Darren

Batman/Planetary: Night on Earth (Review)

Posted on July 23, 2012 by Darren

To celebrate the release of The Dark Knight Rises, July is “Batman month” here at the m0vie blog. Check back daily for comics, movies and television reviews and discussion of the Caped Crusader.

Warren Ellis gets Batman. He gets all of Batman. he gets the Caped Crusader, the Dark Knight, the Knight of Vengeance, the Bat-Man and more. He understands that the various pop culture iterations of the character, from Bob Kane’s gun-totting vigilante to Adam West’s “peace officer” to Frank Miller’s one-man army, are all just different facets of the same idea, reflected differently in various takes on the character. It’s hard to reconcile all of these different interpretations – in fact, I’d argue that Grant Morrison’s Batman run suffered for making the attempt – but Ellis does it with remarkable style, without every seeming like he’s cramming too much in or leaving too much out.

I am Batman. All of them.

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Absolute Planetary, batman, batman: arkham city, comic books, dark knight returns, dc comics, dc universe, dick grayson, Frank Miller (comics), New York City, Planetary, planetary/batman, planetary/batman: night on earth, warren ellis | Leave a comment »

Final Crisis: Revelations (Review)

Posted on July 23, 2012 by Darren

I have to admit, I’ve always preferred DC’s approach to big comic events, as opposed to the approach at Marvel. While Marvel’s events (like Civil War or Secret Invasion) seem to exist to encroach on a writer’s comic book run (Ed Brubaker’s Captain America or Matt Fraction’s Iron Man), DC’s events tend to allow writers to tidy up loose ends. Or, to be fair, that’s what Final Crisis appeared to do. The major tie-in miniseries didn’t seem to exist to fill in gaps with the main book. Instead, they allowed the writers to resolve or move forward their own plots. For Geoff Johns, Rogues’ Revenge allowed him to segue between his first Flash run and Flash: Rebirth, while Legion of Three Worlds allowed him to sort out some outstanding Legion of Superheroes continuity.

Revelations exists to serve as a coda to Greg Rucka’s superb Gotham Central and his Question series, as well as tying in a bit to his upcoming Batwoman work. While I’m not the biggest fan of “comic book events” in general terms, I do respect that they allow writers to tell stories they might not otherwise get a chance to.

Shine a light…

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Apokolips, batman, Crispus Allen, Dark Knight Rises, dc universe, final crisis, god, gotham central, Gotham City Police Department, greg rucka, new gods, Renee Montoya, spectre, Vandal Savage | Leave a comment »

Catwoman: When in Rome (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on July 20, 2012 by Darren

Catwoman: When in Rome technically exists to fill in the gaps in Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale’s The Long Halloween and Dark Victory, particularly in accounting for Catwoman’s absence during the early part of Dark Victory. However, it also exists as something of a “bridge”, connecting Loeb’s earlier Batman trilogy with Sale and his later work on Hush with Jim Lee. It’s an interesting exploration of an early phase of Catwoman’s costumed career, building off her origin in Batman: Year One and seeing the character attempt to move out of Batman’s shadow. While it’s hardly going to be remembered for developing a truly independent version of the character, it does make for an interesting read, and a fascinating companion piece to the rest of Jeph Loeb’s Batman work.

Go fish…

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: batman, Bruce, catwoman, Catwoman: When in Rome, Christopher Nolan, Dark Knight Rises, godfather, jeph loeb, joker, riddler, rome, Selina | Leave a comment »

Batman: The Animated Series – Two-Face, Parts I & II (Review)

Posted on July 20, 2012 by Darren

Two-Face is probably the most tragic of Batman’s foes. Appropriately enough, there are really two reasons why the character works so well as a Batman villain. The first is that he’s a perfect reflection for Bruce: he is one man with a dual identity; one half upstanding pretty boy citizen, the other a monster. The other is an element touched on here: he’s a friend who Bruce failed in a pretty profound way, a character who underwent a massive tragedy, and whose every subsequent appearance is a grim reminder of that failure. Interestingly enough, I think it’s fair to argue that Two-Face has often had difficulty matching the potential he offers as a Batman villain. While I think that the Two-Face episode of Batman: The Animated Series does an effective job encapsulating a lot what makes the character great, it also misses a vital element as well.

Face-Two-Face…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: batman, Bruce, Christopher Nolan, dark knight, dark knight returns, Dark Knight Rises, Dent, gotham central, Harvey, joker, Scott Snyder, two face | 8 Comments »

Batman: The Animated Series – Feat of Clay, Parts I & II (Review)

Posted on July 19, 2012 by Darren

One thing that always impressed me about Batman: The Animated Series was the way that it didn’t just restrict itself to the truly iconic members of Batman’s impressive pool of villains. Batman’s first-stringers are all iconic and brilliant characters in their own right. It would be easy enough to build a television how around characters like the Joker, Two-Face, the Penguin, Catwoman, Ra’s Al Ghul, the Scarecrow, Poison and the Riddler. However, the show didn’t do that. It didn’t restrict its airtime to those major-league bad guys. In fact, many second-tier villains actually received more compelling origins and development. Heart of Ice is regarded as one the show’s best episodes, despite featuring an almost forgotten nobody villain by the name of Mr. Freeze. So it shouldn’t be that much of a surprise that the creative crew were able to build a tragic and moving back story for Clayface.

It’s Clayface’s time to shine!

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: Andrea Romano, batman, batman: the animated series, Bruce, Clayface, Dark Knight Rises, detective comics, Freeze, joker, kevin conroy, Roland Daggett | 5 Comments »

Batman: Prey (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on July 19, 2012 by Darren

I actually have a bit of a soft spot for Doug Moench’s Batman work. That is, of course, before he and Kelley Jones got shunted off to work on whatever insane Elseworlds concept they could concoct, like Batman: Haunted Gotham or Dark Joker the Wild. (Although I think Batman: Vampire wasn’t half bad.) I would really like a nice collection of the work that Jones and Moench did during the nineties – similar to the collections we’ve been seeing for artists like Jim Aparo or Marshall Rogers. I think the pair did a good enough job that they deserve one. (Although I’d rather Breyfogle and Grant first, please.) Still, I think there’s an argument to be made that Prey is perhaps the best of Moench’s Batman work, a story arc the writer did for Legends of the Dark Knight set in the early days of Batman’s career. It’s fascinating, because it’s a wonderful criticism of Frank Miller’s style of Batman writing, long before that school of thought became popular.

Bloody murder…

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: alfred pennyworth, batman, Bruce, caped crusader, dark knight returns, Dark Knight Rises, Doug Moench, frank miller, gordon, Hugo Strange, Joe Chill, joker, robin | 2 Comments »

The Knight is Darkest: Appeals to Fanboy Sanity…

Posted on July 19, 2012 by Darren

Really?

I’ve honestly never understood the internet’s problem with divergent opinions. Why are people so deeply threatened by an opinion that differs from their own? Rotten Tomatoes had to shut down their commenting system after a bunch of rabid fanboys took to protesting negative reviews of The Dark Knight Rises. It’s not a new problem. It happened with the release of The Avengers as well. And The Dark Knight. It seems that internet comic book fans are extremely prone to this sort of violently obsessive behaviour. I say this as somebody familiar with comic books and somebody who really loved The Dark Knight Rises: Why?

Why is an opinion different from yours threatening to you?

The long Dark Knight of the soul…

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: art, Associated Press, avengers, bane, batman, Christopher Nolan, Christy Lemire, dark knight, Dark Knight Rises, Hobbit, Marshall Fine, Movies, rotten tomatoes | 10 Comments »

Batman: Birth of the Demon (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on July 18, 2012 by Darren

To celebrate the release of The Dark Knight Rises this week, today we’ll be reviewing the complete “Demon” trilogy, exploring the relationship between Batman and Ra’s Al Ghul.

Birth of the Demon is very much the odd one out of the Demon trilogy. Of the three stories, it is the only one not written by Mike W. Barr. It also is arguably the most reflective of the three stories in the series, focusing on the origin of Ra’s Al Ghul more than in any modern conflict with Bruce Wayne. Still, it all feels strangely appropriate that, more than a decade after his creation, Denny O’Neil should return to tell the back story of his most iconic addition to the Batman mythos.

Shadow of the bat…

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Al Ghul, alan moore, batman, Batman: Birth of the Demon, Birth of the Demon, Bruce, caped crusader, Christopher Nolan, Dark Knight Rises, DarkKnight Rises, Denny O'Neil, denny o'neill, Mike W. Barr, norm breyfogle, ra's al ghul, Talia, Talia Al Ghul, thomas wayne, Warner Bros | 6 Comments »

Non-Review Review: The Dark Knight Rises

Posted on July 18, 2012 by Darren

If you’ve already seen the film, there’s a more in-depth, spoiler-filled version available here.

It’s here. Christopher Nolan has defied the law of superhero trilogies, which seemed so natural that it was akin to gravity. The Dark Knight Rises might not be the perfect piece of cinema, but it does perfectly wrap up Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy, with enough grace, wit and intelligence to avoid the problems that faced other superhero threequels. While it falls a little short of The Dark Knight, mainly because of what it lacks rather than what it fails at, The Dark Knight Rises manages to make some telling observations about its central character, while proving an epic for our time.

The Dark Knight was the best mainstream film to explore the War on Terror, and The Dark Knight Rises might be the best movie about the social implications of the current economic strife – the philosophy of the “1%.” Finding a way to handle both the political allegory and the central character’s myth in under three hours is no small accomplishment, and Christopher Nolan once again demonstrates why he’s one of the best directors working today. Nobody blends blockbuster scale and aesthetic with sophistication and suspense nearly as well as Nolan.

The Dark Knight Returns?

Note: There will be some spoilers in this review. I won’t summarise the plot, but I will discuss some plot points. I won’t spoil any twists, but I may quote some dialogue. Don’t worry, I’ll warn you when I’m digging into the story itself below.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: bane, batman, batman begins, Charles Dickens, Christopher Nolan, dark knight, dark knight returns, Dark Knight Rises, Dark Knight [Blu-ray], film, joker, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, marion cotillard, Movie, nolan, non-review review, review | 34 Comments »

Batman: Bride of the Demon (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on July 18, 2012 by Darren

To celebrate the release of The Dark Knight Rises this week, today we’ll be reviewing the complete “Demon” trilogy, exploring the relationship between Batman and Ra’s Al Ghul.

Bride of the Demon is generally agreed to be the weakest of the Demon trilogy. Written by Mike W. Barr, with artwork from Tom and Eva Grindberg, it’s hard to argue that it isn’t the most conventional story in the set. While Son of the Demon and Birth of the Demon both justified their one-shot graphic novel status by telling fairly unique Batman stories, Bride of the Demon feels like an adventure that could have been written during Barr’s run on Detective Comics. That’s not to say that it isn’t an entertaining story, or that it doesn’t fit within the context of the trilogy, just that it feels relatively straight-forward and a tiny bit mundane.