Batman has begun to connect the dots on the new broker of crime, the Minotaur. But before he can deal with him, he must go into the city and remind Gotham that, regardless of what Vandal Savage might say, it is still Batman’s city. Batman #10 is written by Matt Fraction, drawn by Jorge Jimenez, colored by Tomeu Morey and lettered by Clayton Cowles.
Will Nevin: Reasonable people can disagree as to the worth of both Bleeding Cool and Rich Johnston, but you gotta give it up for the headline “DC Press Release Reminds Fans Batman: Gargoyle Of Gotham Finale Is Out.”
Matt Lazorwitz: OK, that absolutely made me laugh out loud. And it’s true. We talked about this on the pod, or will based on when you’re reading this, but it’s been a year and a half since the last issue.
Will: That seems ungood. But there’s something to be said for getting the thing out, right? Still waiting on the back half of Widening Gyre, Kevin Smith!
Bat Signal 2.0 is live
Matt: I don’t think there’s been an issue of Fraction’s Batman where there wasn’t a lot to talk about, but this issue has a couple things I really want to call out up front, and one leads into the other pretty handily, I think.
Will: It was a different sort of issue, wasn’t it? What’s on your mind, old chum?
Matt: First is that Fraction has never shied away from topicality, but has Vandal Savage ever been more Trumpian? The interviews where each time he talks about the number of Batman equipment caches destroyed, it goes up, and how he is snide with the press about it? That could be talking about any number of things in any news cycle and it would seem absolutely real.
Will: Throw in a panel of Savage wilting at the smallest pushback, and, boy, you’d have the political moment nailed. As it is, it certainly speaks to the unmoored-to-the-facts nature of the current regime in Washington. And maybe that’s one of the reasons I’ve hated the idea since the beginning? Sitting here, trying to interrogate myself and wondering why I’ve been so opposed to this as a storyline, and maybe it’s as simple as, “Don’t do Hydra Cap after the 2016 election.”
Matt: And my second point has to do with the reaction to all this in the comic. Batman comics have their share of emotional moments, absolutely. So many of them, though, tend toward the darker side of things, about the trauma and loss that is central to Batman. But in a time where it’s hard to look at the world outside your window and feel hopeful, the final five pages of this issue made my heart feel a little lighter, the way good fiction can. “Look for the light,” with Batman standing there against the Bat Signal of his own creation, telling the fascists that he’s here, that good is here, and he’s not going anywhere? Damn, but that felt good. And the amount of narration Fraction gave Barbara Gordon, the looks on the members of the family, the rage in Savage’s body language as Batman blacks out the GCPD? It is all just lovely and just the right notes.
Will: That ending? It soared. I loved it. And the bit where Savage remarked that Jim Gordon was a “brave man” for showing up to work. You know what? He’s right. Daughter in prison, whole world going to hell and Officer Gordon still clocks in. We’ve talked about how much is going on in this book — this issue specifically tries to check in on so many different things and update them — but one of the real bummers is that we haven’t gotten more of Gordon on a beat and what his reality is like. How do the other officers treat him? His supervisors? What does he hope he can accomplish at this point in his life (other than sticking around until the status quo ultimately reverts to something more normal)? Those are things I’d like to see explored, but I know there’s only so much we can do here.
Matt: Fraction did a good job of bringing in elements from other plots (the Minotaur, Dr. Zeller, Wayne Enterprises) while still letting this issue be about Batman and Savage. It’s like the best of ’80s and ’90s Batman comics, where there were long-term subplots. Hell, that one page of Bruce and Selina, looking across the rooftops at each other, the silence between them said more than any words could have, and that also absolutely belongs to Jorge Jimenez continuing to kill it on this book.
Will: Is that the closest Fraction has come to acknowledging “H2SH” — at least as we’ve come to understand it? Given the last page of that interminable story, I think Selina might reasonably be expected to have some frostiness toward Bruce.
Matt: Possibly to probably. It also might be a reference to what is going on over in her book, where Selina is very much back to being a criminal, even if it’s for decent reasons, but Bruce and Selina will always be messy, and that’s part of what makes their relationship interesting.
Oh, and apropos of not much, there’s a fun Batman and Officer Gordon scene in last month’s Justice League Unlimited #19. Just something that tied what’s happening in Batman with what’s happening in JLU, and Dan Mora draws a great Gordon, which is not surprising, because he’s Dan Mora.
Will: “Sun rises in the East. More on this developing story at 11.” Mora’s work is awesome. The Bat books as a whole are really featuring some of the best artists working today.
Matt: Back to this issue, I love that we get Bruce Wayne scenes regularly. And I love the balance Fraction strikes between Bruce the playboy and Bruce the man of business. Combining his resolute stance against getting involved in military projects with the snarky, “Champagne, Blake. I drink champagne.” Not many writers have tried, let alone succeeded, in making Bruce more than a foppish mask for Batman in a long time. But Fraction seems to be succeeding. I say seems only because we’re only 10 issues in. I need to give it a bit more time to be sure it settles out.
Will: And we haven’t even mentioned how Dr. WhatsHerFace is apparently scrapping her project, which means Joker will have to vacate his bacta tank. That could well be A Problem. And Hugo Strange? He seems to be on the deader side of things. Again, so much going on right now.
Matt: Hugo Strange being dead? Must be Wednesday. Although he does seem quite dead here, yes. I wonder what has made Zeller give up her project. She seemed pretty happy about it last time we checked in with her. But you can only be around Joker for so long before he starts to affect you, huh?
Will: Getting chased through the streets of Gotham by men intent on killing you has a way of changing your perspectives as well. As you just mentioned, we’re 10 issues in — let’s say Fraction wakes up tomorrow and decides he wants to go run and play on a farm upstate. How many more issues do you think it would take to reasonably wrap everything up? And that is, of course, without introducing anything else.
Matt: Oof, that’s a good question. Minimum is probably five. One for Joker, two for Savage, two for Minotaur. And I say only one for Joker because that’s the plot with the least we know about. It’s got fewer moving parts at least on the surface, but there could be way more going on than at first glance because it’s a Joker plot, and there’s always more than meets the eye there.
Will: I’m going to guess that he won’t be a laughing fish when he gets out of the water.
Bat-miscellany
- This week, the BatChat podcast looks at Scott Snyder’s New 52 Joker event, “Death of the Family,” and two of the tie-in arcs from other Bat series.
Buy Batman #10 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.
