Getting started with Batman comics

[Egiam]

Hello playgrounders!

I have recently been introduced to the world of "mature" or "sophisticated" comics and manga. I have greatly enjoyed the first six volumes of Urasawa's Monster and Moore's Watchmen. I'm drawn by the aesthetics and themes of Batman. I absolutely loved the movies Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, and am slowly playing Arkham Asylum on PC.

I usually don't have much time for cartoons. Usually, I much prefer books that I can read while travelling.

There appears to be a vast world of Batman comics published by different writers and illustrators since the forties. I don't plan to read them all- just the best. Where should I start? What is considered to be the "best" series?

[pita]

Let's see.
There's The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller, widely considered to be one of the best Batman stories out there. I personally, didn't like, but it may have been my mindset years ago, when I read it. It's about an older Batman, retired, going back to being the Bat.
Alan Moore's The Killing Joke is excellent, especially the re-colored version, though some major elements were taken from it to form the theme of The Dark Knight.
The Long Halloween has a very similar plot to the movie The Dark Knight, Batman: Year One is similar to Batman Begins. They're both different, but they're both great.
I hear that some of the Neil Gaiman Batman stuff is great, but I've never actually read any of it. Neil Gaiman is great in general.
Arkham Asylum by Grant Morrison is fantastic, but I get the feeling you're supposed to understand a lot more about Jungian psychology than I do to fully comprehend it. It's got a very similar plot to the video game.
All I can think of in 5 minutes. There's a lot more.

[Maxios]

The graphic novel where Batman's back is is broken by Bane (Sorry, I can't remember the name)

Batman: No Man's Land

Batman: The Cult

[pita]

The graphic novel where Batman's back is is broken by Bane (Sorry, I can't remember the name)

That would be Knightfall.

[Susano-wo]

I'm going to recomend against knightfall, just because I didn't like it:smallbiggrin:

Also, you will have to read all the Azbats stuff (don't ask:smallwink:) to really complete the story, and that gets rather painful:smalleek:

I would start with Year One, read The Long Halloween, then the Killing Joke [if you can find some good Jason Todd Robin arcs, then I would put those before the killing joke.], then Dark Knight Returns, and I'd skip DKR2...had some good elements, but really, Frank...I'm dissapointed :smallfrown:

I'm sure there are plenty of awesome Batman stories aside from those, but those are all availible in graphic novel format, and are quite good.

[industrious]

I'd recommend Gotham Central, which features Batman in a supporting role. That being said, it's excellent.

[Dienekes]

Year One is always a great way to start your Batman read.
The Dark Knight Returns I personally really like, it's very gritty and dark, however I must warn you, the drawing style turns some people off (a nice way of saying I think it's crap)
Stay far away from The Dark Knight Strike Again.
Killing Joke, and this is coming from someone whose favorite fictional character of all time is the Joker, is good but not amazing. The story is sufficiently dark and the interaction between the Batman and Joker is great, but I can't help but read it thinking something is missing.
Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth. Simply amazing, excellent visuals and a dark story. In my opinion this is the best comic that captures the Batman Rogues Gallery.
The Long Halloween and it's sequel Dark Victory are very solid very entertaining stories. Honestly, I think Long Halloween may be my favorite Bat comic, though that may be the Godfather references talking.
Hush 1&2, a great detective story for Batman, minorly disappointing reveal but overall I rather enjoyed it.
Knightfall 1. The first comic is rather good, it shows the emergence of a new villain and shows Batsy going through hell and finally Get's beaten to a bloody pulp and his back broken. Sadly the followup was not as good.
The Man Who Laughed, have I mentioned I like the Joker? Really, I enjoy reading this comic right after Year One. What's Batman without his greatest villain? Turns out, still Batman.
A Death in the Family, an infamous little story that had one of the most final deaths in comic book history. Not anymore, unfortunately, but I try not to think about that debacle much.
Mad Love, the Joker, and Going Sane. Ok I'm stopping with the Joker love now, honest.
Tower of Babel, Batman's plans backfire, in the most awesome way possible.
No Man's Land. It is very long, very tangled, and sometimes the writing quality is not universally as good. But when it hits, it hits good.
Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader, a very fine and fitting send up to the character.
All-Star Batman. This is firmly in the so bad it's good category. Because he's the God Damned Batman.

I'll add more if I can think of any.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

If you loved Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, here's some familiar ground for you...all of them recommended, I'll spout off a little more about them.

Batman: Year One--I feel it's important to note that this really strongly influenced Batman Begins, particularly in its depiction of Gotham City.

The Long Halloween--the fingerprints of this story are ALL OVER The Dark Knight. There are times when they lifted lines of dialogue directly from this comic.

The Killing Joke--I haven't read this one, but I've heard it's good, and also an important influence on TDK.

And The Dark Knight Returns is phenomenal. Especially the ending. I'll say that much. There was never a sequel. The Dark Knight Strikes Again? You're crazy. Never heard of it.

I've read an issue of Gotham Central, and it was really good. Great for a change of pace. I think it would be a fantastic inspiration for a Batman movie in the style of Nolan...

[The Glyphstone]

Tower of Babel is more of a Justice League story than a Bats story, isn't it?

[Dienekes]

Tower of Babel is more of a Justice League story than a Bats story, isn't it?

Technically yes, though Bats does have a fairly prominent role, so I included it. Since I technically included though glossed over "The Joker" which has Batman appear in around 5 panels, a JL story that focuses more on Bats seemed fair game. Though yes, it should have been warned that it was a JL story.

Also would like to add Batman: Black and White. Unfortunately I've only read 1 of the stories inside, and it wasn't even Batman focused, but it was awesome. And it was not even considered the best of the stories. Sometime I'll have to get my act together and actually read the thing.

[pita]

A DVD you might be interested in checking out is Batman: Gotham Knight. It's a few animated shorts, all set sometime before TDK but after BB, about Batman and his influence on people.

[Foeofthelance]

War Games is another twisted, complex Batman story that I thought was well done. It deconstructs Batman's "enough preparation time" and how just one wrong variable can screw with even his best plans.

[Fri]

I second the recommendation for Year One

Batman Begins trilogy is basically the movie adaptation of Year One.

Anyway, there might be some other better batman story, but Year One is always the good choice to start your batman reading.

[Susano-wo]

Arg, I have such nerd shame right now, but what's the killing joke about?:smallredface:
I was thinking of Death in the Family before

Also, on the Bane issue, I think its the emergence of a new villain that killed the story for me. He just seemed so, Villain Sue, if I may use the term. Oh look, theres a new villain on the block who's so smart and such a chessmaster that he can drive batman to exhaustion, and can physically best him to boot due to super steroids. :smallmad:
But hey, to each his own:smallbiggrin:

And finally, the Joker is the Bees Knees. Do not be ashamed of Joker-Love :smallwink:

[Fri]

The Killing Joke is also a good one. It's the one where Joker want to prove to batman that the only thing that differs a normal person and an insane person like him is 'one bad day.' Involving Barbara Gordon and James Gordon.

[Dienekes]

Arg, I have such nerd shame right now, but what's the killing joke about?:smallredface:
I was thinking of Death in the Family before

Also, on the Bane issue, I think its the emergence of a new villain that killed the story for me. He just seemed so, Villain Sue, if I may use the term. Oh look, theres a new villain on the block who's so smart and such a chessmaster that he can drive batman to exhaustion, and can physically best him to boot due to super steroids. :smallmad:
But hey, to each his own:smallbiggrin:

And finally, the Joker is the Bees Knees. Do not be ashamed of Joker-Love :smallwink:

On Bane. Really, I never got he was so much a Chessmaster from Knightfall. Spoilered because though it's common knowledge, this is about offering up ideas for someone to read so inherently they haven't read it yet.
Sure he plans and beats the Bat. But really his plan is so simple I'd hardly call him a villainous mastermind. Break out the popular villains all at once and watch Batman wear himself out. That's it. Sure he's intelligent, but from this comic I wouldn't place him close to as intelligent as Riddler or Ra's. It's only later that people, other than himself, start claiming he has a great mind that is on par with Batman.
Really he kind of reminds me of Killer Croc before they turned him into an idiot. An intelligent guy who is incredibly strong. Bane was able to get 1 really well played plan together and beat up Batman when he was at his weakest. Impressive, but hardly villain-sue-ish. Honestly though, I think he should have died at the end of Knightfall. There's not much left to do with the character.

[Pronounceable]

As mentioned, the BIG THREE are Year One, Long Halloween and (contrary to popular belief) The Man Who Laughs. Nolan movies is more or less them. Since repetition is proof, I repeat that this three is the creme de la creme of Bats mythos. Plus Mad Love which is originally from animated universe comics, because who doesn't love Harley?

Then there's the overrated but still very good Killing Joke and LH's sequel Dark Victory.

And then there's Dark Knight Returns and Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?, both of which are experimental takes on Bats that happens to be awesome.

War Games, Hush, No Man's Land, A Death in the Family and Knightfall are huge and tangled stories which are more or less standard superhero comics fare and aren't really that distinguished within Bats mythos.

Unlike most Batfans, I'm not too fond of A Serious House on a Serious Earth. I especially despised red on black speech bubbles with horrible font. Artistic licence my batarang, I want legibility dammit. It's too far gone in artistry to the point of pretentiousness. Story is cool tho.

[Egiam]

As mentioned, the BIG THREE are Year One, Long Halloween and (contrary to popular belief) The Man Who Laughs. Nolan movies is more or less them. Since repetition is proof, I repeat that this three is the creme de la creme of Bats mythos. Plus Mad Love which is originally from animated universe comics, because who doesn't love Harley?


For the sake of popular opinion on internet message boards: yes, I agree.

Thank you all for the help. I think that soon I'll take a trip to my local comic store and see what they have.

While on this topic, are there any other comic series in the American tradition(As opposed to the Japanese manga tradition) that I should look for?

[Dienekes]

While on this topic, are there any other comic series in the American tradition(As opposed to the Japanese manga tradition) that I should look for?

Sandman, Fables, more Sandman, V for Vendetta, Superman: Red Son, Kingdom Come, Maus, Astonishing X-Men (the first book anyway), Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow, From Hell, League of Extraordinary Gentleman 1 and 2 (the Black Dossier was kinda disappointing), some of the old greats like X-Man 1 are always worth looking into.

[Eldan]

And whoever liked Sandman should also read Lucifer, it's not-really, but kinda sequel.

However, Sandman and Lucifer are about as far from the Batman movies as you can get. Highest of high fantasy.

You might like V for Vendetta, though: an Anarchist fights the religious fascist government that arose in great Britain after a catastrophe. In the movie (which is pretty different from the comics in parts), it's a plague, in the comics it's nuclear war. It's mostly about how far one can go to overthrow a government.

[Axolotl]

While on this topic, are there any other comic series in the American tradition(As opposed to the Japanese manga tradition) that I should look for?Depends on what type of stuff you want. Sandman is a must and I'd reccomend Transmetropolitan. Beyond that anything by Alan Moore but be warned he pretty dark at times, my favorites being From Hell and the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

I also like the Filth but I could never in good conscience reccomend it to anybody else.

[Susano-wo]

And whoever liked Sandman should also read Lucifer, it's not-really, but kinda sequel.

However, Sandman and Lucifer are about as far from the Batman movies as you can get. Highest of high fantasy.

You might like V for Vendetta, though: an Anarchist fights the religious fascist government that arose in great Britain after a catastrophe. In the movie (which is pretty different from the comics in parts), it's a plague, in the comics it's nuclear war. It's mostly about how far one can go to overthrow a government.

The movie is different than the comics in one big part: it ignores the primary theme, which is discussion of Fascism vs Anarchy :smallbiggrin:

RE: Killing Joke. I remember that one now! I really enjoyed that one

I can see the point that Bane is not chessmaster...I vaguely remember him manipulating more than just the release of the inmates, but I have read that story exactly once, and that was when it came out. Never Again!:smallwink:

RE: Good american comic books: like a previous poster said, Sandman and more Sandman,
I enjoyed the Specter relaunch in the 90s (80s?),
Starman Omnibus collections,
Y: the last man,
the earlier arcs of DMZ(got a bit pointless after a while, since the biggest story elements seem to be locked in stasis to allow the premise to remain),
I enjoyed the run of Morrison Jutice League comics that was basically a series of multiple multi-comic big bad plots where everything seems hopeless but everything comes together at the end,
I haven't read the end(got through mothers and daughters, I think), but I enjoyed Cerebus, Author breakdown moments aside.
Astro City
Grendel
Hellboy/BPRD
Preacher(though veeeery NSFW, and there are moments where I thought he was confusing sexual/gross for funny, but good story, and some of the best characters to ever grace a comic book
And probably a lot I'm forgetting

[Eldan]

I thought Preacher was mainly funny because of the general theme of "You do find this gross, right? What about this? How about if we involved an Armadillo and some chocolate?" that made it vaguely ridiculous.

[Susano-wo]

I thought Preacher was mainly funny because of the general theme of "You do find this gross, right? What about this? How about if we involved an Armadillo and some chocolate?" that made it vaguely ridiculous.

Sure, I definitely enjoyed some of th3e gross humor, it was just that some of it took away from the story (like Making Starr the universes butt Monkey--I realize that was the point of the character, it just took away from things, I think, when its always done for humor factor)

[Eldan]

It's difficult to say, but:
It wasn't the gross humour by itself that was funny. It was just interesting and amusing to see what kind of things the comic would try to throw at me to make me gross out. I think I'm just sufficiently jaded that I would look at it and think "Hmm. That's a novel idea".

[Susano-wo]

It's difficult to say, but:
It wasn't the gross humour by itself that was funny. It was just interesting and amusing to see what kind of things the comic would try to throw at me to make me gross out. I think I'm just sufficiently jaded that I would look at it and think "Hmm. That's a novel idea".

No, I get what you are saying, and there were parts that I found amusing in their audacity.

[pita]

Re: Preacher.
A lot of it was funny due to grossness, like Herr Starr, and oh-dear-god-what-the-f-is-wrong-with-Ennis Jesus De Sade.
But there was also a lot of genuinely funny stuff. Most of Cassidy's stuff is brilliant, especially the prequel he gets in volume 5. I can't think of many other examples, but there is at least one laugh out loud moment in every TPB except for the fourth one, for me.

[Britter]

If you like Batman, and you like Miller's Year One and the Dark Knight Returns, you might want to check out his work on Daredevil. It is pretty fine stuff, and Born Again is one of the best comics I have ever read.

[Tengu_temp]

Speaking of Frank Miller, All-Star Batman and Robin is a very unique reading experience. Because it's so terrible, that is.

[An Enemy Spy]

Read Fortunate Son to see Batman's never ending war on the evil forces of Rock and Roll.
Seriously though, don't. It's terrible.

[An Enemy Spy]

Speaking of Frank Miller, All-Star Batman and Robin is a very unique reading experience. Because it's so terrible, that is.

Are you stupid? Are you retarded or something? I'm the goddamn Batman!

[Egiam]

Well, thank you all again. I used my Christmas Barnes & Noble giftcard to get myself Batman: Year One and The Long Halloween. I'm one chapter into Year One and am already hooked. When I get the opportunity, I'll go check out my local small shop for The Man who Laughed and The Dark Knight Returns.

For some reason, Lieutenant Gordon in Year One reminds me of doctor Freeman from the Half Life saga. But I guess that's because their both incredibly BA gun toting middle-aged guys with glasses named Gordon.