GRAPHIC NOVEL and TRADE PAPERBACK (TPB) REVIEWS

Batman: Evolution  2001 (SC TPB) 224 pages

Written by Greg Rucka. Pencils by Shawn Martinbrough, John Watkiss, William Rosada, Phil Hester. Inks by Steve Mitchell.
Colours: WildStorm FX. Letters: Todd Klein, Bill Oakley. Editor: Dennis O'Neil.

Reprinting: Detective Comics #743-750 (2002) - with covers

Rating: * * (out of 5)

Number of readings: 1

Evolution collects a run of stories which has Batman battling minions of his nemesis, Ra's Al Ghul, with a couple of other, unrelated tales sandwiched in-between.

The four part "Evolution" story line has agents of Ra's stirring up a gang war between various crime factions, while making alliances with mobsters who can help them make and distribute a new, designer drug...a drug with a bizarre side effect. Complicating things, Ra's agents, a woman named Whisper A'daire, and her henchman, Mr. Abbott, are were-creatures, able to mutate into half-beast forms.

I'd been hearing a lot about novelist Greg Rucka's foray into the comicbook medium, with the buzz pegging him as the hot new talent. Unfortunately, there's nothing here to indicate what the fuss is about. The stories aren't so much bad...they're just blandly mediocre. In fact, this collection is the reverse of how something can be greater than the sum of its parts. Here, nothing is particularly bad -- either in Rucka's writing, or the various art chores -- but nothing's particularly good either, and the combination of middling writing, with middling art, with middling colour (more on that later), results in a whole that's less than inspiring.

The whole "Evolution" story seems like Rucka started writing it, hoping inspiration would come to him...but it didn't, so he gave up, wrapping it up in one of the most bizarrely perfunctory manners I've ever seen. The saga seems like the build up to a story...that never materializes. And what does occur is not especially unique as plots go. Other plot threads that are introduced, such as Whisper ingratiating herself with various influential people, never turn into anything.

Even the scene-by-scene stuff lacks inspiration. One issue ends, cliff hanger style, with Batman caught in an explosion...then the next chapter begins with Batman striding out of the explosion, with no explanation for how he survived. Later he goes head to head with Mr. Abbott in the latter's lupine form -- oooh, a big bad fight, we figure, as Batman must use all his skill and wiles to...or not as Batman easily trounces him. Sure, we know Batman will survive explosions, and win fights, but the writer's job is to make us think that he might not, to suggest, at the very least, that it's an effort. There's a kind of laissez faire attitude throughout, such as a later sequence where Batman lets a villain go...only to have her betray his kindness. Except, it was implausible that Batman would let her go in the first place, given all the murder and carnage she had perpetrated! And you realize Rucka only had Batman let her go so he could "surprise" us with her betrayal. Is that what passes for plotting these days?

Then there's a one-issue story following Det. Montoya, with Batman a supporting player. A low key drama piece, it kind of reminded me of the old "Tales of Gotham City" human interest stories that used to run in Detective Comics in the late 1970s/early 1980s...except those were only seven pages or so, not stretched out to feature length. And this seems to hinge on the reader having some past understanding of Montoya, and her relationship with a certain villain, to get anything from it.

This is followed by arguably the collection's best story, an old fashioned detective/mystery piece as Batman investigates some bombings that maybe aren't what they appear. It's still not exactly a classic -- the villain is obvious, and it doesn't really warrant two issues -- but it's O.K.

Then we come back to the Ra's for the final showdown -- which seems like just a rehash of a dozen other Ra's showdowns, done before, and better. Strangely, it's not clear how this relates to the "Evolution" story. Batman refers to Ra's organization being in disarray and short of funds. Is that because of his failure in "Evolution"? Or is it because of something else? Cryptic lines are exchanged between Batman and Oracle about the Justice League...but it's unclear if that relates to Ra's, or something else entirely.

What Rucka does bring to Batman is a slightly kinder, gentler, more compassionate  Bats -- oh, sure, he still beats up and intimidates people, but he's not quite the one- note avenger that has been passed off as a deep character by some recent writers. This is a Bat's who seems to enjoy play-acting the board playboy, and whose occasional conversations with confidants seem a little more human. But, unfortunately, they are just occasional. Batman/Bruce has few people to play off of: Robin's nowhere in sight, while Alfred only has one scene. Lucius Fox crops up but for little effect.

Batman comics have become top heavy with cop characters -- one sometimes wonders if modern Bat-writters would rather be writing "NYPD Blue" than a man- in-tights story. But for all these cops running around, hogging scenes, they aren't especially well defined as people -- I couldn't always tell one from another. Thankfully, Rucka doesn't bury us with 10 page mindless action scenes, yet neither are the main plots anything special, nor are there intriguing sub-plots or soap opera-y character arcs. And, as noted, even the character/human drama stuff is thin. Commissioner Gordon's wife had, apparently, been killed in a previous story. So Batman asks him how he's holding up. Then he asks him again, an issue or two later. End of character/human drama.

The art, like the writing, is neither great, nor terrible. Despite a number of artists, the style remains consistent, and it's a craggy, slightly cartoony look -- but not too much so. It's a style that would be O.K. supporting a great script, but doesn't do much on its own. And it suffers under the bizarre colouring decision. Instead of a rich, multi-hue palette, the decision was to go for an almost-black & white & grey look...except instead of grey, different hues are used -- red for the "Evolution" story; purple and yellow for the Det. Montoya one-shot, etc. It can be applauded as an experiment (assuming it wasn't just DC's way of trying to save costs on printing -- which might explain the surprisingly reasonable cover price) but it doesn't work. If the intention was to create a brooding, film noire ambience, or to set the mood with the various primary tones...it doesn't. And when laid over art that is only O.K. to begin with, it can't help but hurt it. John Watkiss and Phil Hester, both artists employing a lot of thick, moody shadows, probably take to the limited colour the best.

This run of issues follows on the heels of an epic story line where Gotham City was devastated by an earthquake -- hence why this collection is sub- titled "New Gotham #1" (implying it is the first of, one assumes, a series of TPBs set in this reconstructed Gotham). The earthquake story set up a social dynamic between the have nots (those who remained in Gotham and lost everything) and the haves (those who fled only to return to Gotham after everything's settled down). Presumably it's a way of dealing, metaphorically, with economic disparity and race relations. But haven't comics evolved to the point where they can deal with those things directly?

This seems like a pretty negative review, but I didn't hate this TPB. I just felt a certain ennui toward it. Rucka and his artists hit a baseline of competent mediocrity, and don't seem to feel much need to rise above it, delivering workmanlike work, nothing more. Indeed, the impression one gets is of a writer who's just killing time, waiting for genuine inspiration to strike, as if he was told to write a Ra's Al Ghul story, so he dutifully did so. I sympathize with the difficulty of coming up with fresh, exciting stories each issue, month after month. I really do. But that's kind of the name of the game, isn't it?

Cover price: $21.95 CDN./ $12.95 USA.

Batman: Fortunate Son 1999 (HC & SC GN) 96 pages

Written by Gerard Jones. Illustrated by Gene Ha.
Colours: Gloria Vasquez. Letters: Willie Schubert. Editors: Jordan B. Gorfinkel and (posthumously) Archie Goodwin.

Rating: * * * (out of 5)

Number of readings: 2

My original, slightly different reaction to this graphic novel can be read here.

Posting reviews can be an intriguing experiment for a reviewer: you read something, then attempt to formulate an opinion and to set it into words that convey your reaction. And that should be that. But not always. Nine times out of ten my initial reaction to a comic (or book/movie/whatever) will remain largely unchanged after a second or third reading. Sometimes I'll have a mild change of heart -- something I hated, after a second reading, I simply disliked; or something that blew me away the first time, the second time I'll notice some flaws. Usually it's not enough to warrant revisiting my old review -- or, if I do, it simply warrants changing a sentence or two.

Occasionally I'll have a very different reaction that, in good conscience, seems to require re-evaluating my original review. The two most extreme examples -- so far -- are JLA: Year One and, now, Batman: Fortunate Son. In both cases, my original review was highly critical and unforgiving; but after a second reading, well, my stance has softened. Interestingly, another Gerard Jones-scripted effort -- Green Lantern: The Road Back -- also improved with a second reading. But in that case, I liked it the first time...and really liked it the second.

Ah-hah, say critics of internet reviewers, doesn't that prove the net is cluttered with too many self-appointed reviewers who don't know what they're talking about? Not really, says I. Because in most such cases, it's not so much that I disagree with the points raised in my earlier review, so much as with a second reason I can sometimes find myself looking past the vices of a work, and noticing its virtues.

In Fortunate Son we have a refreshingly atypical Batman adventure -- Batman & Robin that is (the original, Dick Grayson, Robin). No costumed villains, or mobsters lifted from bad Godfather pastiches, or serial killers. Here rock star Izaak Crow finds himself spiralling out of control thanks to drugs and hallucinations, sent off on an odyssey by the ghost of the "God" of rock n' roll (a thinly veiled Elvis Presley figure). But this triggers a mass movement cum rampage among Crow's fans -- fans disillusioned, disenfranchised from society. Batman and Robin set out to stop Crow -- but Robin, a rock music fan, is convinced Crow isn't responsible for his actions, that he's being manipulated by outside forces, while Batman, who evinces a pathological hatred for rock, is convinced Crow -- and all rock stars -- are dangerous, out of control anarchists.

Taken at face value -- heck, taken as an epic, 90 page graphic novel, Fortunate Son is a little thin. And with so few suspects, when Robin turns out to be right, that Crow is the victim of others' machinations, it's not hard to guess who the villains are. And as a character/human drama story -- I'm sorry, but Batman just doesn't seem too much like Batman. Unfortunately, ever since comicdom embraced the notion that Batman is one of the most psychologically complex superheroes, he's actually been reduced to more and more cardboard dimensions, I guess to make it easier to psychoanalyse him. At one point Batman's personality is defined by another character as "Control, control, control, control, control..." He's a control freak. Period. This, along with a personal trauma from his youth, are meant to explain his pathological antipathy for rock. But it just doesn't wash in this day and age that a thirtysomething guy like Batman would have such a reaction -- sure, he might not like rock, that's personal preference, but to have him so lose his perspective over music is just implausible. As well, writer Jones fails to really convince you that Batman and Robin are essentially family -- again, not unlike a lot of recent Batman writers who've so constricted the dimensions of the character, they can't make him both a driven avenger and a father- figure.

A complex character is one who has, well, complexity. Not a character who can be defined by only one characteristic.

Though some of Robin's more light-hearted asides are cute.

But read a second time, I realize that the story isn't meant to be taken nearly as literally as I first read it. It's slightly dreamlike, as Jones attempts to fashion a fable exploring the iconic mythology of rock music. When a character, talking about a region where the "god of rock" is still popular, refers to it as being "still his country", you realize Jones is making the sub-text the text, literalizing his theme that rock is like religion for the secular west. The God of Rock and Roll is, literally, God to his followers. However, Jones' attempts to make a grand, insightful examination of Western Civilization seems to rely a wee bit too much on trite cliches. He wants to embrace the notion of the power of the music, how so many musicians have died or been destroyed by fame because their muses eat them up from inside. But isn't it more likely that it has a lot do with being rich and famous and being surrounded by too many yesmen who won't say no when you start snorting the coke? One wonders if, say, plumbers were afforded the same celebrity as rock musicians, whether that profession too would suffer an inordinate amount of burn outs.

As well, Jones' heavy reliance on thinly-veiled celebrity cameoes (the "God" of rock isn't the only rock star who appears to Crow) and tossing in endless snippets quoting rock lyrics, can be befuddling for someone not as immersed into the history of rock the way Jones is. Ironically, many have complained that modern comics are too inaccesible for casual readers, as they throw in endless references and allusions that only hardcore comic geeks will get. Fortunate Son doesn't require you to be that familiar with comics...but it does help to know your rock n' roll (though, to be fair, I got most of the references).

Anyway...

Recognizing the non-literal undercurrents of the story justifies a scene I found implausible the first time -- as Batman visits Arkham Asylum and gets into a music discussion with some of his arch foes. It's not meant to be read on a realist level.

The point is, accepting that Batman isn't entirely in character, or at least, isn't a well-rounded one, and that the story is more a fable than a kitchen sink drama, I enjoyed it more with a second reading. Not the least of which being, as noted at the start of this review, because it doesn't have any super villains, mobsters, or serial killers! It seems a bit of a welcome throw back to late-1960s Batman comics when the comic was trying to get away from the camp stigma of the TV series by trying for a greater social realism, but before it slid back into being a superhero title with Batman battling the Joker and other melodramatic foes. Don't get me wrong. I like super villains, and mobsters, too, but I also like variety.

The art by Gene Ha, though I little stiff, is also pretty effective. Of a realist school of art, Ha's style works particularly well for this kind of story, often emphasizing, not ignoring, the humanity of the heroes -- Batman actually has pupils!

As mentioned, I'm not quite turning my back on my initial review -- much of what I wrote remains valid (and is still available for reading here). But read a second time, I see the glass as more half full, rather than half empty. The art is pretty good, and though the story is more ambitious than it is successful in being as profound as it wants to be, it is ambitious, and appealingly off-beat. It's still not a great read, but I moderately enjoyed it a second time though.

Soft cover price: $23.50 CDN./ $14.95 USA. 

Batman: Full Circle  1991 (SC GN) 64 pages

Written by Mike W. Barr. Pencils by Alan Davis. Inks by Mark Farmer.
Colours: Tom Ziuko. Letters: Todd Klein. Editor: Denny O'Neil.

Rating: * * (out of 5)

Number of readings: 1

A sequel to the events in Batman: Year Two -- and, indeed, it has been included in the 2002 re-issue of Batman: Year Two. Given all the "reality-changing" events DC has gone through, I'm not sure if either story is to be considered "official" Batman history anymore, but the story here has Gotham City once more plagued by the murderous Reaper who died at the end of Year Two. This time the Reaper is Joseph Chill, whose dad, Joe Chill, killed Batman's parents. Joseph wants revenge on the Batman for what happened to his dad (again in Year Two) and, with his sister Marcia, has concocted this scheme of impersonating the Reaper.

I had been kind of cool to Batman: Year Two, feeling it had lots of potential, but didn't really fulfill most of it. I went into Full Circle a little more optimistically. With its shorter length I figured Barr could keep greater reign on his ideas, and it was drawn entirely by Alan Davis, a good artist who, unfortunately, only illustrated the first chapter of Year Two.

The story relies heavily on evoking the previous story, reassembling some familiar characters, such as Barr's re-fashioned Leslie Thompson, a character he clearly has adopted as his own, and the nun Rachel Caspian, daughter of the first Reaper and Bruce Wayne's ex-fiance. And there are themes of family loyalty, revenge and forgiveness.

Once again Barr's playing with good ideas, but once again doesn't entirely handle them properly. There's a surprising superficiality, despite ideas that should make for rich emotions. Characters, even Batman, never really come into focus (there isn't even a mention that Batman and Rachel were once engaged!) while Leslie, who Barr no doubt intends as a lovable crumudgeon, remains obnoxious, a slum angel who seems more contemptuous than compassionate.

A fresh element to the tale is that it's set in the middle years of Batman's career, with Dick (Robin) Grayson. But the relationship between the two is awkwardly portrayed, with Batman as a stern taskmaster and Robin as an irresponsible flake (isn't that precisely the characterization that led fans to dislike the 2nd Robin, Jason Todd?). Anyone hoping for the Silver Age/Bronze Age camaraderie will be disappointed. And Robin seems more there to serve the themes (of family) rather than because Barr has any genuine affection for the relationship.

The story is evocative of an older, much better Mike Barr-written tale, "The Player on the Other Side" (Batman Special #1, 1984), which also had Batman going up against a costumed foe who was a kind of emotional twin (shaped, like Batman, by the death of his father).

Barr seems to want to show some compassion for the Reaper (demonstrating Chill's tenderness toward his own son) but Chill's revenge plan, involving the murder of innocents, is so cold blooded, so psychotic, it's impossible to see the man as anything but a monster.

The story itself is kind of draggy. Since we know the true identity of the new Reaper (robbing the story of some of its suspense and the potential spookiness of Batman thinking it might be a ghost) and since, as noted, the emotional/character stuff is kind of weak, we wait a long time for the Chill siblings' plan to truly manifest itself (the whole scheme of dressing as the Reaper has little true relevance). The climax, with Batman involved in one of those delightfully silly "death traps" villains like to employ, and with an attack on Batman psychologically, picks up somewhat, and is interesting, but it's kind of late in the game.

Davis' art is O.K., but like the story, there's a certain...I don't know. I just wasn't drawn into the story. Perhaps the colours by Tom Ziuko are also at fault, relying on too many similiar hues, rather than emphasizing key figures or elements.

Original cover price: $6.95 CDN./ $5.95 USA.

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