw multiple Batman comics published: Detective Comics (the flagship title) and, of course, Batman itself, plus all the various spin-offs that have come and gone, like World’s Finest (Batman and Superman teaming up), The Brave and the Bold (Batman teaming up with a different super-hero every month), Batman and the Outsiders (Batman as the leader of a ragtag bunch of super-heroes), Shadow of the Bat (stories focusing on supporting cast members in the Batman saga), etc., etc.

Currently, apart from the Batman comics by Snyder and Capullo, there are about 9 other Batman-related titles published every month: good old Detective Comics, The Dark Knight (grittier Batman stories), Batman Incorporated (about Batman’s global crime-fighting organization), Batman and Robin (Batman fighting crime with his son, the new Robin), Batwing (the African Batman), Batgirl (self-explanatory), Batwoman (lesbian Batman), Nightwing (the original Robin all grown up), and Red Hood and the Outlaws (another ex-Robin as the leader of a ragtag bunch of super-heroes).  I might be missing some though.

I’m bringing all this up just so that I can ask some questions: how the hell is there any room for new Batman comics? Is it possible to write and draw a Batman story that doesn’t feel completely redundant at this point? And, speaking directly to the comics under consideration, if it is possible, have Snyder and Capullo managed to pull that off?

How the hell is there any room for new Batman comics?

Most of the best Batman stories of the last thirty or so years (i.e., since I started reading super-hero comics) have followed this recipe: (1) reimagine and recontextualize the basic elements of the Batman mythos and (2) add new creations sparingly, if at all. The idea being that there’s already a ton of stuff there and it’s better to reuse and recycle than to try to fit more stuff in. Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns is probably the most famous example: an aging Batman comes out of retirement to rid his city of a nihilistic gang (the Mutants – the story’s one new element), while tangling with old foes (the Joker, Two-Face), having run-ins with old allies (Commissioner Gordon, Superman), and figuring out what it means to be Batman in the Reagan era.

Old friends

The less memorable Batman stories tend to fail for two reasons: either they don’t really do anything interesting with the elements that are already there or they add “new” elements that feel like cheap copies of the old ones.

Is it possible to write and draw a Batman story that doesn’t feel completely redundant at this point?

Yes! Grant Morrison, arguably the most important contemporary superhero comics writer, has been writing decent-to-great-with-a-lot-of-pretty-good Batman stories for the past 7 years (most recently in the pages of Batman, Inc.). Morrison’s method: go against the grim and gritty, “realistic” approach of things like Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns and those Christopher Nolan movies, by pulling in elements from earlier Batman comics. Morrison’s Batman stories embraced the character’s patchwork-quilt history, mixing and matching characters and themes from Batman’s origins as a noir-ish Dick Tracy rip-off, the circus-like comics from Bill Finger and Dick Sprang in the ‘50s, the psychedelic camp of the ‘60s, and Denny O’Neil’s retro-pulp take on the character from the ‘70’s.

Morrison didn’t shy away from the sci-fi elements of Batman’s past and he didn’t try to deny the goofier, comic book-y stuff either: i.e., Bat-Mite!

(Tangentially, Morrison isn’t just an important guy in terms of superhero comic books: he’s been tremendously influential on contemporary pop culture in general, but to go into that would really require a post of its own.)

But have Snyder and Capullo managed to pull something similar off with these new Batman comics?

Unfortunately, no. There’s intelligence behind the stories here, and I have to give Snyder credit for a certain amount of ambition. He’s not recycling, but rather attempting to add a whole bunch of stuff to the Batman mythos, not to mention provide a big new mystery for Batman to solve. But what he’s trying to add – the Court of Owls, a conspiratorial society that has secretly run Gotham down through the years while pursuing a generation-spanning feud against the Wayne family – just doesn’t fit. It’s too big an idea coming too late in the game to work with what readers already know about Batman and his city. There just isn’t enough space for a new bunch of villains who have supposedly been plotting against Batman all along. It doesn’t help that it feels as if Snyder chose the owl motif for the bad guys simply because all of the other animal themes have already been taken by Batman’s villains. It also doesn’t help that Snyder botches the mystery plotting: he alternates between giving things away too easily and adding in twists that were impossible to predict, simply because he didn’t properly lay the groundwork for them.

Still, though the story isn’t great, these comics have a few things going for them. Mainly: Greg Capullo’s art is terrific. He has a softer, cartoonier take on Frank Miller’s work from the Dark Knight books.

Capullo gives Batman his own Robocop-style armor

And Capullo isn’t simply a good illustrator, he and Snyder have worked out a number of strong action sequences. If the thematic content of these comics is a little disappointing, on a formal level they deliver.