Reading Through 2021 87: Batman by Grant Morrison Omnibus Volume Three, by Grant Morrison and Chris Burnham

Batman by Grant Morrison Omnibus Volume Three, by Grant Morrison and Chris Burnham

Collecting work from the 2010s, published 2020

Omnibus One was fun. Omnibus Two was better. Now for the story of Batman Inc.

It's very good cover, but the set of omnibuses aren't unified as a set outside of the logo

Right up front, this is not as good as Omnibus Two. It has the problems of high expectations working against it. I really enjoyed Two and was hoping for it to keep up the compelling story. And when this was coming out, I remember people praising Batman Inc. as exciting... 

The Japanese here is a fun Easter egg. Mike Marts, Nathan Fairborn, and Morrison himself get shout outs in the signs

Omnibus Two left off with Bruce Wayne announcing Batman Inc, and this book begins with Batman rounding up his international team of Batmen. He starts in Japan, then moves on to Argentina, and South Dakota on a recruiting drive. This part of the book was the most fun for me. The book has two arcs, one for each of the two Batman Inc. series collected. The first arc is building up the organization, and the second is letting all the dominoes Morrison had lined up fall down.

Yeah, I want to see a Native American Batman riding a bison

These recruitment adventures are the most exciting and novel. Seeing how Batman concepts can filter through other cultures is really cool, and the stories are solid. Burnham draws a lot of this, with Yanick Paquette also doing some art chores. Nathan Fairbairn does consistently great colours. You get the feeling that this is an AAA package. No filler. If the story lags, the art and novelty carries it along.

A stunning double-page title card

The story is not flawless. There is too much reliance on double-crosses and triple-crosses and quadruple-crosses. At certain points, I didn't know who was a good guy if they weren't in the immediate Bat-family. If you don't know who you're rooting for, it's hard to be invested in their objectives or care about the dangers. So I ended up reading for the moments rather than for the story. And there are many exciting moments.

Some work better than others. At the end of one issue, they promise a great cyber-Batman story on the Internet 3.0, and I was excited to turn the page.

I'm ready for this!

The next issue was all done with computer rendering, and was unreadable in many places, with muddy images.

Batwoman is outlined in yellow, Bruce in red

It was a single issue that, while it mostly didn't work, it showed Morrison having fun and playing with the book. Internet Batman rendered in 3-D; he had to take it to the next level to make it worth the concept.

There are some side stories with other characters which were mostly enjoyable. And for the most part, I liked the art across this whole book. Most of the art was clean and dynamic, not overly reliant on heavily shadowed capes. If I had a complaint with the second volume, it was that a lot of the art was over-rendered with shadow, which is not an issue with this one.

Cameron Stewart continues to have some of the cleanest forms in mainstream comics

The second half of the book is decent, but not as exciting. Batman Inc. is a great concept, Batmen around the world, but it adds up to about six other Batmen. It ends up feeling much smaller than "worldwide." The villain of the book, Leviathan, is a massive secret organization, but Batman Inc. never seems to be similarly omnipresent.

I love the counter-culture concepts Morrison sneaks in: be afraid of your kids

And the Internet made much so much of Batcow at the time. I wasn't reading it, I wasn't looking for Bat-news, but I heard of Batcow a lot. I don't know what I expected a cow to do, but it mainly just stood there, and was a mascot for Damian. It was cute, but pretty throwaway.

Another writer will take a stab at Bat-Cow in a decade or two

The Leviathan storyline features Talia Al Ghul, a suiting character to tie a run featuring Damian Wayne, her and Batman's son, together. She gets some good character definition, as someone who has capabilities but has been held back by her overprotective father. Her emotional connection to Batman and Damian gives complexity to her dynamic with them.

The Bat-clone Talia grows is a sad, damaged thing

But at the end of the day, I barely remember how the book ends. The book tries to have ramifications as Bruce Wayne becomes a wanted man, and his empire collapses, but it all seems to be back to normal by the end. At the end of the book, a few people are dead, but they've all come back since because it's a comic, so there isn't much point in caring. The book is about the ride, not the impact on continuity.

Some fun storytelling in a Japanese capsule hotel. The top line shows a nice time lapse from evening to night, and the middle row shows a great use of panels to break up a single space

I was surprised how much of the art Chris Burnham did. Most modern mainstream books, artists do three issues and swap out, and Burnham did half this book. His art style wasn't entirely consistent. Sometimes there would be a real janky image and I wouldn't think it was his art. And he would sometimes draw massive eyeballs on characters, which just looked weird. But a majority of his work was clever and clear, with a great balance of cartoonishness and realism. He's not Frank Quitely, but he's a real good substitute. His art can carry a story.

I got a laugh out of seeing Spring-Heeled Jack

I loved the way Morrison mined old, often embarrassing, Batman continuity for his international Batmen. Some adjustments were made, but he used the foundation Silver Age writers had left for him. The detail throughout was impressive, but not surprising from a hyper-literate writer like Morrison.

The first appearance of Spring-Heeled Jack in the 1840s

All in all, I liked this book and will probably revisit it in a decade, though after I re-read the second, more exciting and coherent Omnibus. There was unreached potential in the concept of Batman Inc. It's fun, but the execution felt smaller than the concept. Another writer could take the ball and run with it, but with the current state of dour that guides DC, it's unlikely that a concept as wacky as Batman Inc. will be explored again anytime soon.

 

Omnibus Three was not something that gave me deep thought, or something that I even found particularly easy to follow to as I was reading. It was very much blockbuster entertainment that bounced from crazy set piece to crazy set piece. It had something that I don't associate with Batman these days: fun.

Reading Through 2021 47: Batman: Son of the Demon, by Mike W. Barr and Jerry Bingham

Batman: Son of the Demon, by Mike W. Barr and Jerry Bingham

1987

I bought this when it was new, at age 11 or 12, and at the time I didn't get it. I didn't hate it, but it was over my head, and I never read it again. I was surprised now to see it was from 1987. In 1988 and 89, I was dropping $$$ on the Killing Joke, Arkham Asylum, the Cult, Legends of the Dark Knight and so on, but this was probably my second or third Batman purchase. Twelve dollars (Canadian) was a lot to me at that time. Still I never read it a second time. Reading the Grant Morrison Batman run, which features Batman's son prominently, I wanted to give this a second read.

It's a painted cover, but almost looks computer colored

I liked this, and I liked it a lot more than I thought I would. I don't know what I expected exactly, but I figured it would be very competent but unexciting. The story is probably best described as competent, but the art in this is beautiful, and elevates the whole thing. It's an exceptional looking book.

The back cover. What's missing? No writing, no blurb, just an image and a price. That is wonderful

At this point I've read enough of the O'Neil/Adams Batman run to know about Ra's al Ghul and Batman's romance with his daughter Talia. There's a 50/50 chance I had no idea who the characters were when I first read this. The Son of the Demon builds on their history: Ra's is a supervillain but not necessarily evil, his daughter is loyal to her father, and her and Batman are torn between their love and their ideals. That history is taken as a given in this story.

This is a graphic novel, and this is as "mature" as it chooses to get, flesh-wise. Lovely background wash on this page too

With that, the story begins with Batman stopping a terrorist attack and getting hooked up with Talia again. The story moves quickly, and soon he's eating dinner with Ra's and Talia, and they realize they have the same goal: taking down this terrorist mastermind Qayin (Cain, like in Cain and Abel). But the plot moves too fast. Batman says he'd like to work with Ra's, and Ra's replies that if he wants to, he has to marry Talia. Batman says yes. They start terrorist hunting as a team, and loving it. Soon though, Talia lets Bruce know she's pregnant, and Bruce cannot let his child suffer as he did so he decides to stop fighting. Talia immediately (like, during the same conversation, on the same page) fakes a miscarriage and Bruce can now stop the bad guy with a clear conscience. They split up and a final page reveal shows that an orphan child has been adopted.

Bingham doesn't use a grid, but his pages are sequentially readable

The story concepts are strong, the motivations are strong, but the pacing doesn't quite work. Fight scenes get six pages to tell their story, but character building scenes get one or two pages at a time. Barr was mainly a monthly comic writer at the time, so I can see he's branching out of his comfort zone. It's almost there. It works better in synopsis than it does on the page. He does a good job of seeding Bruce's childhood trauma throughout the book. The opening action scene highlights his compassion for a pregnant hostage.

Batman cares about kids

The art though, wow, I just didn't remember liking it much at the time. At that point, I was drooling over Art Adams and Todd McFarlane, and this art had more substance than I could handle. Bingham renders his lines like Neal Adams, with loose ink but controlled shapes. His storytelling reminded me of John Byrne: structurally sound with lots of full body shots. It is masterful work. And I don't even know another book he's done. I'm going to look him up after this, but I wanted to write this without any outside influence. My worry is that most of his career is doing standard superhero comics.

This scene reminded me of something from Robocop

He does the colors himself, lots of oranges and blues, and creates a consistent tone throughout the 80 page book.

And this really reminded me of something from Robocop. There is some of the 1980s in here

I don't know what the reputation of this book is among Batman readers. It hasn't gotten the DC Absolute treatment. Obviously the legacy of Batman's child is a very important one and Damian Wayne probably got a lot of people to go back to this to see where he came from. Being a graphic novel probably didn't help it stand out at the time though. With the Killing Joke or Arkham Asylum, and especially the Dark Knight Returns, DC was really thrusting Batman forward in narrative and style, while this was a a throwback to the 70's. It's not a life-changing comic, but it is a really good one.

I Really Should Read This 10: Batman by Grant Morrison Omnibus Volume Two, by Grant somebody

Batman by Grant Morrison Omnibus 2, by Grant Morrison and a long list of artists

Collecting work from the 2010s, published 2019

Of any comic I could possibly write about, Grant Morrison's Batman is the best selling, most read and written about one, and relatively recently too. Perhaps my main value as a reviewer here is as someone who actively avoids Batman comics. 

For the most part, I just avoid Batman. I was there for Death in the Family, Bat-mania in 1989, I bought Arkham Asylum and Killing Joke on the stands (as well as Son of the Demon!), so I'm up on the character. But somewhere in the 2000's, it stopped being fun for me. Sometimes I was into it (Batman Begins! Arkham Asylum/City on PS3!), but usually I was tired of his saturation in the culture, and the excessive, incessant voices of Batman fanatics (they could give Star Wars fans a run for their money). Good product shines through, but a lot of the Bat-products were coasting on the brand more than quality. 

When Morrison was writing Batman, there was a big shakeup with the character, which was that Batman "died", and Dick Grayson, the first Robin, took over the role. Detective Comics had an arc called The Black Mirror. I read it and it was fresh! Dick brought a whole new vibe to the role, and Batman seemed new again. I read the first arc of Batman and Robin as well (reprinted in this volume), with Morrison reuniting with his All-Star Superman partner, Frank Quitely, and it was exciting! This was the last time I read Batman. When Bruce came back, I stopped. I just wasn't interested in the flawless human that is Bruce Wayne.

Characterization is a key to making this book sing

Why did I decide to read this now? I spent the summer reading Grant Morrison comics, and I wanted more and this was a reasonable price (for an omnibus). My take on Omnibus Two? Because it combines three different series and so many artists, it isn't quite consistent in quality, but it ranges from good to incredible. 

The first thing you notice in it is that Dick Grayson isn't Bruce Wayne. He's thinner, more humble, and more acrobatic in his movements. That's a lot for an artist to convey, but the artists here really do their best to do so. Frank Quitely stands out as the best of the book. He has the line, the design, the movement; pretty much everything he draws is perfect. There was not a thing I would change. He designs a new character, Professor Pyg, who is a disgusting new addition to Batman's rogues gallery, as are his horrific dollotrons.

Oh yeah, Quitely did work the word smash into the wall Damian hit. Frank Quietly is a precious treasure

All of this is personal taste, but I prefer the 'clean' artists in the book; Cameron Stewart, Chris Burnham, and Andy Clarke stood out to me. I'm not so into Tony Daniel, or Andy Kubert's rougher lines. And I actively dislike Philip Tan and Frasier Irving's art, which veered into the grotesque for me. It's all personal taste though, and the art I didn't care for didn't break the book at all.

This was some nice narration from Bruce Wayne

The story has two parallel plots that converge at the end. In one, Gotham is being terrorized by a mysterious criminal organization called the Black Hand, while the second has heroes trying to track down a not-dead Bruce Wayne as he travels in time. I feel this way with a lot of big stories: the big plots make no sense. Bruce Wayne was shot with an Omega Beam which sent him back in time, and he makes time jumps at every solar eclipse, and when he arrives in the present, time will collapse? I don't know, it's gibberish. The Black Hand stuff makes more sense, but it's still a lot of hand-waving. 

That's fine, you don't read a book like this because the over-arching plots all make sense. I had to learn that the hard way with 1985's Secret Wars. This book is about the character, the interaction, and above all, the awesome. Dick Grayson is a great Batman, but Damian Wayne is an incredible Robin. Both of them learning their capabilities at once makes for an engaging read. Damian is an egotistical monster of a kid, but he can do way more than most kids. When he gets in a dangerous situation, you don't know if he's going to surprise you by pulling it off, or if he'll be mortified that he's gotten in way over his head. It is exciting and unpredictable, in a way most superhero comics aren't.

The coloring and the rendering are just not my tastes, but I understand why there has to be a Wild West Batman

I wasn't into the Batman through time story as much, but I get it. Caveman Batman, Pirate Batman, Cowboy Batman. It's almost like Morrison couldn't not do it once he had the concept. Again, the ideas behind why it's happening is absolute nonsense. But Batman is a cowboy, so fine!

I remember reading at the time that Morrison wanted to unify the goofy Batman of the 50s and 60s with the modern one, and to a good extent, he does. He creates a sense of joyous excitement that I don't recall in other Batman comics. Every closing page of the Batman And Robin series ends with a three panel teaser of the next issue. I can hear the rock and roll soundtrack as the credits come in.

It's like he's daring you not to keep reading. It's a great modern update to the Silver Age "Next Month!" box

It's a real shame the Dick Grayson era couldn't have lasted longer. Like, ten years or so. When I read the Black Mirror, it felt like the actual new status quo. Reading this, I see that almost as soon as Dick started as Batman, the 'real' Batman was already being written back into the book. It's a shame, but that simply wasn't what Morrison was writing. Seeing these three omnibuses, it's clear that the death of Batman was simply part two of a three part arc. 

I have Omnibus Three sitting on the shelf, and I'm looking forward to reading Batman Inc, a storyline that was buzzed about at the time, but I've never read. And the number one reason I'm looking forward to reading it is this: it sounds fun.