Frank Miller's vision of Gotham City is
grim. A dark and decayed metropolis where almost everyone in
positions of power are on the take. A place where two brave citizens,
police Lt. James Gordon, and Bruce Wayne, take a stand against the
corruption and risk their lives to save the city.
In Batman Year One, which follows the
first year after Bruce Wayne decides to do something to save the city
he was born to, Gotham City is certainly not a place one would choose
to raise a family, yet that is just what Lt James Gordon finds
himself doing when he is transferred to Gotham from Chicago. His
arrival coincides with Bruce Wayne's decision to don the cape and
cowl of the Batman. Working separate, the two men begin their epic
struggle to fight crime in Gotham City, Gordon from within, Batman
from without.
This is a terrific book. One can almost
hear the punches, the rabble of the streets, the gunfire; smell the
detritus littering the streets, the damp decay of the city, feel the
filth that permeates the air, and the suffering the citizens must
face every day. There's no campy 60s Batman, quirky Tim Burton
interpretation, or just sad Joel Schumachery here. Just gritty
realism with fallible, mortal heroes and irascible villains.
I give the book four stars instead of
five, because Miller never really takes us inside Bruce Wayne or
Batman to let us know the pain he feels or give us a sense of the
dual nature of his psyche, or the passion that drives him to risk
live and limb to save citizens that repeatedly attack him. It
obviously inspired Christopher Nolan and David S Goyer when they were
writing Batman Begins, right down to them swiping elements of scenes
from Batman Year One. It's not perfect, but certainly a major
contribution to the Batman universe.
You might also be interested in:
No comments:
Post a Comment