Best Batman stories or storylines, in your opinion

[sabongero]

Inevitably, with the reboot, there will be a topic regarding "What is the best Batman stories?" ... so we might as well start one now.

You can list them, but also post an opinion of why you consider them the best or one of the best Batman story/storylines in your opinion. You can post a brief opinion, or a long essay if you want. That is entirely up to you.

[C_Miller]

There's the obvious classics like Year One, Dark Knight Returns, Long Halloween, The Killing Joke, ect.

But for me the Morrison run stands apart. Well, probably ending with the Return of Bruce Wayne... It's not that I don't like Batman Incorporated, I really do, but it doesn't fall into the classic category with me. The reason I really dug Morrison is because I'm not really big on the Bat-Dick that he has been portrayed as lately (and continued to be portrayed as in the New 52). I feel like a lot of modern writers like to play on the insanity of Batman rather than what makes Batman awesome, IMO, which is his drive. They can often seem like the same thing, but they are very different. Yes, one of the tricks to Batman is that he's always prepared, but writers often write him as paranoid.

Morrison dragged Batman through the mud and brought him back to the light and brought back much of his humanity. There's a reason that the arc where he disappeared was called "Batman R.I.P." and his return was called "The Return of Bruce Wayne." And of course his Batman & Robin run with a light hearted Batman and a dark and gritty Robin was a brilliant turn around on a common trope in the Bat Mythos. Robin turning the crowbar on Joker was great... Say what you will about Morrison, when he gets on a title, he learns every thing about the property and re-does it in excellent and creative ways.

Unfortunately a lot of this progress has been discarded and I think I would have liked Batman Incorporated better if the New 52 didn't pull the rug out from under a lot of things.

[EdwardNigma]

The Long Halloween, Hush, Dark Knight Returns, Dark Victory, The Killing Joke, Face the Face, and Under the Red Hood come to mind.

[Dispenser Of Truth]

Morrison's run and Ego at the top. Also Snyder's run on Batman, War on Crime, Dini's run on Detective, Dark Knight Dark City, Death Strikes at Midnight and Three, The Autobiography of Bruce Wayne and Odyssey. One step down DKR, Year One, The Devil's Trumpet, Death and the Maidens, and the honest-to-god template for modern Batman comics, "Superman and Batman...Brothers?!"

[Batman Forever]

Morrison's Batman Stuff
Loeb's Batman stuff
Frank Miller's Batman Stuff
Englehart's Batman stuff
Denny O'Neil's Batman Stuff
Bill Finger's Batman stuff
Some of the giant batman crossovers like knightfall and no man's land

I'm sure I'm missing some stuff

[yorickbrown]

I love Long Halloween and Killing Joke, but my personal favorite would probably be Black Mirror

[nepenthes]

Everything Frank Miller and Grant Morrison ever wrote...That's a good whack of comics right there.

Batwoman, Year 100, Ego, Black Mirror. Greg Rucka. Grant and Breyfogle era. Early 80's Moench/Colan/Newton/Conway era.

I made a gigantic list of these once; http://community.comicbookresources....-Edition/page5

[Icefalcon]

Year One, because it was the first time I've ever seen a rework of an origin that made it better without invalidating anything central to the character

[Atlanta96]

For me it's the Chuck Dixon stuff. Not only was his work with Batman himself spot on, in stories like Contagion, No Man's Land, and the flawed but entertaining Knoghtfall, but he also gave us the best era for the entire Bat-Family with series like Nightwing, Robin etc being very satisfying, and there was a very strong team dynamic. It's an era that will probably never be lived up to because of how bloated the family is now.

Morrisons run is admirable in ways but it's not for me.

Snyders run was hit and miss. It peaked too early with the Owls storyline.

Millers Batman work was great up until TDKSA.

Jeph Loeb wasn't bad. Hush was okay, Long Halloween was okay.

[AlexanderLuthor]

I think this is a pretty good list: http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2...knight-returns

[The Whovian]

-Morrison's Batman run is majestic. Just pure and utterly elite Batman writing.
-Dini's Batman
-Snyder and Capullo's Batman
-The Long Halloween and Dark Victory
-The Dark Knight Returns
-Batman Year One
-Hush
-The Black Mirror
-Under the Red Hood
-Tomasi and Gleason's B&R run
-Batman Eternal

[Jim Kelly]

Trying to think of a story direction that I haven't talked about in the other threads like this one--just so I don't repeat myself.

Here's one: The story that was in BATMAN Nos. 204 (August '68) and 205 (September '68)--"Operation Blindfold" and "Blind as . . . a Bat?" This might be one of the most significant stories in all of Batman's history.

Both parts take up the whole issue--which was significant in itself, there had been issue-length stories before, but to have two parts, back to back--that made it one of the longest continuing stories for Batman and Robin.

The most significant things about the story--the first issue in particular: This is the first issue of BATMAN since the title's debut in 1940 where Bob Kane's name does not appear on the story. It marks the end of Kane's involvement with the Batman titles (having hatched a new agreement with the publisher). In fact, it gives actual credits for the real writer and the real artists. The writer and the penciller are brand new to Batman--even though they both got into the comics business at virtually the same time as the Darknight Detective himself (1939)--Frank Robbins and Irv Novick (long time inker, Joe Giella, handles the embellishments). Commissioner Gordon has the look he's had ever since--the bushy moustache, although I think Gil Kane gave him that look first, in a previous Elongated Man story. The issue really tries to put the Dynamic Duo on a new direction.

The way that Novick lays out the story is very cinematic. I don't even need to pull this comic from my collection because his lay-outs are so memorable. Robbins tells the story in the new way--not having a splash page on the first page that is a scene from inside the story to follow--but rather beginning the story and building to a big scene which is rendered in a double page spread. In other words, the current way of telling stories. Given Robbins was a seasoned comics artist himself, he probably had a visual understanding of how to tell a story.

I can't give away the whole plot of the story, but it builds like a movie. And for most of the adventure, Batman and Robin are fugitives, hunted by the police, while at the same time they must pursue their own leads to track down the criminal mastermind behind "Operation: Blindfold." Batman's detective abilities are on great display here.

While I was totally impressed by this two-issue mystery when it came out, at the same time, I wasn't happy--because all the writers and artists that I loved on Batman were gone or would soon be gone. So I remain ambivalent about this yarn, yet I can't deny how really powerful it is. Anyone reading it would have felt as I did that nothing could ever be the same for Batman and Robin. Robbins and Novick had set a new standard. In fact, I think they set the bar so high with their first outing that they were hard-pressed to come up with something as good for quite awhile. But in time, they did create many more great Batman stories.

And it sets up directions that other comics would follow over the years, such as the impressive use of detection, a more hands-on Commissioner Gordon, Batman as fugitive, elaborate conspiracies and multi-level story telling.

A runner-up: The Topp's cards with the black bat numbers, art by Bob Powell and Norman Saunders. The first sequence of these has an ongoing plot on the back of the cards, which involves the Joker, Catwoman and Penguin. I don't know who wrote it--maybe Powell--but it takes the characters seriously, unlike the TV show (without which these cards would never have been made). I liken it to the kind of story you'd find in a 1930s pulp detective magazine. The combination of the text and the art establishes a kind of Batman that wasn't yet seen anywhere else.

[kingaliencracker]

The Long Halloween
Knightfall
The Killing Joke
Year One
The Dark Knight Returns
A Death in the Family

[seusilva]

Trying to think of a story direction that I haven't talked about in the other threads like this one--just so I don't repeat myself.

Here's one: The story that was in BATMAN Nos. 204 (August '68) and 205 (September '68)--"Operation Blindfold" and "Blind as . . . a Bat?" This might be one of the most significant stories in all of Batman's history.

Nice suggestion! I never heard about that one... it's good to see new references to explore.
In the legends of the dark knight there are amazing stories like Blades, Venom, Shaman, Faces, Sanctum... Paul Dini story in Batman BW is really good too.

[JFP]

I knew the vast majority of respondents would say Dark Knight Returns. I don't think many comic fans of today have read a Batman storyline before Frank Miller.