Bruce Wayne’s date night with Anna Zeller (Is it a date? Maybe? Yes? No?) is interrupted by assassins trying to kill the good doctor. Can Bruce get them out of this without revealing his other identity? Batman #5 is written by Matt Fraction, drawn by Jorge Jimenez, colored by Tomeu Morey and lettered by Clayton Cowles with Jimenez.
Will Nevin: It’s a new year, and we’re back after an extended layoff. And we’ve got more Batman than we can throw a batarang at. Next week is a whole Absolute truckload. But this week is some good ol’ normal-sized Batman.
Matt Lazorwitz: We’re really at a point where there are loads of Bat titles again. I don’t know what we’ll be able to cover if we stick to the one-book-a-week format (which seems to be what is preferred), but I know I can’t wait to cover Greg Rucka’s triumphant return to Batwoman.
Will: Oh my goodness, I cannot wait for Rucka to be back on a monthly title. Rucka and Mark Waid putting out new books at DC. What is this, 2003?
A Night on the Town
Will: Let’s start with my favorite place to start: in the weeds. Do you make anything of the switch here from Lady Death Man to The Ojo as the name for the mysterious woman after the two people obviously not on a date in this issue?
Matt: Not really. I think that might have been a working name. The most I would take is that it’s a goofy sort of name, which is fine if you’re creating a one-off character, but maybe Fraction got to like the character and wanted to give them a better name because he intends to use her more, and that’s a goofy mouthful to keep using.
Will: It’s at least not a trademark issue, as neither “Lord Death Man” nor “Lady Death Man” popped up as active marks in a search of the U.S. trademark database. (FYI: Batman: The Audio Adventures is still a pending mark, at least when it comes to adaptations derived from the podcast. So maybe there’s a little hope that’s not completely dead.)
Matt: So, now that we’re out of the weeds, I really enjoyed this issue. It’s light on story, so to speak, but it was a showcase for what Jimenez can do, and it’s Bruce Wayne all throughout, even if he’s doing Batman-type stuff. I can’t tell you the last issue we saw where Batman appears in a featured role but isn’t in costume at all.
Will: And it’s an odd appearance for Bruce Wayne, innit? He’s not at all concerned with keeping kayfabe — this is a stunningly competent, even proficient defender. Maybe he drops the act because, you know, he doesn’t want the two of them to die? Seems like a good enough reason to stop pretending to be a spoiled fop for me. But I imagine explaining his proficiencies will be the least of his concerns given the reveal of the last page.
Matt: Yes, he definitely comes across as more competent than usual here, but he’s at least a little careful. He drives like a racecar driver, but he even says, in that offhand Bruce Wayne way, that he has won “awards” for his driving. He does hide Dr. Zeller when he whips out the real Batman fighting skills. It’s still way more skill than Bruce Wayne would normally show, though, but I think Fraction is trying to build a Bruce who isn’t quite as two-dimensional as many portrayals have been. And he might have gotten away with it, if it weren’t for that pesky teen.
Will: How about that for a different way to learn The Secret? That’ll absolutely mark Zeller down as one of two things from what we know from history: a soon-to-be corpse or a new ally. And given that hit squads are already after her, I’m not betting on ally.
Matt: I think there might be a third option in this case. This is someone who has a device that can rewrite minds. I think we might start as ally, and then by the end of the story, the device might overwrite her memories of Batman’s identity. How that happens, we’ll have to see. We still don’t have the answer to the question posed in issue #3, about exactly what she’s doing with that machine right now. If her motives wind up being more sinister, that might also change where this goes.
Will: Eternal Sunshine-ing is an option I didn’t account for, but I should have: Zeller wouldn’t be the first Bruce Wayne love interest to have her mind wiped, would she? She certainly seems like she’s on the side of the angels … at this point. Or it’s at least what we as readers have been led to believe. But I think you’re right in that this still has some room to grow and blossom.
Matt: It’s nice to see a Bruce Wayne love interest who is more than just a front at this point. Since “Hush,” the only major love interests we’ve seen other than Catwoman have been Jezebel Jet, who I think everyone was waiting to make a heel turn, and Julie Madison during the amnesiac Bruce phase, and you knew that had a limited shelf life. This feels like a character who has potential to be something to the mythos, like a Vicki Vale; a character who can do things in the world around Batman, but still have a life outside Batman’s orbit. I admit, I would have liked her not to learn The Secret quite as early, as that blurs the line between Batman and Bruce, but to have someone who knows and doesn’t want to be part of Batman’s world, or that Bruce wants to keep in Bruce’s, might be interesting. We haven’t seen any indication one way or the other yet, but I’m just spitballing ideas.
Will: I want to circle back to some of your first comments about this issue to agree with them completely lest anyone get confused. First, this is an absolute playground for Jimenez with some great action scenes. And, second, we don’t have a lot of narrative development here aside from the little oopsie we’ve already talked about. What do you make of Fraction giving a whole issue to what amounts to a chase?
Matt: I think Fraction is a writer who knows how to work with an artist. You look at his FF, where he was working with Mike and Laura Allred, and he gave him lots of weird vistas and quirky character beats to draw, which is very Allred. Here, he’s working with Jorge Jimenez, one of the masters of superhero action. So he’s giving him action. He did do some character development for Zeller, got to have fun with Bruce and introduced a new villain. I’m curious to see if the next issue or another one soon will be more quiet and character-centric. I think there’s a place for issues like this; superheroes are an action genre. And the action here remains pretty grounded; it’s martial arts and driving. It very much fits what he’s been doing with the book in general.
Will: It’s a balance, right? I think you can have more contemplative issues and more action-focused stories, and I didn’t think this was out of place with the first four from Fraction. But it’s interesting how he put down so many of the balls he’s been juggling to this point. Although I don’t really remember Zeller being mentioned in the last issue. Seems difficult as fuck to write a monthly title with a whole bunch of subplots, Matt. Glad it’s not me who has to do all the hard work.
Matt: I know, right? And I really dug the visuals/power set on The Ojo, by the way. Adding new characters to the mythos is always tricky, because there are so many already, and if 1 in 10 sticks, it’s a good thing. But we have three, between Zeller, Ojo and Minotaur that I think have potential to stick around, and that’s because none of them are trying to be flavor of the week and are just working into the story as needed. It’s nice to see, isn’t it?
Will: God save me from the Punchline/Ghost-Maker/Clownhunter/Gardener era of character creation. (Although to be fair, I do kinda like Clownhunter. Fun design. Great motivation.)
Matt: Yup, you knew exactly what I was thinking about there.
I’m looking forward to seeing how this issue fits into all the threads we’ve seen laid out so far. This definitely remains one of the high points of DC’s line right now.
Bat-miscellany
- The BatChat podcast reads three stories featuring one of DC’s odder superheroes: the Steve Ditko created wildman, The Creeper.
Buy Batman #5 here. (Disclaimer: As an Amazon Associate, ComicsXF may earn from qualifying purchases.)
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.
