King Batman Run: Analysis and Enjoyment Thread

[Hilden B. Lade]

One last art reveal by King before #85 lands tomorrow!

https://twitter.com/TomKingTK/status...94518563807233

[millernumber1]

One last art reveal by King before #85 lands tomorrow!

https://twitter.com/TomKingTK/status...94518563807233

I love these "every night" type panels that King's done a lot of - from Rooftops, to The Question, to here.

[gregpersons]

I love these "every night" type panels that King's done a lot of - from Rooftops, to The Question, to here.

Me too.

"What do you do when it's not most nights?"
"I prepare."
"You prepare."
"For what?"
"For most nights."
"For most nights."

[millernumber1]

Me too.

"What do you do when it's not most nights?"
"I prepare."
"You prepare."
"For what?"
"For most nights."
"For most nights."

It's interesting. Rooftops, despite being the issue where I watched Strip Panel Naked's video helping me to appreciate King's repeated dialogue more, still tends to make me feel it's a bit overdone there. It's why I say that King's improved in balancing the repetition - not just of Bat/Cat, but of all his dialogue.

[Katana500]

Me too.

"What do you do when it's not most nights?"
"I prepare."
"You prepare."
"For what?"
"For most nights."
"For most nights."

I reckon if they ever made King's story into an animated movie. The dialogue would probably come across better with the way its said. Looks a wee bit unnatural on paper but its not too hard to imagine on screen Catwoman sarcastically parroting Bruce to irritate him.

[David Walton]

I reckon if they ever made King's story into an animated movie. The dialogue would probably come across better with the way its said. Looks a wee bit unnatural on paper but its not too hard to imagine on screen Catwoman sarcastically parroting Bruce to irritate him.

That's a really great point. How you imagine the lines being spoken makes for an entirely different experience. I generally like repetition and think King uses it effectively.

[millernumber1]

That's a really great point. How you imagine the lines being spoken makes for an entirely different experience. I generally like repetition and think King uses it effectively.

I generally do, as well - I just think he had a bit too much at the beginning, and balances it better in the last half of the run. I'm also curious if I'm just used to it now.

[gregpersons]

That's a really great point. How you imagine the lines being spoken makes for an entirely different experience. I generally like repetition and think King uses it effectively.

I agree. It "sounds" right in my head... I imagine them as having a kind of Cary Grant / Katherine Hepburn style of quick-tempo patter.

I reckon if they ever made King's story into an animated movie. The dialogue would probably come across better with the way its said. Looks a wee bit unnatural on paper but its not too hard to imagine on screen Catwoman sarcastically parroting Bruce to irritate him.

Good call. Quite a lot of this run feels well-suited to cinematics.

I wonder if we will see a DC animated movie version of King's run sooner than we expect — only because the animated version of "Hush" emphasized the Bat/Cat angle even more prominently than the original comic.

Considering how the DC Animated movies tend to streamline things, I think I'd want to limit an adaptation to focus on Bat/Cat. I'd definitely split the storylines up for the sake of coherency and limited time. I don't think it'd be wise to follow the comic to the letter in an adaptation.

With a little bit of tweaking, you could assemble the story like so:

—Date Nights... (prologue)
—I Am Suicide
—Rooftops
—Every Prologue is a Prelude (the Proposal)
—Super Friends (pt 1 & 2)
—Rules of Engagement
—Something Borrowed, Something Blue
—I Am Bane
—Everyone Loves Bane (a mixture of Everyone Loves Ivy / City Of Bane) — supervillain takes over everyone's minds, Batman is physically broken, recovers with Cat's help to save the day
—...Last Rites (epilogue)

I'd cut the aspect of the run focused on Gotham Girl and Flashpoint Batman and "can Batman be happy?", and most of everything post-50. I think that story track is enough of its own thing that it could work as a sequel.

Okay fine here's the beats to the sequel using King's run.

—The Button
—The Best Man
—The Wedding (Flashpoint Batman replacing Bane)
—I Am Gotham
—Cold Days
—Tyrant Wing
—Knightmares
—The Fall and the Fallen
—City of Batman (Flashpoint Batman replacing Bane)

You have to change a few details, the biggest one replacing Claire's recovery from I Am Suicide/I Am Bane with someone else... maybe something with Alfred having cancer and Bruce needing to obtain a type of venom from Santa Prisca.

But otherwise I think if you split it this way, you can picture how it would work in the different format.

You still miss out on some of the more tangential stories like Brave and the Mold, and especially War of Jokes and Riddles — but it makes more sense to cut War, and perhaps instead expand that into being its own thing rather than an extended flashback in these narratives.

[Katana500]

I agree. It "sounds" right in my head... I imagine them as having a kind of Cary Grant / Katherine Hepburn style of quick-tempo patter.



Good call. Quite a lot of this run feels well-suited to cinematics.

I wonder if we will see a DC animated movie version of King's run sooner than we expect — only because the animated version of "Hush" emphasized the Bat/Cat angle even more prominently than the original comic.

Considering how the DC Animated movies tend to streamline things, I think I'd want to limit an adaptation to focus on Bat/Cat,

With a little bit of tweaking, you could assemble the story like so:

—Date Nights... (prologue)
—I Am Suicide
—Rooftops
—Every Prologue is a Prelude (the Proposal)
—Super Friends (pt 1 & 2)
—Rules of Engagement
—Something Borrowed, Something Blue
—I Am Bane
—Everyone Loves Bane (a mixture of Everyone Loves Ivy / City Of Bane) — supervillain takes over everyone's minds, Batman is physically broken, recovers with Cat's help to save the day
—...Last Rites (epilogue)

I reckon you could streamline the story into two animated films. Kinda like the death and return of superman movies!

I would absolutely love to see Bruce, Selina, Clark and Lois at the theme park - maybe they would cut the batman/wonderwoman fighting the hordes for time and could add wonderwoman and steve to the theme park visit.

[millernumber1]

I agree. It "sounds" right in my head... I imagine them as having a kind of Cary Grant / Katherine Hepburn style of quick-tempo patter.



Good call. Quite a lot of this run feels well-suited to cinematics.

I wonder if we will see a DC animated movie version of King's run sooner than we expect — only because the animated version of "Hush" emphasized the Bat/Cat angle even more prominently than the original comic.

Considering how the DC Animated movies tend to streamline things, I think I'd want to limit an adaptation to focus on Bat/Cat.

With a little bit of tweaking, you could assemble the story like so:

—Date Nights... (prologue)
—I Am Suicide
—Rooftops
—Every Prologue is a Prelude (the Proposal)
—Super Friends (pt 1 & 2)
—Rules of Engagement
—Something Borrowed, Something Blue
—I Am Bane
—Everyone Loves Bane (a mixture of Everyone Loves Ivy / City Of Bane) — supervillain takes over everyone's minds, Batman is physically broken, recovers with Cat's help to save the day
—...Last Rites (epilogue)


I'd cut the aspect of the run focused on Gotham Girl and Flashpoint Batman and "can Batman be happy?", and most of everything post-50. I think this storyline is enough of its own thing that it could work as a sequel.

But I'd definitely split the storylines up for the sake of coherency and limited time. I don't think it'd be wise to follow the comic to the letter in an adaptation.

This is an interesting idea...but my favorite stuff is all the post-50 stuff, so I wouldn't love it. Ah, well.

[gregpersons]

That's what I get for posting and then editing after — I agree it works best split into two like Death & Return of Superman.

[Inversed]

Good call. Quite a lot of this run feels well-suited to cinematics.

I wonder if we will see a DC animated movie version of King's run sooner than we expect — only because the animated version of "Hush" emphasized the Bat/Cat angle even more prominently than the original comic.

Considering how the DC Animated movies tend to streamline things, I think I'd want to limit an adaptation to focus on Bat/Cat. I'd definitely split the storylines up for the sake of coherency and limited time. I don't think it'd be wise to follow the comic to the letter in an adaptation.

With a little bit of tweaking, you could assemble the story like so:

—Date Nights... (prologue)
—I Am Suicide
—Rooftops
—Every Prologue is a Prelude (the Proposal)
—Super Friends (pt 1 & 2)
—Rules of Engagement
—Something Borrowed, Something Blue
—I Am Bane
—Everyone Loves Bane (a mixture of Everyone Loves Ivy / City Of Bane) — supervillain takes over everyone's minds, Batman is physically broken, recovers with Cat's help to save the day
—...Last Rites (epilogue)

I'd cut the aspect of the run focused on Gotham Girl and Flashpoint Batman and "can Batman be happy?", and most of everything post-50. I think that story track is enough of its own thing that it could work as a sequel.

Okay fine here's the beats to the sequel using King's run.

—The Button
—The Best Man
—The Wedding (Flashpoint Batman replacing Bane)
—I Am Gotham
—Cold Days
—Tyrant Wing
—Knightmares
—The Fall and the Fallen
—City of Batman (Flashpoint Batman replacing Bane)

You have to change a few details, the biggest one replacing Claire's recovery from I Am Suicide/I Am Bane with someone else... maybe something with Alfred having cancer and Bruce needing to obtain a type of venom from Santa Prisca.

But otherwise I think if you split it this way, you can picture how it would work in the different format.

You still miss out on some of the more tangential stories like Brave and the Mold, and especially War of Jokes and Riddles — but it makes more sense to cut War, and perhaps instead expand that into being its own thing rather than an extended flashback in these narratives.

That's actually really clever idea of how you would split King's run into movies. Would love to see it all structured like this. Though, they each would probably need to be closer to 90 minutes each as opposed to the 70 minutes that the DC Animated films usually are.

They do tend to stick with specific standout storylines whenever they are adapting, and King's run, as shown through here, is better seen as one long arc rather than as individual connected stories like Morrison or Snyder, etc., so this would be a first if they decide to go this route. I think we'll probably end up getting a Dark Nights Metal adaptation first, or possibly something else from Snyder's run (besides the kind of Court Of Owls adaptation we got), before we get a King one.

[David Walton]

King will have screenwriting experience now with NEW GODS so maybe he could write the adaptation(s) of his Batman work. Winick adapted UNDER THE RED HOOD and it's one of the strongest DCAU films.

[Scott Taylor]

Everyone loves Ivy might be my favorite Poison Ivy story.

[charliehustle415]

Can't believe it's almost here the finale to King's epic.

Regardless of the ups and downs in the 85 issues, it is quite a feat to write as much as he did in such a short amount of time. I mean he wrote multiple books, he wrote the biggest most popular superhero in the world that double shipped, and he has been working on multiple television and film projects.

I am looking forward to see what he does in regards to Batman after Bat/Cat