I'm departing from
my new method of writing up my DC Comics, described at the beginning
of my
just previous post as being a month at a time, mainly because
this overly thick comic, more a thin trade paperback than floppy,
does not fit in with what is currently being published by DC. Here
we get, several months into the New 52, a continuation of the Old DCU
– what would have been the next several issues (after #8), of Grant
Morrison's tale of the world-wide franchising of the Batman
crime-fighting “brand” in preparation for a looming confrontation
with the threat of “Leviathan.” And there is more yet to come.
Formally
announced last week, the makeup of the New 52 is changing come
the July-cover-dated issues published in May (at least as I count
it). Among the six titles replacing an equal number of series that
are ending with their June issues is a new Batman Incorporated,
also by Morrison along with one of his artists here, Chris Burnham.
Which is good, because this book ends on a major
revelation/cliffhanger that I will avoid giving away. So it could be
that vestiges of the Old DCU will be around a bit longer. It's hard
to tell – the new Batman Incorporated seems to be solicited
as a new ongoing title, not a miniseries, and I find it hard to
believe a new ongoing will be set in the pre-Flashpoint era.
That seems to be confirmed in a Comic Book Resources interview
abstracted
at the Gotham Knights website. But significant on-the-fly
adjustments/retcons to the status quo of the years-long Morrison
Batman saga which has all been leading up to this will have to
be made if it's set in the DCnU. To tell the truth, I had hoped that
that might be why the final issues of the “old” Batman
Incorporated title were delayed and ultimately combined into this
one volume, to give Morrison and company time to make those
adjustments (e.g., maybe Stephanie Brown's most recent adventures
were as Spoiler rather than Batgirl – hey, at least she'd still be
in continuity). I did find the statement that “the 'Batman
Incorporated: Leviathan Strikes' one-shot, that project we should
really treat as a bridge project,” intriguing, and went back and
reread Leviathan Strikes yet again to see if there were some
kind of discernable shift from beginning to end such that the
beginning could be pre-Flashpoint while the ending could be
post-Flashpoint. But as far as I can tell there is no such
readjustment, nor any such shift (hey, it's Morrison – could've
been!), and apparently the several months' wait since #8 was just
Morrison getting behind again.
What about this
book specifically? Well, it's Grant Morrison mind-bending at its
best – well, that's a matter of opinion – one thing about
Morrison is that I know I'll get a heck of a lot of reread value out
of his comics. Some are pretty incomprehensible one first read. And
second read. And third read. Ad infinitum. But each reread
is rewarding with a slightly deeper understanding of what he's trying
to do. And I'm sure that I'll be coming back to this time and again.
I think it may help to read Morrison's Supergods, which I am
currently. More immediately, I will suggest right off that reading
through a short ten-twelve page illustrated recap of the previous
Batman Incorporated issues that inexplicably follows
the cliffhanger ending before reading this volume is a start toward
pulling it all together. And the first part, equivalent to #9, is a
bit more straightforward than the rest. There we see Stephanie
Brown's long-anticipated adventures in the English girls'-school of
evil. If this is indeed our last glimpse of this lately fan-favorite
character, it's a good way to go out, especially her last bit of
inner'logue – not actually her last pages because she does make a
visual appearance a couple pages later, but our last real
“interaction” with her. Surrounded by her fellow students, here
are her last words: “I couldn't believe [Batman]'d left me on
my own, then it struck me... Batman doesn't leave you behind unless
you can handle it. … [T]hese girls were trained by some of the
most dangerous men and women in the world. … Me? … I was
trained by the actual most dangerous men and women in the world, and
I didn't come here to learn... …I came to teach.”
The
rest, equivalent to #10 (ff?)? It's Morrison, complete with non-linear storytelling bouncing
all around. Maybe the placement of the recap pages is not all that
inexplicable. As far as a summary overall goes, I found a wonderful
set of annotations
for this volume online (warning: spoilers) that begins with a couple of paragraphs
abstract. I disagree a bit with the author in that, as indicated
above, I would
have liked to see some accommodation made to the new status
quo here if the upcoming
series is indeed going to be set in that new continuity, but that's a preference rather than a quibble. Of course, would have had no real problem if Morrison were given carte blanche to finish out his six(?)-year saga without jumping continuities. Of course, regardless of what the CBR interview says, Morrison may well just do his own thing. It's not like DC's going to tell him no if it meant he couldn't tell the story at all. Or, with Morrison, it's just as likely he'll work it into the story itself (which is kind of what I hope). Whatever. We'll see. A final extra to this book, most likely just to fill out pages to one of
DC's current standard page-length/price-points, is a gallery of
alternate covers for Batman
Incorporated #1-8.
This
book does accomplish its most important task – it leaves me wanting more and
waiting in great anticipation for the story to take back up in the
new Batman Incorporated
later this year.
Cheers!
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