As someone who bailed a few issues into Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo’s Batman: The Court of Owls story arc in the monthly Batman comic book which spanned the bulk of the first year of the New 52, I found that I really enjoyed the crossover follow-on story as compiled in the late February hardcover release, Batman: Night of the Owls
It’s the first crossover of the New 52. Batman: Night of the Owls
AMC Theaters’ newest marathon event is tonight, the Dark Knight Trilogy Marathon, and with more than 60,000 advance ticket sales it has already become the biggest selling marathon movie event to date. Starting at 6 p.m. and culminating with the premiere of The Dark Knight Rises at midnight, tonight is sure to be a big night for Batman fans.
Until then, for your viewing pleasure and to get you psyched for Batman night, here is a gallery of all of the Batman cars–the Batmobiles–that have appeared on-screen, from the TV series in the 1960s to today’s bulky offroad vehicle, featured on the lawn between the Hilton Bayfront Hotel and the San Diego Convention Center last weekend as part of the Comic-Con festivities. The photos I took this weekend don’t do justice to these big, sleek, bad Bat-cars.
First off, above is the original 1955 modified Lincoln that became the Batmobile driven by Adam West in the original Batman TV series.
My favorite of them all and the best looking in person–Michael Keaton’s Batmobile from the 1989 Batman and Batman Returns movies.
Val Kilmer’s Batmobile from Batman Forever.
George Cooney’s Batmobile from Batman and Robin.
Christian Bale’s Batmobile “The Tumbler” from Batman Begins and The Dark Knight.
Christian Bale’s Batmobile from the new film The Dark Knight Rises.
Christian Bale’s Batcycle from the new film The Dark Knight Rises, on display in the Comic-Con exhibit hall at the Warner Brothers booth. The cycle is a separating feature of the Tumbler.
Details for tonight’s movie event across the country:
C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com
Review by C.J. Bunce
If we didn’t have Batman #1 and Detective Comics #1, there would be a fair amount to rave about with Batman: Dark Knight #1, another DC Comics “New 52” title, written by Paul Jenkins with pencils by David Finch (interestingly the artist on this book has top cover billing over the writer, which I don’t recall seeing before).
First of all, the art is great and the Batman narration is as good as the other two main Bat-titles. Note: I won’t be buying or reviewing a fourth title, Batman and Robin, since Frank Miller’s All-Star Batman and Robin series may have forever scarred me and averted me from a title focused only on that duo.
Here, Batman is again on his way to foil a breakout at Arkham Asylum. But wait a second, isn’t that the plot of Batman #1? Didn’t these writers coordinate that kind of glaring oddity? It could have been useful and interesting had they shown two sides of the same event, but the writer shows us no indication here of that happening.
A new twist is an internal affairs detective who is pretty savvy to Bruce Wayne’s support of Batman, including getting too close for comfort to a likely background relationship between Bruce and Commissioner Gordon.
Despite some nice splash pages, good inks by Richard Friend and good color work by Alex Sinclair, this issue does not offer anything not available in another title. It begs the question: Why not just give readers a weekly Batman comic that fuses 2-4 of these series together? Soon we will be seeing more story elements tripping over each other, such as the fact that a presumably new “love interest” is introduced here (Jai Hudson) and yet we see Batman “linked up” with Catwoman Selina Kyle in the Catwoman series. Continuity is just lost out the window.
If you have to pick just one Batman title to go forward with, you’ll be hard pressed to keep this as your keeper of the bunch. For me, Batman is the series I plan to follow going forward. Keep in mind that Batman is the busiest guy in the DCU right now, also appearing in Justice League, Catwoman, Batwoman. Not to mention other Bat-zines like Batwing and cameos in every other book. Can you have too much of a good thing? I think we’re going to find out.
Here is some nice pencil work by Finch:
Ultimately Dark Knight may be one of the victims of trying something as ambitious as releasing 52 new series at once. It makes you wonder if the writers and artists realize how much they really are competing against each other for consumers’ dollars. It is unfortunate because even having a nice piece of work such as this result may not keep you in the running when you’re in the leagues with other equally good creators.
