A Gloomy Bruce, a Glowing Gotham in Future State: Dark Detective

Welcome back to Bat Chat with Matt (and Will!). In the police state of Gotham City, Bruce Wayne is dead. Or so the Magistrate thinks. With nothing but the tattered costume on his back, Batman must fight to save his city. Elsewhere, Grifter plays some cards and breaks some heads. We see these two new tales of Gotham in Future State: Dark Detective #1, featuring:

Dark Detective, written by Mariko Tamaki, drawn by Dan Mora, colored by Jordie Bellaire and lettered by Aditya Bidikar

Grifters, written by Matthew Rosenberg, drawn by Carmine Di Giandomenico, colored by Antonio Fabelo and lettered by AndWorld Design

Matt Lazorwitz: Well, Will, you said you wanted a Batman who had to struggle, and boy howdy, is Bruce in a hard way in this issue.

Will Nevin: The particulars escape me at the moment, but there’s a story in the last Legends of the Dark Knight run where they let a British guy come in and write OUR American hero — the general idea was that we had a super tech Batman with missiles and flying machines and all sorts of fun stuff, relying on it more and more until he can’t afford it anymore and has to relearn how to be Batman. I remember that it was a British writer because Batman says specifically that he’s without his “kit,” meaning a uniform, a term typically associated with soccer. Learn English, damn you. But, yes, Batman is without his kit here, and that’s my Bat jam.

Also, Bruce Wayne is dead. That seems problematic, too.

Dark Detective

ML: So the incoming creative team on Detective Comics gets off to a pretty strong start with this issue for me. We don’t have the problem we had with Next Batman, where there’s so much going on and so many different plots. This is Bruce Wayne, front and center, having to deal with the fact that he is “dead” in both his identities.

WN: Everything about this clicked for me: I liked the clean, futuristic Gotham, the sharp lettering, Tamaki’s dialogue and story — it all worked. And like you said last time, “Future State” Gotham under the Magistrate is starting to make sense, and you can see how maybe Next Batman and Dark Detective could plausibly coexist in the same space — even though I think Dark Detective should have come first given the messiness you laid out.

ML: This does seem to be the book that is laying out a lot of the groundwork for what this Gotham is. The mixture of dark, grimy alleys out of an ’80s crime movie and flatscreens everywhere from a sci-fi near future works to make this Gotham feel like something we haven’t seen before, but is close to what we’re used to. It’s a counterpoint to that timeless Batman: The Animated Series feel that exists in a nebulous past; this exists in a nebulous future.

WN: That too was a nice contrast to Next Batman in that Gotham felt different and changed. I dunno, Matt, but it sure seems like John Ridley’s book was never meant to be part of “Future State” and is just some repurposed content. Looking at the solicit for his hardcover collection, it really feels like DC wanted to give him a signature, top-shelf Batman run but have since scaled back to a bunch of little odds ’n’ ends like Next Batman and digital-first stuff.

ML: That’s … an interesting thought. Especially since that book was rumored to exist long before “Future State” was, I wonder if the Jace Fox Batman was worked into the overall world of “Future State.” I hadn’t thought of it, but I can see it. I still think there’s potential there, especially under Ridley’s pen, but this was definitely the stronger introductory issue.

And as much as Nick Derington is a stellar artist, and his art on Next Batman was great as usual, Dan Mora kicked this issue out of the park. His art evokes that current Capullo-inspired Bat house style, but has strong storytelling and design of his own. I’ve loved his work on Once & Future over at BOOM, and he’s definitely been due a big break, and I think this is it.

WN: Goshamighty, I think out of all the new teams carrying over from “Future State” to the relaunch in March, I might be most excited for Tamaki and Mora. It’s fresh and cool and, most importantly, different, setting up a nice contrast with Batman when everything gets back to normal.

ML: Now, onto a bit of speculation: Who do we think is Peacekeeper-One? It’s someone who knows Batman’s identity. My money is on Lucius Fox being behind the Magistrate, but he’s not in the armor. If that is the case, is Peacekeeper-One important, or is it the man behind the curtain who is the big reveal?

WN: Ooooh, I like that idea, especially as a contrast to Lucius’ previous role as the man behind the Bat. It makes sense, too, given that some break or tragedy with Lucius is referenced, but he doesn’t seem to be dead. Generally, I think we’re looking at three categories for the possible identity of PK-1: someone from the Batfamily, someone from the Fox family or someone from GCPD. And I have no real reason to say this other than to be a bit contrarian, but I’m going to go with the last category and offer Renee Montoya as a big surprise that doesn’t make any sense and one guess I’m already regretting as I’m typing. How about Ghost-Maker? That seems even worse.

ML: Please God no.

Grifters

ML: My knowledge of Grifter is pretty limited, basically just the Ed Brubaker/Colin Wilson miniseries Point Blank and a handful of random appearances, so please, people more familiar with him correct me on this, but this is way more of a … Han Solo attitude than I’m used to with this character. I mean, dude was created to be the Gambit analogue on the WildC.A.T.S., but this is over the top. Not necessarily in a bad way, but I was shocked by the joke-a-minute thing here.

WN: Oh lord, if you don’t have the background on a character, we’re in trouble. The two things I can initially say here is (1) I’m glad this got looped in to Grifter’s appearance in Batman at the start of what we can both agree was the cursed Ghost-Maker arc and (2) this had a real buddy cop/action comedy vibe I enjoyed. Even as Luke Fox came off … kinda pathetically.

ML: Yes, this was a nice counterpoint to the much more subdued and darker narration of the other story in this comic. I am a little perplexed by how the usually hypercompetent Luke Fox does indeed come off as a bit of a goof, but I’m wondering if that whole thing is a setup. Is that really Luke, or some kind of double the Magistrate put in there to get Grifter to lead the peacekeepers to someone they want more? That also might explain how Luke is walking around free in Next Batman.

WN: I think my favorite thing here — especially since I’m tabula rasa in regard to Grifter — is the light and breezy tone. I mean, this thing just zips along. I haven’t read much Rosenberg — 4 Kids Walk Into a Bank was one book I at least remember starting, and I think I read parts of his Punisher — but do you think we’re getting his best stuff here?

ML: If not his best, it’s high up there as some of my favorite. I likes 4 Kids Walk Into a Bank a lot, and while his Uncanny X-Men work wasn’t bad, it was unremittingly dark; it was basically a suicide run where two-thirds of the team dies over the course of half a dozen issues. I compared Grifter to Han Solo at the beginning of this, and it absolutely works. Rosenberg captures that snarky, try-to-talk-my-way-out-of-this attitude, something we don’t see often in Gotham. Sure, Dick Grayson is quippy, but he’s not got the same roguish thing Grifter is doing here.

WN: I imagine that, what, all of our colleagues have an opinion on that Uncanny X-Men book?

ML: Oh, I have no doubt.

WN: I know everyone has a line when it comes to characterization and tone — you said Grifter was more Solo-ish than expected; I don’t remember any spots where he got irritating (say like the worst bits of Deadpool where he’s only a meta clown without any heft, an idea we’ve talked about before), but that line is going to get crossed for some reader somewhere.

ML: I think there are definitely Batman readers who don’t want any kind of humor in their Batbooks, and they will definitely find the snark and the buddy cop stuff not to their liking. But I agree, Grifter never becomes grating in his portrayal here.

WN: I like my Batman dour. My book would probably be Dour Detective, since I don’t think most Bat runs have enough of either. But that’s also the magic of these backup stories: I can get the Bat I want and enjoy whatever else DC is serving up.

ML: And this is only Rosenberg’s second credit at DC in his career, so even though he’s an established creator, it’s a good place to start him.

What did you think about Carmine Di Giandomenico’s art on this story?

WN: Nothing about it really stuck out to me, which is not to say it wasn’t fine; For something like this in the action/comedy genre, lemme just read and enjoy the thing without something to jar me out of that space.

ML: Yup, I think the style worked for the story. All in all, this whole issue was one of the more solid all-around books I’ve read from “Future State.”

WN: And, again, this got me *pumped* for the new Detective Comics run.

Bat-miscellany

I kinda want that Magistrate deck of “most wanted masks” cards.
Fun wartime cards fact: The most famous deck of cards produced for war is probably the most wanted Iraqis set produced during the 2003 U.S. invasion. However, one U.S. Army archeologist also put together three sets highlighting the cultural treasures of Egypt, Iraq and Afghanistan with information on how to protect the property.

Matthew Lazorwitz

Matt Lazorwitz read his first comic at the age of five. It was Who's Who in the DC Universe #2, featuring characters whose names begin with B, which explains so much about his Batman obsession. He writes about comics he loves, and co-hosts the creator interview podcast WMQ&A with Dan Grote.