As the year hastily dwindles to a close I’m beginning to look back and take stock at what the hell I’ve been spending my hard earned cashish on. Something that’s missing from the receipts of my hard earned cashish has been an amazing Bat Book. I mean, dude, where is it? This calendar year has been devoid of anything Bat-tacular. It’s been a Rat-A-Bat-Bat of blecchh month after month. Maybe you need to have a new arc start up in Detective Comics where the B to the M is actively searching for the reason why he can’t exist in any plots that make readers go ‘Wow’.
Bats: I can’t put my finger on it Alfred. All the stories that are written about me suck donkey balls.
Alfred: What type of donkey balls Master Bruce? A Catalan Donkey? Maltese? Irish?
Bats: That’s just it Alfred. These stories are sucking every single breed of Donkey Sack.
Alfred: That’s not possible Master Bruce.
Bats: Here, read this –
Bats tosses Alfred one of DC’s 2023 Bat Book offerings. Alfred flips through it.
Bats: Are you going ‘Wow’ or are you going ‘Hmm’.
Alfred: I’m going Egad, Master Bruce.
Bats: Exactly. Someone or something, perhaps an existential force, is calibrating all the plots of my books to the suckage of equine sackage.
Alfred: How very Hip-Hop of you to say sir, adding an ‘age’ to your verbs and nouns.
Bats: Thanks old chum, that Sirius XM subscription you added to the Batmobile was a magnificent idea.
Alfred: I’m glad you’ve finally discovered EPMD Master Bruce.
Time is running out for Bats to deliver the Bats comic of the year. I saved this comic for today so I could delve into what looks like a Halloweenie type of comic. Not that I care about Halloween at all, it’s just, I dunno, I thought it’d be fun, cut me a break! Jeez. In the corner of my eye I spy Christian Ward’s ‘Batman: City of Madness’ in prestige format which may ultimately be the Bat Book of the year, but I already purchased this one, so…, yeah. It’s kinda like how you set up a date with a chick where you’re thinking ‘Ah, she’s cool, this could be fun’ and then you match with a smoking hot Yoga teacher who loves making smoothies and practicing reiki in the nude.
You’ll go out with the ‘cool this could be fun chick’ but all you’ll be thinking about is the Yogi Babe Hoagie, such is life.
So for the cool, this could be fun chick, well, there are issues. First, I appreciate the amount of pages I’m getting that are completely ad-free but methinks 7 bux is a bit much. I’m getting Ward’s prestige Bat book for the same price, I think you need to knock off a few bucks here. Secondly, this may sound ridiculous, but I can’t stop thinking about the Writer/Author’s last name, Grampa. He’s Brazilian, I get that, but I immediately went to ‘Wait, are there, like, Grampas and Grannies and Aunties for last names in Brazil?’. If Mr. Grampa married someone with the last name of Granny could he then hyphenate it to Grampa-Granny and then would my head explode or just short out for a couple of minutes.
DC created an animated trailer for this book that Gramps put on his insta page:
Their tagline is ‘When you chase your own Shadow, it leads you into the Abyss’
Maybe it should be ‘When you buy $3.99 books from DC, it leads you into eBay to see how much you can sell a comic that you don’t want anymore’.
I mean, this book is a bit confusing and slightly off. I saw that there was a lot of gripes about Gramps and his artistic style. I happen to dig it, it’s very stylized for sure. Only thing is it’s heavy on the eyes, meaning it kinda takes you a moment to take in the panels if that makes any sense; the linework is a bit busy with the detailing and caricature approach to some of the characters. It’s really cool in some instances and somewhat muddy in others; sounds exactly what dating a ‘She’s cool this could be fun’ babe would be like.
My main complaint is that I really don’t know what time period or universe this book exists in. By the look of Bats, it seems like they’re going for the first appearance in Detective Comics look with the slanted eye slots and curved pointier ears. But then we get panels where people are on the subway looking at their phones and then a scene with a news reporter whose online video just went viral with a hashtag. Huh? Is this the 30s or present day? The feel of it gives me the sense that it’s old school yet clearly that’s not the case but the cops are reacting like Batman just appeared on the scene. Bats is also tinkering with what seems to be his first ever Batmobile so it’s 2023 and Batman just started do his Bat thing in a world that looks old-timey. Oy vey.
Next, the villain, I’m not sure what to make of him, you see him, wince and go ‘Umm, what?’ It looks like something straight out of a high school/art school sketchbook. It’s doodle-ish and does not feel like he’s based in a grounded reality in relationship to the world that Gramps has created. Look at him:
So that’s tears streaming out of his eyes, he’s almost always crying or has tears just pouring out his eye ducts like he’s Daniel Kaluuya in ‘Get Out’.
But this dude isn’t heaving or hunching over or making any facial expressions that would indicate that he’s deeply upset; so he’s clearly not Jewish. This dude is fighting with tears just flowing out of his eyes, c’mon Grampy, feels contrived. Bats is on the tail of some serial killer that’s murdering dudes in a weird way and the whole ‘Detective Procedural’ aspect of this book actually works quite well and progresses nicely. Maybe Law & Order should hire Grampa.
So upon further investigation this guy's name is Crytoon, he is the Gargoyle of Gotham [crickets] umm, deep sigh, face plant, brow furrowing. Admit it, the first thing you thought of when you saw that name was wonder if there was a 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit' sequel coming out since this guy sounds like someone straight from Toonland.
Look, if you’ve got a serial killer villain who’s weeping all the time maybe you should have him on a killing spree of all the dudes who run the dating apps. I mean, I’m constantly weeping inside from having to use them maybe this Weepy Goth dude in the cool Matrix coat could be our hero? You’d find all the CEOs of apps like OKCupid, Tinder, RAYA, Hinge murdered over the mainframe computers that house the proprietary algorithms. Perhaps affixed to their bodies are little emojis that look like roses, super likes, direct requests and other bullshit that you have to pay up for in order for an AI Insta Chick to see before not responding to your messages.
My last gripe of the book is, how many times are we going to see Alfred descending some stairs in the Batcave with a tray and a bowl of soup on it to deliver to Brucey?
You think Bats is eating soup after flying around Gotham and exerting every ounce of his energy? Homie needs a steak or an arroz con pollo or something hearty. At one point Alfred leaves a piece of cake for Bruce in the Batmobile and I’m immediately like, a loaded breakfast burrito would’ve made more sense. Seriously, we need to see heroes fueling up more. I wanna see Wonder Woman biting into a lamb chop while holding the bone. I wanna see Supes doubles fisting two roasted chickens before taking off.
Oy vey ismir. Going out with ‘Could be fun chick’ was kind of a bust. Now, I still may very well grab the next issue based off of the interesting procedural that Granny Grampy Campy has got going on but it’s hanging on by a thread.
Alright Christian Ward, you’re up next. I swear though, if I see one fucking bowl of piping hot soup anywhere in your book I’m going to blow a gasket. First Batman Artist to draw Batman devouring a steak in the Batcave should win an Eisner.
Rating: 7.1
Verdict: Pull hesitantly and cry about it
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