Quarter Bin #42 "Knightcontinues"

Disclaimer: "Quarter Bin" does not always feature comics from an actual quarter bin.  The quarter in the title is for inflation purposes.  This is my two cents worth on older comics.

I don't normally link to the material that helped inspire what I sometimes write about here at Comics Reader, but as it happens, the subject and specific comics came up with another blogger I follow, PT Dilloway, who wrote about the same general topic here.  I originally heard about this story thanks to History of Comics on Film, which wrote about it in this survey.

Okay!  So let's print up the marquee:

AZRAEL #s 37-38 (DC)
from January-February 1998

These issues are part of a greater arc (including the ones before and after) called "Angel and the Bane," which constitute a rematch five years in the making, after the climactic Batman #500, in which Jean-Paul Valley, having succeeded Bruce Wayne as the Dark Knight and donned his armored Batsuit for the first time, defeats the man who broke Wayne's back.  A cool logo, probabl cooler than the ones used during the "Knightfall" saga, is created for these issues and everything!

I should note that Azrael #36 was available, too, but not having an exact outline of the issues I needed, I couldn't be sure, because it was one of those Faces of DC covers that the company released across its line for releases dated December 1997.  It was one of those initiatives that certainly makes a mark,but it also doesn't provide any details about the story inside the actual comic, so double-edged sword there.

Anyway, "Angel and the Bane" is not a major story, except maybe for Azrael, so it's not strictly essential to have read the whole story anyway.  It's very much indicative of what Azrael as a whole did for a hundred issues.  This is not to say that legendary writer Denny O'Neil wasted his time, but that he created a very insulated experience, which is odd, because for a time, Jean-Paul Valley was very much mainstream.  He was, after all, Batman.

Then again, that's usually the fate of fairly random characters trying to replace icons.  Ever try to keep track of the guys not named Steve Rogers who have been Captain America?  Even Ed Brubaker won't be able to keep Bucky Barnes relevant as the Winter Soldier.  Arguably the only replacements who won't be forgotten are Dick Grayson (who has pinch-hitted for Batman twice, but has also well-established himself both as Robin and Nightwing) and the three human Green Lanterns not named Hal Jordan (Guy Gardner, who became an icon as an atypically coarse hero; John Stewart, one of the most enduring black heroes; and Kyle Rayner, who after all had the weight of the whole Oan legacy on his shoulders for a while).  You could also argue Wally West as the second Flash (Jay Garrick belongs to a separate tradition, though he is routinely included in the same franchise), though recent years have seen him completely forgotten in favor of his predecessor and mentor, Barry Allen.

Anyway, what separates Azrael from most heroes and probably helped O'Neil stick him in a distinct corner for so long is that all his skills are completely artificial, programmed into him by a fanatical religious order.  For that reason, he has a lot more in common with Bane than might be appreciated on the surface.  In the comics, Bane is still best known for the steroid Venom, which is green and made him a hulking menace, though he used his brains to overcome Batman.  For many fans and writers, no matter how often Bane is shown to have overcome and come to completely despise Venom, he is inextricably associated with it.  In a way, it's Bane's own programming, something he must continually overcome.

That makes the dynamic between Bane and Azrael more compelling than simply the strange dance Bane took with two men named Batman.  By the time he realized that the Batman who beat him (mostly thanks to clipping the hoses connecting and feeding Venom to him) wasn't the original, Bane probably came to think of Azrael in a whole new light.  Since I haven't read the complete "Angel and the Bane," I don't know how much O'Neil spent philosophizing on this, but to Bane, the concept of Azrael must have been irresistibly compelling, in much the way Batman was when he was first trying to make his name (successfully, at least to start).  Here's a man who like I've said was also induced by artificial means to become something more than what he was.

(Here I should note that while growing up in the prison pit from the comics and Dark Knight Rises, Bane is not the weakling suggested in Batman and Robin before being injected with Venom for the first time.  That may go over well with Captain America, but Bane only survives, and is in fact selected for the procedure, because he's already amply physically capable.  The actual weaklings died because their bodies couldn't handle it.)

In "Angle and the Bane," he uses a modified version of Venom as a tool of control, a marketable asset, to try and restart his empire.  He targets Azrael as a test subject, curious to see what will happen when this curious individual is pumped full with it, and whether withdrawal will kill him.  I didn't read the final issue, as I said, nor the apparent subsequent "No Man's Land" tie-in followups, but suffice to say, the hero in the title of the series prevails, which can be assumed thanks to the fact that there are sixty issues yet to go.

This is not, then, a story about a rematch.  That's not what Bane wants or needs, and not what Azrael wants or needs, either.  Azrael, in fact, seems to be an incredibly reluctant hero throughout this series, who is at the margins of Batman's world, though seven issues after this arc, the series is newly subtitled Agent of the Bat; this seems to have no noticeable impact.

In comics characters can be created and discarded with equal ease.  I'm no stranger to finding some creations more fascinating than their publishing history suggests.  On the whole, Bane has been able to weather his "Knightfall" legacy better than Azrael, who has become a footnote (even replaced with a totally new character, Michael Lane, for a time, though using the same name and backstory), even if he must continually fight the perception that he's only worthwhile if hopped up on Venom, or at least somehow thinking about it.

In Dark Knight Rises, Venom is entirely removed from the equation, but then Bane is also reduced, in the end, to being a henchman to a higher power (a relationship to Ra's al Ghul derived from the comics).  Mr. Dilloway and me have debated what exactly that means to his overall role in the movie, whether it truly diminishes his other accomplishments in bringing Gotham to its knees.  I don't mean to say that Bane didn't, in fact, do that, but for me, he's a character who's most fascinating when he uses his mind.  He has turned his body into a weapon, to be sure, with or without the use of Venom, but his original defeat of Batman had nothing to do with his body (except for the whole back thing) and everything to do with his mind.  That's something that was quickly forgotten, even by the time Jean-Paul Valley beat him, and something every writer, even those with the best intentions, have never really gotten back to since.

"Angel and the Bane" is a sincere attempt by O'Neil to reclaim that territory.  Personally, I would have very much appreciated in this strange relationship had lasted a little longer, if Bane hadn't simply slipped away and Azrael continued doing whatever it was he did for another sixty issues.  Azrael begged for concrete context, just as much as Bane did.  Bane could never be a Lex Luthor.  The sad part is, two years after "Knightfall," DC turned another bruiser into a calculating menace, Blockbuster, who went on to trouble Nightwing...for a hundred issues.  Imagine if Bane had ever been used with that level of commitment.

Maybe the stuttering attempts to use Bane since "Knightfall" helped make Dark Knight Rises possible.  Maybe a poor publishing history also paradoxically helped keep the Azrael property viable.  Jean-Paul Valley maybe doesn't have the same staying power as the suit he wears.  In the later incarnation, the suits literally gobbles up its wearers, uses them up and spits them out.  For Valley, that ended up being exactly what replacing Batman was like.  Maybe that was something of the point of that story, too.  It takes a will like Bruce Wayne's to make that work.

For a lot of heroes, legacies are an incredibly hard thing to come by.  You know Batman, you know the Avengers, but there are others like Azrael who slip through the cracks, even if they make a spectacular splash at some point.  For villains like Bane, legacies can be a hard thing to live down.  So it's only appropriate when something like "Angel and the Bane" happens, even if it leaves very little impact at all.  If you care about the characters, you'll check it out, and see exactly why it happened, and what it meant.  It could inspire someone to do something even greater in the future.

Catching Up On Some Recent Comics

Action Comics #12 (DC)
Grant Morrison rounds out the first year of the New 52 Action Comics by pitting Superman against Captain Comet, one of DC's cosmic superheroes, in an epic showdown.  Hey, it's the most relevant Comet's been in years!

Aquaman #11 (DC)
Geoff Johns continues the saga he may be only spending a little while longer on, if recent reports are to be believed.  Still, if it's true, he's still done far more to make Aquaman a vital character than anyone in the dozens of attempts over the years.  If nothing else, this will make an epic, massive collection, and be put right alongside Brightest Day, where Johns and Peter S. Tomasi previously worked on the character.

Atomic Robo and the Flying She-Devils of the Pacific #2 of 5 (Red 5)
A better issue than the previous one, filled with Brian Clevinger's trademark wit, and Robo's hapless reactions to the insanity around him.

Atomic Robo Presents Real Science Adventures #5 (Red 5)
The latest issue of this anthology series is highlighted by Robo's confrontation with the man who killed Nikola Tesla (in this comics iteration), who was the creator of Atomic Robo (in the comics).

Batman: Earth One - Special Preview Edition (DC)
Yes, I bought and reviewed the full graphic novel last month, but I thought it'd be fun to see what it might feel like as a monthly-installment-sized edition.  Yes, this only covers the first fifteen pages, but it really does have a different feel.  There's a bonus preview of Scott Snyder's New 52, but the provided content is practically impenetrable, and certainly doesn't sell the Court of Owls concept, even though that's the name of the collection the preview is hawking.

Batman Incorporated #3 (DC)
The horrific shooting in Aurora, CO, delayed release of this book, though not necessarily shipments.  Morrison brings back Matches Malone, Bruce Wayne's underworld alter ego, while we learn what's really going on with Damian, who has for now assumed the identity of Redbird (which was also the name of Tim Drake's Robin-mobile).

Batman and Robin #12 (DC)
Tomasi concludes his Terminus arc with a big bang, which is a little disappointing in that Terminus didn't quite receive enough time to develop as a villain.  Long story short, the series was better earlier this year.

Before Watchmen: Comedian #2 of 6 (DC)
I read elsewhere that Edward Blake's introduction to Vietnam seemed a little generic.  I guess I haven't saturated myself with enough Vietnam fiction, since I found it to be pretty fascinating.  On the one hand, the Comedian considers this battlefield to be just another battlefield.  On the other hand, this is a guy whose best friend was just assassinated.  He has a right to be a little cynical, have an impulse to let loose a little.  That's my perspective, anyway.  Brian Azzarello also provides a fascinating insight into the possible origins of the emerging drug culture we still live in today, playing along the same notes as the second issue of Silk Spectre. (If you need a little perspective on it, Before Watchmen is an unlikely but certainly welcome forum.)

Before Watchmen: Nite Owl #2 of 4 (DC)
Whatever else I might have had to say about this issue is kind of overshadowed by the recent passing of comics legend Joe Kubert, who inked this series over son Andy's art.  I'm not a historian of the craft, but I can certainly appreciate Kubert's huge legacy, and it's a shame that he had to die in the middle of his last great contribution.  As I said in my thoughts for the first issue, Joe's inking made a definite impact on Andy's art in this book, one that spoke to the generational nature of the project.  Where some people have only been able to view Before Watchman through the Alan Moore controversy, I've relished it as a chance to view comic books in their most pure and relevant form, something creators like Kurt Busiek and James Robinson have been trying to do ever since, well, Watchmen.  Comics have, for better or worse, come to be defined by superheroes and legacies, and that's something Before Watchmen fully embraced, what the original stories were all about, in fact.  And Joe Kubert had a huge role in developing that.  Sorry to see you go.

Before Watchmen: Ozymandias #2 of 6 (DC)
The genius of Before Watchmen can also be explained this way: we're finally going to see Ozymandias and Comedian on equal terms.  That's something the original stories surprisingly avoided.  At the end of this particular issue, we begin to see a rectification.

Creator-Owned Heroes #1 (Image)
Image has slowly become the go-to home for every conceivable comic book project, and while the founders envisioned a forum to create superheroes that would contend with the popularity of the books they left behind, the projects that've come along over the past decade have redefined the company as a catch-all for creators who would otherwise look for a place in small presses.  Which has in essence made Image a large small press.  Sometimes a book like The Walking Dead can happen, but that's very much the exception to the rule.  Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray, regular writing partners who regularly work for the Big Two, join forces with Steve Niles (best known for his horror efforts) in launching a new anthology format, almost magazine-like offering, working on dream projects.  The problem is that the format short-changes those dreams.  To be frank, the examples in this debut issue don't feel like they were worth the effort.  But maybe they're better with commitment.

Demon Knights #12 (DC)
Paul Cornell may be writing this series for the trades.  I think that's the best thing to say about it.  I love Demon Knights, and I also wish it could be something more.  It's a rolling, sometimes rollicking adventure, but every time it seems like we're finally getting somewhere...it's the end of the issue.  So, Cornell may be writing for the trades.  This is not a complaint.

Earth 2 #4 (DC)
James Robinson continues his chronicle of the alternate Justice Society, in which everything old is new again. This now includes Al Pratt, the original Atom, who in this version of events is a soldier in the world army that sprang up in response to the Apokolips apocalypse.

Green Lantern #11 (DC)
Black Hand puts together a creepy family reunion and Sinestro brings Hal Jordan to his own personal Batcave, allowing us our first glimpse of the next Green Lantern.  Seriously, Geoff Johns could write this franchise forever.

National Comics: Eternity (DC)
The first of a series of one-shots reimagining various DC properties ("National Comics" is what the company was before it embraced the Detective in one of its flagship titles).  Jeff Lemire sees Kid Eternity basically as a Ghost Whisperer.  That's as much as there is to see here.

Peter Parker, Spider-Man #156.1 (Marvel)
I guess Marvel is releasing Point One issues of cancelled Spider-Man series to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the web-slinger.  This one is written by Roger Stern, a veteran I know best from 1990s Superman (but he's been around!).

RASL #15 (Cartoon)
The final issue of Jeff Smith's second comic book opus (his first being, of course, Bone), and finally an explanation for the title (an acronym for Romance at the Speed of Light, which was also the name of the third collection, and title of the eighth issue).  Things've boiled down to Rob's need to destroy the journals of Nikola Tesla (yes, the same dude as the comics creator of Atomic Robo) in order to save the universe, lest they be used to destroy it (which in fairness to Rob is a process that was already started across several alternate realities).  The big problem Rob gets to overcome in the finale is the revelation that Maya, the source of the eponymous tattoo and motivating factor in so many ways for Rob's journey throughout the series, is also his biggest threat.  He's been running the whole time toward this moment.  It's still disappointing that the series only lasted fifteen issues, but as Smith himself pointed out elsewhere, that still adds up to a lot of pages for any collection, and one way or another, this will sit proudly next to Bone on any discerning reader's shelf.  Perhaps like Demon Knights, it will read better and last longer in the memory in trade format.

Red Hood and the Outlaws #11 (DC)
Again, I have to say how different this series is from just about anything else, not just because of the distinctive art from Kenneth Rocafort, but because of Scott Lobdell's writing, which moves along at its own pace, a little like Grant Morrison's.  It is, then, any wonder that Lobdell and Rocafort have been tapped as the latest replacements in Superman?  Perhaps this will solve two issues.  This is a book that deserves to stand out, but it's also one that can be alienating (much like the heroes in the book themselves, who are all alienated), as has been proven since its launch last fall.  Perhaps more a little more convention will help readers discover how awesome it is.  This issue, by the way, features some familiar and unfamilar backstory for Koriand'r, better known as Stargirl.  Apparently she has some Farscape in her.

Last Week's Comics and an Epic Showdown

It should be noted that sometimes "last week's comics" will include some purchases that were not actually released last week.


Aquaman #10 (DC) Ever since Brightest Day, Geoff Johns has made it his mission to revive Aquaman as a legitimate presence in comics.  DC has tried just about everything in many different revivals to achieve this over the years, but Johns alone seems to have had the radical approach of merely making Aquaman himself interesting.  As he's done with Green Lantern, Johns has achieved this by widening the scope of Aquaman's career.  Previous efforts to this regard have always centered on underwater kingdoms, and while some of these have an impact, they did not succeed in making the character for whom these kingdoms were created...relevant.  Aquaman is not defined by underwater kingdoms.  If he were, he'd be no better than Black Panther, an incredibly negligent ruler, spending so much time hanging out with other superheroes who notably have no interest in this faraway responsibility.  Some creators have also tried to make his human origins interesting, to little avail other than extremely temporary visibility.  Aquaman, unfortunately, is a character who can be summed up in an entirely dismissive fashion: he talks to fish.  Johns decided to ignore all that and instead reveal a side of the character that speaks to his strengths in a far empowering way, as a guy who had an entirely separate group of allies who link his undersea world to surface concerns in ways that are still being explored nearly a year into the series and a rivalry with his archnemesis that has turned decidedly personal.  Aquaman has always been portrayed as the victim in his stories (which is really weird), but Johns is turning him into a multifaceted and even culpable figure.  Like Wonder Woman, he has always been a character who was supposed to be important just because he supposed to, and during Flashpoint last year their common significance as warriors was made plain.  Yet being a warrior isn't enough.  But being a tragic hero might be.  This is a good issue to see how Johns is accomplishing this.

Before Watchmen: Silk Spectre #2 of 4 (DC) What's absolutely fascinating about this issue has a connection to Alan Moore's story that could almost have been entirely forgotten in the midst of hype for being the best superhero story ever told.  Darwyn Cooke and Amanda Conner remind readers of the social significance of it, too, as they outline the insidious plot to turn drugs into the next big consumer hit, a habit that doesn't need to provide anything lasting in order to create its own constant demand.  Laurie is just beginning her career as a costumed crimefighter, something she never thought she'd do, but it's another habit, in effect, that she can't overcome.  If there's a message, it's that one of these habits is productive and the other isn't.

Cobra #15 (IDW) Longtime fans of G.I. Joe will know that one of the big developments in the late 80s continuity was the revelation that Cobra Commander had a hidden son named Billy.  Billy hits Cobra in a big way this issue, only he's not the boy we used to know, but a man, who in the opening pages sounds suspiciously like the Cobra from earlier issues, the ones trying to sell the organization to the public.  If he's not evil, then he certainly has an ego, and could have easily been used by his father's allies, possibly without him even realizing it.  It's this malleable sense of morality that allows this series to remain so brilliant.  You know who the bad guys and the good guys are, but they're both forced to exist in a world where it's not so easy to keep those distinctions separate when something needs to be done.  This is not a G.I. Joe book in any traditional sense.  You don't even need to care about G.I. Joe to enjoy it, and I'm certain that you don't even have to have read the several other dozen issues behind this one to start enjoying it now.

Justice League #11 (DC) I don't think Graves will go down as one of the most memorable villains in JLA history, and I don't think Geoff Johns thinks so, either.  He's a catalyst, a means to an end, to make a point, that this team is not perfect, even though its reputation in the book and as a comics commodity suggests so.  Readers from any number of eras will tell you that the Justice League is fallible.  The different and the distinction Johns is making here, and certainly in this issue, is that even a membership comprised of its most iconic members has visible chinks in its armor.  The underlying story from the beginning of the series has been Wonder Woman's journey, and it's fair to say that Johns has been doing more than other writer of the team to make her relevant.  Her relationship with Steve Trevor, which takes a considerable step this issue (but not one you might be thinking of), has been at the center of this significance, but the big splash is her fight with Superman and Green Lantern.  It's something of a cliche to try and help out a character's reputation by putting them in a situation like this, but for Wonder Woman, she's rarely had a moment like this.  In recent years she's come to be defined more closely as a warrior than ever before, but Johns has managed to channel that into someone who can be irrational and rational at the same time.  She can be reasoned with.  (It's also amazing that Johns is willing to show Green Lantern as so vulnerable in these pages, considering he's gone a good way into making the character his signature work in comics.)  The Shazam backup continues, and can it really been only the fifth installment?  Johns and Gary Frank are owning the former Captain Marvel as no one since Jerry Ordway.  I don't think he'll be overlooked again anytime soon.

Nightwing #11 (DC) The subplot of Detective Nie that Kyle Higgins has been sowing throughout this run is starting to come to a head.  I don't know why Nightwing seems to elicit these kinds of characters (Chuck Dixon and Devin Grayson previously worked similarly extended angles), but I'm glad it's another thing that Higgins is most assuredly doing write in this book.  There's plenty of story threads to keep reader interested this issue, including a visit from Sonia Branch, the daughter of Tony Zucco (the mobster responsible for the death of Dick Grayson's parents), who turns our hero down for a loan due to the established risk involved; a conversation with Damian, loaded with references to recent comics that also helps Nightwing riddle out some detective work; and the villain Paragon, who's there to exploit as much as possible.  Guest artist Andres Guinaldo is hit-and-miss, especially with Dick's hair for some reason, but the coloring makes a good contrast of Nightwing's basic gray and the new red swash.  All in all, this is a book that rewards regular readers.

Now here I'm going to talk about some recent new series from cult favorite writers Jonathan Hickman, Brian Wood, and Brian K. Vaughan.  Hickman's been famous recently for his work with Marvel, notably Fantastic Four, but he originally made his name on creator-owned titles for Image.  Wood is known for Demo and DMZ, while Vaughan is probably the biggest name of the bunch, having crafted Y: The Last Man and Ex Machina, two long-running titles that had readers invested in the unusual lives of their central protagonists.

I read these issues last week:


The Manhattan Projects #3 (Image)
from Hickman


The Massive #2 (Dark Horse)
from Wood


Saga #3 (Image)
from Vaughan


Of the three, I'm most impressed by Saga.  Hickman is known for having a wild imagination, but cycling it through either historical figures or established characters (sometimes blending the two, as in S.H.I.E.L.D.), and Manhattan Projects is not so different from this mold, even though it seems to have a little more breathing room than usual.  As the title implies, it deals with the development of the atomic bomb, and Hickman's idea of the greater things going on around it.  He gets to play with Einstein, Roosevelt, and a wacked-out version of Truman (if this is even close to truth, my history teachers have a lot of explaining to do), among others.  This particular issue handles the actual deployment of the bomb that resulted, and so it's fun (insofar as that bomb was "fun") to read Hickman's depiction of these events, although there's little indication of what exactly he's doing to build a larger story.  Maybe I need to read another issue.  The Massive, meanwhile, appears to be part-Wood and equally parts Dark Horse reviving Arvid Nelson's brilliant Zero Killer, but in a decentralized form.  For this reason (because I loved Zero Killer), I'm perhaps less inclined to view Massive as a singular creation, even though it's a book (like all three of these titles) that has a considerable amount of buzz around it, mostly because of Wood's involvement.  Saga, meanwhile, is something totally new from Vaughan, at least as far as my experience goes.  Maybe his Runaways was similar.  At any rate, this is a story set on an alien world, and Vaughan has embraced its otherworldliness, almost to a degree that I must ask you to see for yourself.  It's like Neil Gaiman doing Pixar (Coraline only gives you so much of a clue).  If you ever sampled Grant Morrison and had a hard time figuring him out, Vaughan might have provided an adequate window into that kind of storytelling, like Seaguy but without being a parody of superhero comics.  This one demands to be read again.

Passing the Green Flame

Green Lantern: Passing the Torch
collects Green Lantern #s 156, 158-161

The final issues of Judd Winick's run on Green Lantern features the aftershock of his signature storyline, the outing of supporting character Terry Berg and the resulting sever beating he receives because of it.

Terry's friend happens to be Kyle Rayner, the erstwhile Bearer of the Last Ring, who takes the attack badly, exiling himself to space rather than confront his lost faith in humanity.  John Stewart once again wields the emerald power in the first issue, and himself struggles to find something to believe in, while Rayner and Jade, the daughter of the first human Green Lantern, Alan Scott, try to shepherd a new generation of Guardians, and try to find some new direction.  Ganthet sets them on a mission that plays like an episode of Star Trek, before they discover that one of the Guardian foundlings has gone missing and forces everyone to face some harsh truths and face what they've been avoiding.

Being a fan of Kyle Rayner since his introduction in 1994, and especially Ron Marz's extended run with the character, I was disappointed to leave him behind when I parted ways with comics in 1999.  I missed Winick's run originally, but the Terry Berg arc was one of those unavoidable developments, one of the signal comic book stories of that era.  In its own way, it's a Green Lantern story that compares to the famous Green Arrow road arc from the 1970s.  Winick does not let Rayner off the hook, and neither does Terry, for his decision to run away from his problems rather than confront them, as he essentially abandons his friend in his moment of need.

If that's not a reason for you personally to read Passing the Torch, there's Rayner's trademark deep immersion into the whole Green Lantern mythos, which was always strangely appropriate, considering he was coming in at a moment when it seemed all the old ways had been lost thanks to Hal Jordan.  The collection includes the return of Mogo, famously the planet Green Lantern, whose profile would be heightened in the reboot of the franchise that would come several years later.  It also features a handy timeline of Green Lantern lore, as if making a statement for everything new fans from the Geoff Johns era might want to know.

As a character and a moment, much of Rayner's time as Green Lantern may now seem anachronistic, even the Guardian foundlings, since these little blue men are in current continuity once again the same old guys they always were.  Reading Passing the Torch is a nice reminder of what that time was like without needing to be bogged down by its particulars.  John Stewart wonders if he should become a member of the Justice League.  The long journey and development Kyle has enjoyed in his ten years dominating the franchise seems to be reaching a natural ebb.  The title might refer to the characters in the collection, or that subconsciously, it's a goodbye to the fans who followed these adventures and refused to let Kyle be forgotten (he currently stars in Green Lantern: New Guardians, using his unique talents as a conduit between the many different corps).

The fun thing is that the writing from Winick is never better than when he's handling Kyle and Jade, treating them as the centerpiece that they are.  Kyle became famous for his relationships, both with Jade and Donna Troy, that never seemed to work out.  His most recent doomed love was with Soranik Natu, the daughter of Sinestro.  I'm sure he's got a few more in him.  He's the new Dick Grayson in that regard.  So yeah, you can just have reading it, too.

The Blue Amazon

Concluding a story begun with Superman's Metropolis and Batman: Nosferatu, Wonder Woman: The Blue Amazon is an Elseworlds one-shot that adapts classic silent cinema (in this instance The Blue Angel and Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler) from writers Randy and Jean-Marc Lofficier.

Wonder Woman has long been identified as the third member of DC's Trinity, yet she has rarely had the same opportunities as her compatriots.  This is a rare instance where someone had to go out of their way to give her the nod in a separate project.  Though it is the final chapter of a trilogy, one might read it separately (as I did) and not miss a beat. 

The Blue Amazon explores a nightmarish world dominated by two surreal figures, the inheritors of three founders who left a lasting impression, and not always for the better.  The third of this new ruling class has been kept prisoner by a psychopath who takes her for granted, until the day she's unleashed thanks to the appearance of her greatest foe.  The whole thing sets off the intrinsic worth of Wonder Woman without referring to any of her familiar elements, except for Steve Trevor.  It's a testament to a potential that has rarely been explored, unless in very simplistic ways.  It doesn't help her cause that of the Trinity, only she lacks a link to the real world.  In Blue Amazon, this is seen as a strength, and any continuing skeptics might take this lesson to mind.  It even suggests the one thing Wonder Woman has never really been allowed to explore, the biological capability that sets her apart and would make her instantly identifiable.  That's another reason why Blue Amazon is a must-read, not just for existing Wonder Woman fans, but those who might appear in the future.

The art, it should be noted, does not seem to know that all female characters in comic books must be depicted as sexually attractive as possible.  In fact, like the rest of the world around her, this Wonder Woman is almost grotesque.  It's just one of the signifiers that you're reading something special. 

The Dark Knight Rises

For the record, Christopher Nolan finally succeeded in turning Batman into something other than a comic book character.

THE DARK KNIGHT RISES is the story of a revolution, and Nolan’s Batman has become a legend worth remembering.  The story begun in BATMAN BEGINS is most definitely concluded here, and the ominous portents of THE DARK KNIGHT fulfilled.  The wonderful thing is that Nolan has succeeded in setting different but complementary tones to each of the films in this trilogy.  The first one was about psychology, the second was about the law, and now this one is about justice.

This is now the definitive Batman story.  It has a beginning, a middle, and an end.  I made the first statement in this paragraph referring to the trilogy, but it might as well speak directly to DARK KNIGHT RISES.  This may be the rare threequel where you don’t need to have seen the first two films to understand what’s going on, much as clearly most viewers of DARK KNIGHT hadn’t come to the party with the first one.  DARK KNIGHT was a meditation of chaos, and its mayhem was its own kind of spectacle.  Yet now, you can begin to see it in reference to the rest of the story.

Nolan’s central concept has always been of duality.  Nearly every character in these films has two sides to them, obviously Batman/Bruce Wayne, but even seemingly neutral ones like Jim Gordon and Alfred Pennyworth, who are trying their best to adhere to systems that don’t come naturally to them.  The villains all have split personalities, whether obvious like Two-Face or Henri Ducard/Ra’s al Ghul or subtle like The Joker, whose apparent lack of history is its own kind of history, something he’s free to make up as he goes along.  I won’t go out and spoil the one in DARK KNIGHT RISES, but that continues.  But even more than in the other two, this one puts a heavy weight on Batman’s.  This is Nolan’s concluding thoughts on what it all means, so you know the exploration is juicy.

The reason I say this is not a superhero story is because there’s meaning and consequence to every action, in exactly the way these things are only played at in, say, THE AVENGERS.  It is not escapism for the sake of escapism, though Nolan protects Batman from even his worst defeat, knowing that his message would be tarnished if the full effect of Bane’s presence were felt, the way the comics did in his original appearances.   There is not violence for the sake of violence, but rather so that you know these characters are forced to make life-altering decisions, which is something that has been another theme of the trilogy.  This is not to take away from Bane or to say you don’t worry for Batman, but it’s enough for both that this is the first time in a movie with costumes where the fighting feels real and momentous.

All of the characters in DARK KNIGHT RISES have something to say and add to the story.  You know the new names (Anne Hathaway, Tom Hardy, Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-Levitt) plus those who’ve been with us since the beginning (Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman, Gary Oldman).  As with the earlier films, there’s very little overlapping between performances so much as specific pairings, so each actor and their respective role gets a chance to achieve full impact without stepping on each other’s toes.  More than its predecessors, DARK KNIGHT RISES has definitive arcs for nearly all of them, like how Nolan mapped out Batman in the first one.

I love finding little quirks in films that speak to a greater film experience.  Hardy’s Bane, for instance, is similar to his role in STAR TREK NEMESIS, and it’s something of an odd coincidence, because Bane’s story is most definitely Bane’s story.  There’s also a vast improvement over the weakness that ultimately sabotaged ANGELS & DEMONS, the key moment of DARK KNIGHT RISES (hopefully now that I’ve pointed that out, you will be able to identify it for yourself without my needing to spoil anything here; as a hint, it involves Ewan McGregor’s character in the former and a certain vigilante in the latter).

DARK KNIGHT RISES is about a revolution that might have taken place in the wake of Occupy Wall Street, had there existed a legend like Batman.  In these films, strongmen attack Gotham because it is a symbol, and the city is in turn protected by a symbol.  Nolan asks us if the ends justify the means, and there may be a suggestion of his own answer here, or perhaps just the only one that makes sense for this story.

If nothing else, this is the best of the Batman films.

Quarter Bin #41 "Gotham Central and For Tomorrow"

GOTHAM CENTRAL #16 (DC)

From April 2004

GOTHAM CENTRAL #22 (DC)

From October 2004:

Harking to another Comic Book Resources article, I found myself finally reading some issues of GOTHAM CENTRAL, a Batman family comic that centered on the regular police presence in the Dark Knight’s home turf, written during its run by Greg Rucka and Ed Brubaker, two creators who have made names for themselves by mostly staying within a more realistic interpretation of superheroes.  Rucka has stuck mostly to crime comics, though he remains one of the best Wonder Woman writers of the modern era, while Brubaker, who has done his share of similar comics, has in the meantime made his name most familiar with a sustained run with Captain America, in which he totally transformed the franchise (and influenced the coming movie sequel by introducing the concept that Bucky Barnes managed to survive WWII by unwittingly becoming a Russian agent codenamed the Winter Soldier).  These particular issues of GOTHAM CENTRAL were written by Brubaker.  I was persuaded to read these because of the covers.  The first features a misleading reference to the Joker, who I was assured had been handled brilliantly in the series, though he is not in this issue, which rather features fairly routine police work from pretty much everyone in the book who didn’t actually become name characters (those survivors would be Crispus Allen, who would go on to be the new host of the Spectre; Jim Corrigan, who I assume was used as a red herring, because he shared the name of Spectre’s original host; and Renee Montoya, whose profile was subsequently elevated when she became the new Question in the pages of 52).  The effect of this is that GOTHAM CENTRAL reads like a comic book adaptation of any TV procedural drama you can name, and is not an impressive demonstration of the quality I’ve heard about.  The second issue has Harvey Bullock on the cover, with a reference to the Penguin (which is either ironic, given what Geoff Johns did with BATMAN: EARTH ONE, or a story he was actually referencing, and the reason I got this one), which actually pans out in the story.  This one was worth reading, not just because I knew and therefore cared about the characters, but because it made sense as a standalone read.  Coming out of the experience, I’m not sure I would personally recommend GOTHAM CENTRAL, at least not if you’re willing to make a bigger commitment than a few sample issues.  Following the perspective of the regular law enforcement of Gotham City is a worthy subject, but I’m not sure it’s a good idea to ignore Batman when you’re doing so.  Any issue should reference him a little more prominently than was evidenced by these issues, not because it’s relevant, but because it’s conceptual necessary.

SUPERMAN #215 (DC)

From May 2005:

This was the conclusion to Brian Azzarello and Jim Lee’s “For Tomorrow” arc, a sort of culmination to everything DC had been trying to do during the first decade of the millennium prior to INFINITE CRISIS, or in other words five years of desperately attempting to make Superman cool and relevant to readers.  Since that time the company has cooled its jets a little, trusted its creators a little more, and even gotten some of them to embrace writing the character for the character’s own sake.  “For Tomorrow” features a continuity that no longer exists, another of those interpretations of General Zod that I personally consider to be instantly irrelevant after Geoff Johns’ ACTION COMICS run (and subsequent New Krypton adventures).  Yet it makes an interesting point, and one I suspect was Azzarello’s intention, that for a guy whose origins are defined by great loss, Superman has made a life out of preventing bad things from happening to anyone else, kind of overlooking that good can sometimes come from tragedy.  I would use that as an argument to get Azzarello writing more Superman, see what else he can say about that.  The artwork from Jim Lee, meanwhile, looks more like his Image material than his current JUSTICE LEAGUE work (or either of his Batman projects), and is a little more distracting than it is a draw, and I think that’s another reason why “For Tomorrow” has fallen between the cracks since it was originally presented, harking back to an era that not only no longer exists, and isn’t something anyone besides Kurt Busiek is interested in revisiting, other than in the pages of the late SUPERMAN/BATMAN, which itself became increasingly irrelevant before disappearing at the dawn of the New 52.