In Detective Comics #1,064, the Orgham family faces Talia’s assassins and makes a real estate purchase, Two-Face shows where he stands and Batman is saved by an old friend. The lead story is written by Ram V, drawn by Rafael Albuquerque, colored by Dave Stewart and lettered by Ariana Maher. In the backup, we get deeper into the mind of Harvey Dent as his personalities are in conflict, both with each other and an alien force lurking within. Written by Si Spurrier, drawn by Hayden Sherman, colored by Mick Filardi and lettered by Steve Wands.
What turned mild-mannered, if a bit disturbed, Edward Nashton into the brutal serial killer called the Riddler in the world of the film The Batman? See the beginning of his journey in Riddler: Year One #1, written by Paul Dano, drawn and colored by Stevan Subic and lettered by Clayton Cowles.
A classic Bat rogue officially joins the universe of the Audio Adventures in Batman: The Audio Adventures #2, written by Dennis McNicholas, penciled by Anthony Marques, inked by J. Bone, colored by Dave Stewart and lettered by Ferran Delgado.
Matt Lazorwitz: We’re back after two weeks, and I apologize to everyone for that. My comic shop had some shipping issues, and so I wound up not getting any DC books for those two weeks. This week I got all three weeks, and so I am back and ready to do some serious writing.
Will Nevin: I’d say I missed us, but we still did the ol’ pod in that interminable interlude. May it never happen again!
’Tec
Matt: Before we get into the story here, I think we’ve said this before, but this book is an artistic delight. Between Evan Cagle’s gorgeous painted cover, Rafael Albuquerque’s blend of character and action in the main story and Hayden Sherman’s weird and detailed vistas within the mind of Harvey Dent? This might just be the best looking Bat book, if not comic in general, on the stands right now.
Will: And the amazing thing is that we’ve read issues of ’Tec that were visually terrible! (Usually with fill-in artists, but whatever.) This is a great looking thing, but I’m still warming up to the story. To me, it reads like a prelude to a Dark Knight Returns-esque Batman, one who is getting too old to do the job but is still hanging on for some reason. To that end, I’d like Barbatos to be a bit more allegorical here, maybe tempting Bruce to do something to hold on to the mantle while violating everything it stands for.
Matt: We could be going that way, or we could be heading for a phoenix rising from the ashes moment. This could be Bruce who needs to find something to cling to again, to revitalize his feelings about The Mission.
What fascinates me is how this and Batman are two such completely different comics. Batman is widescreen superheroes. It’s big, it’s loud, and while there are emotional beats, it’s all pretty simple; it might not always be my cup of tea, but it is well done in that respect. Here, everything is in the nuance. There are multiple plots running, all of which are tied together. Everything and everyone has an agenda, and we have masterminds behind masterminds. And while Batman features the entire Bat family, here we have just Jim Gordon. And you know how much I love Batman and Gordon working together.
Will: And we got one of our favorite Gordon story beats: the idea that he knows who’s under the cowl but he’s keeping up the illusion. The man’s a detective. Of course he knows.
Matt: I loved that!
The Orgham family is an absolutely fascinating antagonist to me. They seem to be incalculably rich, based on the scene where they buy Arkham Asylum back, possibly my favorite non-Gordon scene, and they have a werewolf as their hitter. If you’ve listened to WMQ&A at all, you know I love werewolves, so getting a new Bat rogue who is a werewolf? Sign me up.
Will: Batman would never believe in werewolves. Until he had to fight one.
Matt: This issue also performs a neat bit of continuity cleanup. I had thought Talia was no longer in charge of the League of Assassins after the events of “Shadow War,” and we saw Angel Breaker running it over in Harley Quinn, so I thought this was a continuity error, but no, this is a faction of al Ghul loyalists who broke away from the LoA. That makes a lot of sense, and it even includes Ubu! I missed Ra’s bodyguard, and it’s good to see him back.
Will: “Angel Breaker.” Ugh. Who the hell is in charge of naming things these days? And as far as Ra’s bodyguard goes, he’s got something to atone for, doesn’t he?
Matt: Poor Ubu. He done fucked up.
And after three issues of great Jim Gordon backups, we get an equally interesting Two-Face backup. I like that these backups are serving the main plot, fleshing out aspects and giving us insight into characters who are smaller parts of that plot.
Will: Fuck me was that backup ever good. Sherman needs more Big Two work because I’ve never disliked anything they’ve ever done. Two-Face pushing back against the Orgham family’s programming, accusing Harvey of impersonating him? Great shit. Give me this — stuff integral to the story that also fleshes out more of the universe — over some Punchline drivel any day.
Riddler
Matt: I am going to start out with something that might sound like damning with faint praise, but it is something I want to call out. This comic is not overwritten. When I saw Paul Dano, the actor who played Riddler in The Batman, was writing a comic, I expected what we usually get from a first-time comics writer, especially one whose only writing credit outside of comics is a shared screenplay credit: a novel on the comics page. But this is briskly written and paced, and I am pretty impressed with the fact this wasn’t dragged down by too many captions.
Will: Brother Matt, I’m going to do you one better and say that this is a Good Comic(™) regardless of who wrote it, and it being the product of a Hollywood interloper makes it all the more incredible. I don’t know whether Dano got some type of assistance (ghost written, perhaps?) or if he leaned on Subic, but he’s goddamned good at this right out of the Arkham gate. I mean, shit, how much better is this than Riddler: One Bad Day? The series could go into the tank from here, and it’s already more readable and true to the character. I am impressed as fuck with this.
Matt: When you first suggested we cover this book, I was nervous because I was expecting at best a grimdark mess, and at worst something incomprehensible, but I agree. This is Good Comics(™). This gives us a better feel for why Eddie became the guy he is. He’s a put-upon loner who lives alone, has a truly shitty boss and feels like the world is crushing him. I don’t think anyone living in the year of our lord 2022 can’t feel kinship in at least one of those three things.
Will: I’d love to know more about how this came together. Is this Dano’s own backstory for how/why he played the character the way he did? Was this taken from Matt Reeves’ notes on how the Riddler was born? Regardless of the answers, you’re right in that we get a sympathetic Eddie … at least at first. He sees crime. He sees injustice. And like so many other people in Gotham, he becomes infatuated with a symbol that’s arisen to fight those things. When Eddie breaks — as of course he will — to the extent that Batman can be rightly blamed for it will be an interesting turn in the story. But we’ll get there. For now, it’s enough to tell anyone that this is a worthy entry in The Batman canon.
Matt: Not only does he see it, but he is part of it. His shitty boss has been taking credit for his work at the accounting firm he works in (I think it’s accounting), and when he finds an irregularity, that boss is more than willing to turn a blind eye when he’s told to back off. But it seems Eddie isn’t. That is often the origin of a superhero, not a villain. But Eddie is damaged enough that we know he is going to go the other way. Crime is endemic in Gotham, and as we get to the last page of the issue, and see how deep his firm is with the mob, he is starting to realize it’s not just a city crumbling, but a city being ground to dust.
Will: It’s easy to see how this character can and will turn against Batman and more toward nihilism and anarchy — if he doesn’t matter, then nothing matters. Here’s a fun thought experiment for you: Would you rather have this series continue (which it will, obviously) or have it stop right here as this perfect little glimpse of what Edward Nashton once was? I will eagerly await the next issue, sure, but that second option is a tantalizing one.
Audio
Matt: Ra’s al Ghul was one of my big suspects for the mysterious mastermind behind the chemical company conspiracy introduced at the end of season 1 of the podcast Audio Adventures, but as no casting was announced, I moved on to thinking it was Scarecrow. But introducing the character here makes me feel like I might have been right the first time.
Will: Are you ever wrong? That’s probably a rhetorical question, but, yeah, I like the developments here and the tone this series (universe?) continues to straddle — more serious than B:TAS and the all-ages books but still more playful than most of your main line stuff.
Matt: This might be the first comic to have a delusional Killer Croc fighting hallucination candy people, and I am here for that. But then we cut from the comedic to the more serious, as we see what he’s doing to the real people he’s put those hallucinations on top of. That juxtaposition is this series in microcosm. And I love it.
Will: Matt, this is how you get man-eating monsters in the sewers. Do you want man-eating monsters in the sewers? We both like our Crocs a bit more on the human side, but if he’s going to be more of an unstoppable brute animal, make him a delusional one. What a fun turn.
Matt: Yes. I think this sort of monster Croc works for the world of the podcast, and add in the effects of Joker love toxin, and he’s pretty great.
Meanwhile, we have a demon cult that is searching for a sword to kill Ra’s al Ghul once and for all. Their demon design is a bit simian-like to me. Did you get a Brotherhood of the Monkey’s Fist vibe off these guys?
Will: There was a smidge of that, for sure. I just loved the bit where they’re like, “Oh, yeah, when we said we aim to serve the demon, we’re talking about cutting off his head and putting it on a plate.”
Matt: Great bit! And we also get another bridge between seasons 1 and 2 with us finding out that the wooly mammoth that Penguin bought, and was a pretty big plot point in season 1, was stolen by our season 2 big bad, Scarecrow. And again, we have a Penguin who is straddling the monster line a little. He’s mostly traditional Penguin, but his teeth are on the monstery side. And again, it works for this world.
Will: Here’s a basic question for you: Where does the series fall in relation to the series? Is this all going to be one interlude that takes place before season 2 — establishing a status quo in the process — or does it run alongside it at some points?
Matt: I am not sure. Season 2 picks up a couple weeks after the Season 1 finale, so there is room for it to all fit in between. We don’t have hard dates here, like we did in Season 1 or the premiere of Season 2 (which I just listened to and it continues to rock hard), so we’ll have to see, but nothing there indicates this is running contemporary to the new season.
Bat-miscellany
- This week on the BatChat podcast, it’s the runup to Halloween, so it’s time to talk about the Legends of the Dark Knight Halloween Specials.
- In doing a little research, it turns out Paul Dano is the grandson-in-law of film and stage director Elia Kazan, a figure we have maligned on more than one occasion on the podcast, since he named names to HUAC.
- Fuck him for naming names, but still see A Face in the Crowd. — Will
- The cover to Audio Adventures # 2 homages the legendary Wolverine panel from Uncanny X-Men #132, and it looks great.
- Enjoying Audio Adventures? You should check out the WMQ&A NYCC special, where Dan Grote talks to series artist Anthony Marques.
Matt Lazorwitz read his first comic at the age of 5. 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 podcasts BatChat with Matt & Will and The ComicsXF Interview Podcast.
Will Nevin loves bourbon and AP style and gets paid to teach one of those things. He is on Twitter far too often.
