Detective Comics #1: Don’t You Know What The Night Can Do

Tony Daniel draws one hell of a Batman. He’s got some kind of bastardized mixture of 1990’s McFarlane, modern Jim Lee fine line and detail work going that makes things just look exciting and keep the eye on the panel, combined with enough broadly inked, shadowed, Frank Miller-style panels of Batman in silouette that mix together to make an instantly recognizable, iconic style of Batman art. Of all this week’s New 52, Detective Comics #1 is probably my favorite in the art department, which is saying a lot considering this week included work by Rags Morales, George Perez and Yanick Paquette. Then again, considering this week’s art included Rob Liefeld’s Hawk & Dove, Daniel could have drawn Batman as: “>(:|)-<=<” and still not been my least favorite. Seriously, though: I’m liking the look of this book.

Daniel is putting together a pretty solid entry-level Batman plot in this book as well. Make no mistake; for the first 18 pages or so, he’s not exactly reinventing the wheel: Batman feeling tortured by failing to prevent the Joker’s murders, persuing Joker relentlessly only to end chase to save a little girl from danger and evading capture by the police via an attack helicopter chase, all in Batman’s first major story following a reboot, is not exactly groundbreaking storytelling (*cough* *cough* Dark Knight Returns *cough*). But Daniel keeps the story moving along and entertaining, and breaks up what could be considered derivative by introducing the concept that Joker might commit his crimes while naked, which made even this old Batman fan take notice and comment: “AAAAAAAAAAANOOAAAAAWHYYAAAAAAA”.

That said, Daniel might want to take a page from Keith Giffen and JM DeMaettis and get someone else to do dialog for his plots. Don’t get me wrong – there’s nothing here that reaches the hideous depths of, again, Hawk & Dove, but there’s some pretty hamfisted stuff in this book that, depending on the depths of your personal pop culture depravity, can drag you out of the book. For example, this…

Forget about it Joker. You can’t run. I OWN the night -Batman, Detective Comics #1

Merely reminded me of THIS…

reach up and touch the light

(love still shines)

Own the night

You make me come alive

I OWN the night. -Chaka Kahn, Miami Vice

…which is not how you want your book perceived. Even when I managed to block Chaka out, I still can only read that line with a Sylvester Stallone / Judge Dredd / “I AM da law!” line reading in my head.

But any shortcomings I might have had based on the dialog and somewhat derivative story were wiped away by the last two pages of the story. GOD. DAMN. I’ve debated throwing the final spash page up here, and decided I don’t have it in me to ruin it for you. Go here if you must see it now, but do yourself a favor and hit your local comic store or, if you must, your iPad, and get this book for yourself.

Tony Daniel set a high bar, story-wise, with that ending. I’ll be on board to see if he can cash the check that ending wrote.