After all the talk of how awesome Dark Knight was I decided to take a look and borrow it from the library. And I have to ask, why do people think this guy is so good? Give me one good reason beyond 'because Batman is so badass in it'. And further more, why do people assume that more realistic automatically means you should make it more 'gritty' and 'dark'.
@Jesse Astle: The Dark Knight Returns is pretty good.
Between it and Miller's Year One, its pretty much responsible for the whole "dark and gritty" world of comics that you mention. It seems the norm now but when it came out it wasn't. It was also one of the first books to delve into the whole idea of batman as a necessary "evil".
The only reason I think your unimpressed now is that so much of what DKR did was incorporated into who and what the character is that you take it for granted now.
I think the general consensus now is that Miller has lost it. The stuff he used to put out doesn't even compare to what he puts out now. I don't think anyone talks about him in a favorable light anymore.
@tande04: The dumbest part of the Frank Miller Batman canon is simply how ludicrous he makes Batman when he's fighting. He's basically written as a proto-Wolverin, or that mentally disabled boxer from Sin City. So instead of a skilled, trained fighter you get a lumbring idiot who wanders forward into bullets, gets stabbed all the time, gets punched and kicked continuously, and breaks every bone he has.
I mean... Miller has Batman unable to even duck a single punch, for christ's sake.
@tande04: Possibly. But it's not like the anti-hero was anything new then either. Much of Kurosawa's heroes were anti establishment, not to mention Milton's Paradise Lost or even Odysseus from the Odyssey.
I got no problem with dark characters or even a more violent Batman. What I do have a problem with is shoddy story telling and one dimensional characters. I have the feeling that I would have liked the Dark Knight when I was fifteen. I would have loved the whole gloves made out of kryptonite thing.
But I think as one gets older your tastes evolve. You want good story telling, complex characters, and not just uber violence and big tits. I think it's a bit sad that the comic book industry, in general, hasn't evolved as well.
But I'm more than willing to change or modify my opinion if someone wants to try to change it.
I think it's pointless to hope it'll be as good as Dark Knight Returns or Batman Year One, so the only way I'm picking this up is if it's just as or even more terrible than ASBAR.
And by pick up I mean download illegally of course.
I loved DKR, but DK2 was absolute garbage. I am not all that excited about this. :|
The whole private army thing was stupid as were the silly Super Girls or whatever the fuck they were called. There were just so many things I don't understand why they went into that book because all it did was make it seem incoherent to me.
Of course Batman has a gun. Eventually, he's going to need to bust a Kryptonite cap in Superman's ass (or in the least, take him out like Lenny in Of Mice And Men).
@gods-n-clods: Doesn't he carry kryptonite all the time anyway? You don't need to shoot it into Superman to really damage him, it just needs to be near him.
@gods-n-clods: Actually there was a Batman one-off that Alex Ross wrote and, of course, illustrated where Superman gets mind controlled by Brainiac.
Batman chases him on a jetpack and pulls out a handgun loaded with a kryptonite bullet.
Bruce briefly mentions the vow he made when he started to never use a gun on someone, but says that he is more than willing to break it to keep the one he made to Clark when he handed him several stones of Kryptonite just for cases like this.
Batman manages to shoot Supes in the back and when he hits the ground he quickly removes the mind controll device and fishes out the bullet so that the wound can close up and Superman can recover.
I think Bats apologize but then Clark just tells them that he knew he made the right decision to give him the kryptonite and thanks him.
@IDesigner loves himself some car: The story is called "The Trust" and is actually bundled with the hardcover edition of a Alex Ross/DC comics anthology called "Mythology".
Kind of an expensive package... so maybe you should look into torrenting it just for that story.
I think it was Denny O'Neill (who,really, deserves the credit for "redefining" the character) who was the most adamant that he should never use guns. Miller I think actually had him use a gun in DKR.
I pray to all that is sacred and holy in this world that this is not the Holy Terror project Miller has been threatening for years.
Maybe they should switch roles, with Miller doing the art and Adams writing. That's the only way this project has any hope of being remotely acceptable.
Frank Miller + writing + Batman = FAIL
Actually, make that
Frank Miller + x = FAIL, where x can take on any value.
@Bill-Lee: We know, but that has long been written out of the mythos. Much like Superman's inability to fly, etc.
Reintroducing that in the context of this day and age without real contextual explanation of why it's happening really ruins the moment. It's exactly why All-Star Batman and Robin was so damn hilarious. If it had been written like that 30 years ago, it would've been edgy and cool. Now it's campy and silly.
@Rocketknight: Yes but I think the character makes more sense without a gun. The whole point of Batman is that he's conditioned himself to the point where he doesn't NEED a gun to fight crime.
Thank you, God, he said, remembering that no one really cares about stories where the hero never makes mistakes or behaves in a way that blogs would not approve.
09/22/09
So welcome to last year Frank Miller.
09/22/09
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Between it and Miller's Year One, its pretty much responsible for the whole "dark and gritty" world of comics that you mention. It seems the norm now but when it came out it wasn't. It was also one of the first books to delve into the whole idea of batman as a necessary "evil".
The only reason I think your unimpressed now is that so much of what DKR did was incorporated into who and what the character is that you take it for granted now.
I think the general consensus now is that Miller has lost it. The stuff he used to put out doesn't even compare to what he puts out now. I don't think anyone talks about him in a favorable light anymore.
09/21/09
09/22/09
I mean... Miller has Batman unable to even duck a single punch, for christ's sake.
09/22/09
I got no problem with dark characters or even a more violent Batman. What I do have a problem with is shoddy story telling and one dimensional characters. I have the feeling that I would have liked the Dark Knight when I was fifteen. I would have loved the whole gloves made out of kryptonite thing.
But I think as one gets older your tastes evolve. You want good story telling, complex characters, and not just uber violence and big tits. I think it's a bit sad that the comic book industry, in general, hasn't evolved as well.
But I'm more than willing to change or modify my opinion if someone wants to try to change it.
09/21/09
And by pick up I mean download illegally of course.
09/21/09
The whole private army thing was stupid as were the silly Super Girls or whatever the fuck they were called. There were just so many things I don't understand why they went into that book because all it did was make it seem incoherent to me.
09/21/09
09/21/09
09/21/09
09/21/09
09/21/09
Batman chases him on a jetpack and pulls out a handgun loaded with a kryptonite bullet.
Bruce briefly mentions the vow he made when he started to never use a gun on someone, but says that he is more than willing to break it to keep the one he made to Clark when he handed him several stones of Kryptonite just for cases like this.
Batman manages to shoot Supes in the back and when he hits the ground he quickly removes the mind controll device and fishes out the bullet so that the wound can close up and Superman can recover.
I think Bats apologize but then Clark just tells them that he knew he made the right decision to give him the kryptonite and thanks him.
09/21/09
09/21/09
Kind of an expensive package... so maybe you should look into torrenting it just for that story.
It wasn't that long either, just 10 pages or so.
09/21/09
I pray to all that is sacred and holy in this world that this is not the Holy Terror project Miller has been threatening for years.
09/21/09
09/21/09
Frank Miller + writing + Batman = FAIL
Actually, make that
Frank Miller + x = FAIL, where x can take on any value.
09/21/09
It seems like he took everything that was once good about himself and exaggerated it to such an extreme that its a parody of itself now.
Completely unrelated but that has to be the best stuff I've seen Adams put out in, well, ever.
09/21/09
Here's another image with an armed Batman.
09/21/09
Reintroducing that in the context of this day and age without real contextual explanation of why it's happening really ruins the moment. It's exactly why All-Star Batman and Robin was so damn hilarious. If it had been written like that 30 years ago, it would've been edgy and cool. Now it's campy and silly.
09/21/09
This is not the first time Batman has been depicted with a gun nor will it be the last.
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