Favorite Decade for the Bat?

[Shadowcat]

This decade had it tough. Why you wonder might I say tough? Because there were some choice material being given to us leading up to Crisis on Infinite Earths by Mr. Moench and others (like Paul Levitz's Huntress back-ups in the Wonder Woman mag), but all that gets eclipsed by 4 little events: The Killing Joke, The Dark Knight Returns, Batman '89 and Year One. We have Alan Moore as his stock was rising, Frank Miller at the pinnacle of his creative height and Michael Keaton proved everyone wrong when he was announced as Batman. Hell, we had a young neophyte by the name of Todd McFarlane doing interiors on the oft overlooked Year Two storyline by he and Mr. Barr.

But don't think that the quality ends after the Miller/Moore stuff ended, we also had some amazing things like Jim Starlin's run on Batman, Alan Grant's phenomenal Detective run (still one of my faves), the Catwoman mini series that fleshed out Miller's short Selina cameo, etc.

[Pharozonk]

My vote would go the 90's. I loved Dixon, Grant, and Moench as rotating writers on the books. I also loved Dixon's run on the Robin ongoing series which made me a huge Tim Drake fan.

[Shadowcat]

The rolickin' 90's. Many people feel that the 90's does nothing but leave a bad taste in one's mouth, but we had some really great stuff coming out in the 90's. We had Knightfall, the Animated series, and the expansion of the Batline. Sure, in the past we've had a book here and there with ties to Batman, but not star him, with some middling success, but it wasn't until this decade it became a franchise. Disagree if you want, but it really branched out during this period.



We had Robin, Nightwing, Catwoman, Azrael and the Birds of Prey as ongoings (or mini's until they became ongoing) during this time period, so I feel this is when Batman really stepped it up to the next level. We also had the phenomenal sequel, Batman Returns...and that's about it as far as live action movies go...

[Jphu8414]

I'm surprised more people aren't saying 2000-2009. Lots of good stories and memorable runs and we got two great movies (Begins, and The Dark Knight)
...or is it just because I'm alot younger than some of the users on here?

[Pharozonk]

I'm surprised more people aren't saying 2000-2009. Lots of good stories and memorable runs and we got two great movies (Begins, and The Dark Knight)
...or is it just because I'm alot younger than some of the users on here?

How old are you? I'm 18, but I still love the 90's Bat books.

[swing kinker]

Difficult one as each decade had at least one great run. The impact the 80s had probably swings it for me, the tonal shift and emergence of UK talent brought a lot of great stories. Miller's classics, Killing Joke, The cult, Jason Todd's death, ten nights of the beast and the start of Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle as a team. Must have been a terrific time to be reading comics because they sure read well retrospectively

[teej]

The 70s are probably the best decade but the 90s were my favorite.

There was a lot of great stuff coming out of the 90s but the entirety of Chuck Dixon's Bat-Family work along with the Legends of the Dark Knight series cinch that decade for me.

And it's the decade that I grew up with. So there's that too.

[ngroove]

The 1970's rolls around, and we get disco, Tricky Dick (lol) and Denny O'Neil & Neal Adams reinvention of the caped crusader. With a return to more pulp stories, and more detective oriented material. Throwing off the camp of the previous decade, we get stories like Ra's Al Ghul's entrance, and a return of a more sinister Joker.

Does all the "1970s people" only know of Dennis O' Neil / Steve Englehart like a "historian"?, but what about Batman Family, with Batgirl, Batwoman, and Robin, against Killer Moth and Cavalier? The debuts of Spook, Black Spider, Captain Stingaree, Calculator, Firebug, while bringing back Signalman, Crazy Quilt, Kite Man, Calendar Man? Added with of course, more awesome to outrageously FUN battles against Riddler, Penguin, Catwoman, Two-Face, and Scarecrow?

Batman 317 . Riddler.jpgBatman 314 . Two-Face 003.jpgBatman 312 . Calendar Man 007.jpg

[MykeHavoc]

2000-2009

We had Brubaker, Rucka, Morrison, Dini etc. writing books.
We had Batman Begins and Dark Knight.
We had Justice League/JLU/Return of the Joker etc.

Was a good time.

[Jphu8414]

How old are you? I'm 18, but I still love the 90's Bat books.

Oh cool I'm 18 too. I do love 80's and 90's Batman as well but I still thought 2000's Batman would be actually be getting more votes

[John Venus]

Does all the "1970s people" only know of Dennis O' Neil / Steve Englehart like a "historian"?, but what about Batman Family, with Batgirl, Batwoman, and Robin, against Killer Moth and Cavalier? The debuts of Spook, Black Spider, Captain Stingaree, Calculator, Firebug, while bringing back Signalman, Crazy Quilt, Kite Man, Calendar Man? Added with of course, more awesome to outrageously FUN battles against Riddler, Penguin, Catwoman, Two-Face, and Scarecrow?

Batman 317 . Riddler.jpgBatman 314 . Two-Face 003.jpgBatman 312 . Calendar Man 007.jpg

I've talked about some of the stuff you mentioned and more:

Unlike the cool kids who grew up reading Batman Year One and The Dark Knight Returns, my formative years was spent in reading a black and white collection of The Untold Legends of Batman. My fellow Bronze Age aficionado's would introduce me to stories like Alan Brennert's 'To Kill A Legend', 'Interlude of Earth 2', 'Paper Chase', 'The Autobiography of Bruce Wayne' and I also got the opportunity to read Barbara Gordon's debut story, Denny O'Neil's 'Joker's 5 Way Revenge' and Steve Engleheart's 'Strange Apparition' story. I also enjoyed Mike W. Barr and Jim Aparo's 'Batman and the Outsiders' (which was actually in the 80's) and Bob Haney and Jim Aparo's 'Brave and the Bold' run.

Furthermore, you had titles like 'Batman Family' where Batgirl and Robin would fight the devil, the ghost of Benedict Arnold, mobsters with weird cosplay fetishes and robot dinosaurs. It really felt like anything could happen in the Bat title at the time.

I also remember reading the Black Spider's introduction story which was solid.

There was also the story where Batman, Robin (Jason Todd?) and Catwoman teamed up to fight Film Freak.

The Laughing Fish also happened during this period.

There was also a very memorable Two-Face story with Batman risking his life to reach out to be his friend which still holds up very well.

[John Venus]

I'm surprised more people aren't saying 2000-2009. Lots of good stories and memorable runs and we got two great movies (Begins, and The Dark Knight)
...or is it just because I'm alot younger than some of the users on here?

I'm 21 years old. My reading habit is just a bit eclectic since I didn't read 'grow up' reading just one specific era but a mix of the 80's, 90's and 00's. I was buying every Batman comic I could get and once they stopped importing comics here, I resorted to the internet to search for more comics.

The 2000-2009 Batman is cool. I admit there is a lot of good stuff there but the early parts of the decade was also the height of the Bat God/Bat Jerk era when Batman was building Brother Eye to spy on his colleagues and of course there was that War Games nonsense. Plus, as much as people love Morrison's run he didn't exactly work well with the other writes. So you had Morrison running wild with the Bat Books with Bruce hopped up on meth and smashing people with baseball bats and everyone else scrambling to change their stories to fit in Morrison's status quo changes. The books especially 'Batman' and 'Detective Comics' felt so tonally different they might as well having been taking place on different Earths. So it was a very uneven decade with some REALLY good stuff mixed with some REALLY bad stuff (most folks whom I know that hates Batman said it was because of the early 00's) and some REALLY weird stuff like Morrisons' Bowie Joker.

I grew up with Batman: The Animated Series so I prefer a Batman who is grounded, pulpy with the right balance of silliness and darkness. A Batman who is flawed but also a caring individual who tries his best and most importantly is a DETECTIVE first and foremost. So I gravitate more towards the Bronze Age Batman than the 00's Batman.

[son of booyah]

80s. Comics got good.

[Hoosier X]

Difficult one as each decade had at least one great run. The impact the 80s had probably swings it for me, the tonal shift and emergence of UK talent brought a lot of great stories. Miller's classics, Killing Joke, The cult, Jason Todd's death, ten nights of the beast and the start of Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle as a team. Must have been a terrific time to be reading comics because they sure read well retrospectively

I read Batman and Detective through most of the early 1980s, but the books weren't that good in the immediate aftermath of the Crisis on Infinite Earths, so I quit for a while. I almost voted for the 1980s because of how great the Moench, Colan, Newton, Mandrake issues were (not to mention Mike Barr, Alan Davis, Jim Aparo, Bob Haney, etc.) (I voted for the 1950s.)

The Dark Knight Returns and Year One were amazing when they first came out. I'm not so keen on The Cult, Ten Nights of the Beast or Death in the Family, but the first appearance of the Ventriloquist and Scarface is pretty great.

[PyroSikTh]

I can't really vote as my favourite ten years was 2005-now. We had Grant Morrison, Scott Snyder, Nolan's trilogy, and the Identity/Infinite Crisis/52 saga.

If I vote for 2000-2009 I cut out half of Morrison's run, and all of Snyders. If I vote 2010s, I cut off half of Morrison's run, and Nolan's trilogy.