Starting to read Batman comics (What's Canon?)

[howie3601]

Hello, I'm new here and to comics and I've decided to start reading Batman first (I'm more of a Marvel fan), but Batman is an exception and a good excuse to start with DC.
Please forgive me for my ignorance, and know that I'm new and I know very little about comics. However, through movies, Video Games and animated shows/movies, I have a decent knowledge
on Batman's lore. At least I think I do.

I'm overwhelmed on where to start. For now, I started reading some the first Batman comics like "Batman #1" and "Detective Comics" I'll only read the first few issues though. After that I want to read the comics in chronological order.
I've been told to start with "Batman: Year One" and then start the New 52 run. I would love any other suggestions on what you think I should read first. It would be greatly appreciated.

Here are my questions

1. How many "universes" are there in Batman Comics?

2. What is the main canon?

3. Is the new 52 run canon to "Batman: Year One" and "The Dark Knight Returns"?

4. Could you give me a break down in order on what to read in chronological order?

Thank you, any info would be appreciated!

[LifeIsILL]

Batman, Detective Comics, Legend of the Dark Knight, Gotham Knights, Shadow of the Bat, Batman and Robin, Batman Confidential, Superman/Batman are all canon.

[blunt_eastwood]

Hello, I'm new here and to comics and I've decided to start reading Batman first (I'm more of a Marvel fan), but Batman is an exception and a good excuse to start with DC.
Please forgive me for my ignorance, and know that I'm new and I know very little about comics. However, through movies, Video Games and animated shows/movies, I have a decent knowledge
on Batman's lore. At least I think I do.

I'm overwhelmed on where to start. For now, I started reading some the first Batman comics like "Batman #1" and "Detective Comics" I'll only read the first few issues though. After that I want to read the comics in chronological order.
I've been told to start with "Batman: Year One" and then start the New 52 run. I would love any other suggestions on what you think I should read first. It would be greatly appreciated.

Here are my questions

1. How many "universes" are there in Batman Comics?

2. What is the main canon?

3. Is the new 52 run canon to "Batman: Year One" and "The Dark Knight Returns"?

4. Could you give me a break down in order on what to read in chronological order?

Thank you, any info would be appreciated!

1. There are a few alternative continuities, but the main one is what you will find in the vast majority of published titles.

2. What's printed in the vast majority of titles. Batman and Detective Comics are the main two titles that feature stories in the current continuity.

3. If you want them to be. DC intentionally avoids having a hard continuity or timeline so that they can pick and choose what's canon to fit the needs of the current story. So like I said it's really up to you. Their status won't necessarily hinder you from enjoying any current stories.

4. There's a sticky at the top of the board that should provide this in full detail. But if that's too much you can just start with Batman Rebirth and then read Batman #1 (2016) onwards.

I hope that helps.

[Restingvoice]

1. 52 Earths

2. Earth-0. Everything published that have this cover layout. The Batman symbol under the issue number is on every Batman family books.

Attachment 75130

The alternate universes have different labels, such as Black Label, Earth-One, or Digital First

3. Yes and No. In New 52, Zero Year replaced Year One, but now in Rebirth, the event of Zero Year still happened, but no longer the origin.

TDKR is a future story in Frank Miller universe and not yet adopted as canon in Earth-0.

4. Fair warning, continuity is kind of a mess right now, because they're bringing back what's lost after the New 52 Rebirth, but there's no clear chart on what's in or what's out. We can only glean by what's on the page.

So if you read, just jump in the present, judge the past by what's in the flashback, and if you do want to read past books, remember that things may have been changed.

Here are the general layout and chronology:
The Tom King Batman and James Tynion Detective Comics run at about the same time, and they crossover.
All-Star Batman by Scott Snyder is also canon but can be read separately from King and Tynion without any clear timeline except for their publication date. Snyder's Batman story continues in Dark Nights Metal, No Justice, then the current Justice League run.
After Tynion left to help Snyder build the Justice League family, Tom King's Batman, current Detective Comics, and Snyder's Justice League all remain canon, just not that connected with each other much and can be read separately.

Rebirth run does indeed continue from where New 52 left out, specifically Snyder's Batman and Geoff Johns' Justice League, but The New 52 run is more essential if you want to read Snyder's story. King kinda does his own thing.

The New 52 Batman world has 3 big movers
Snyder on Batman handled the New 52 world building.
Grant Morrison finished the story he wrote since before New 52, adjusting it to fit New 52 continuity.
Peter Tomasi writes Batman and Robin that follows both Snyder and Morrison.
The New 52 run is tighter than Rebirth. There's a lot of crossovers and mini-series so I'm not gonna list the chronology now.

[MajorHoy]

As to what's "canon", I don't know if DC even has that defined anymore.
Different writers make different references to things from the past in different stories, and sometimes it's a vague mention of something from a past story where the whole story isn't really "canon".

[LordMikel]

To answer the question of what is Canon? Bruce Wayne's parents died in front of Bruce after seeing a movie. He was raised by Alfred. He studied for years and became Batman. He is now Batman. He lives in Gotham. That will get you through probably 75% of Batman stories just fine.

[kevink31593]

As to what's "canon", I don't know if DC even has that defined anymore.
Different writers make different references to things from the past in different stories, and sometimes it's a vague mention of something from a past story where the whole story isn't really "canon".

To answer the question of what is Canon? Bruce Wayne's parents died in front of Bruce after seeing a movie. He was raised by Alfred. He studied for years and became Batman. He is now Batman. He lives in Gotham. That will get you through probably 75% of Batman stories just fine.

I agree with the above quotes. As someone who has been reading Batman comics for over 25 years now, I can say that I've gotten less and less concerned with what is "canon" as time passes. My main concern now is just whether or not I enjoy the story that I am currently reading. There are so many Batman stories, I can definitely see how that would intimidate a new reader. But my best advice is just to start with a story that looks interesting to you, and go from there.

[oasis1313]

To answer the question of what is Canon? Bruce Wayne's parents died in front of Bruce after seeing a movie. He was raised by Alfred. He studied for years and became Batman. He is now Batman. He lives in Gotham. That will get you through probably 75% of Batman stories just fine.

This is pretty much the gist of what you need. DC has been through so many reboots and regurgitations that there isn't any real canon left anymore.

[Aahz]

Just looking at the main continuities, there have been several over the years. The kind of thing that is special about Batman is that due to his popularity even when the continuity changes a lot of stories still remain canon, or at least to a degree that stuff happend at least similarly than in the original stories, even if a few details had to happen differntly.

The first are the classic "Earth One" and "Earth Two", Earth Two DCs continuity for the Golden Age Comics (late 1930s to mid 1950s) and Earth One the continuity for the Silver Age Comics (mid 1950s to late 1960s). In case of Batman there is no clear separation between them, most Golden Age Batman comics are canon on both "Earth One" and "Earth Two", the really difference between both only became really visible in later Bronze Age comics (late 1960s to mid 1980s) were "Earth Two" was written as and alternate earth with an older Bruce Wayne who had married Catwoman.

The Next Main Continuity is "New Earth" which started after Crisis on Infinite Earth in in the mid 1980s. In that event "Earth One" and "Earth Two" merged with a few other Earth and created a new continuity which lasted untill 2011. This is the Continuity were Batman: Year One and most of the other famous Batman stories lines are set.

In 2011 there was the Flashpoint Event which resulted in the "New 52" Continuity, in which a lot of the stuff that happened at the end of the "New Earth" is still canon, but for most of the earlier stuff it was not really clear, and Batman: Year One was replaced by Zero Year as Origin story.

In 2016 DC Started Rebirth were it was Reaveld someone had used Flash point to alter the reality and that stuff from older contiunities starts to reappear in the new continuity, this has unfortunately now lead to a situation were it is not really clear what is canon and that stories that for example Years One and Zero Year are kind of treated both as being canon, even if that doesn't really make sense.