I thought about getting this to see Warren Ellis do a "straight-take" on Batman, but I can't STAND Hitch's art, so..........
I thought about getting this to see Warren Ellis do a "straight-take" on Batman, but I can't STAND Hitch's art, so..........
Does continuity really matter? I just want a good story
Same here, but with in continuity there's the risk that they'll attempt to tie it into some big event, and I just want a story that stands alone by itself. Luckily whether in or out of continuity this still looks to be just that. And here's hoping it'll be a good story!
The pacing is just so decompressed it isn't even funny, I mean I kind of expect a good amount of that kind of storytelling from Hitch and Ellis but this was excessive even for them and worse it gave us no insight into Bruce or his case and the whole reason behind favoring a decompressed narrative structure is to slow things down so you can get into the characters so to have that style and learn nothing is just a waste of pages. We were "treated" to nearly 14 whole pages of a brawl between Batman and a ghoul named The Face Eater and then three pages of Gordon turning on the Bat-signal and Batman flying up in the batjet and repelling down to the roof...all with barely any dialog and no mono-logging at all so we learn nothing about what Bruce is thinking and how the case effects him and then as quickly as it starts it's just over and we're moving onto a seemingly unconnected case. This has one more issue to catch me or I'm out. I really can't believe I'm saying that given how much I love both Ellis and Hitch but that's where we are.
Last edited by thwhtGuardian; 11-16-2019 at 06:00 AM.
I could not understand the Love for Ellis' Moon Knight and it sounds like DC wants to do that with Batman. Is the latest Wildstorm any good? Thinking of getting it for Midnighter and Apollo
Yes The Wild Storm is a very good book and I recommend you read it.
BUT a word of warning - there isn't much Apollo and Midnighter within.
Sure they do show up but not in the way I think you're thinking.
Side note - found Ellis' MK very good and I am enjoying The Batman's Grave quite a lot.
I mean something as simple as Batmanin the day time is a plus for me (yes I'm a bit weird. Blame Adam West Batman ).
Writing and art are also top notch. It's also heavy on the detective aspect of Batman which I have missed.
This will undoubtedly read better in tpb.
Last edited by Flash Gordon; 12-11-2019 at 10:17 PM.
On The Wild Storm...
While I absolutely agree on that buying it for The Midnighter and Apollo might not be the right call, there are two things worth noting.
- First, the arcs are essentially stand alone(in six issue arcs). One could very easily pick up the arc where the team most folks would know as "The Authority" forms and not miss much.
- Second, The Wild Storm was easily the best thing in all of comics during the time it was running. Just the arc where Lynch deals with the former ***** subjects(essentially the book's Gen 12/Team 7 analogs) was worth whatever you would pay for the entire run.
I like #3 a lot, though it was such a quick read.
Ellis writes a great Batman for 2019.
If the masthead for this issue had read The Batman's Grave #1 instead of #3 I'd feel a lot better about the fate of this 12 issue maxi-series then I currently do. Although there is still plenty of decompression present as we're treated yet again to ten whole pages devoted to a wordless fight scene with a nameless villain the scenes with actual characterization with Bruce and Alfred are absolutely incredible ad although seemingly a throw away plot point the exchange about a digital household assistant and its dangers was just the modern twist I've been yearning for. That said, those scenes only take up about a third of the book with the other two thirds being the aforementioned fight scene and technical babble about chemical compounds that while giving it a real world feel go on for too long without adding anything else. I really don't know if I'll be sticking with this, we're three issues in but there isn't a cohesive feel or a truly compelling hook yet which are definitely elements you need in order to tell a twelve chapter story.
On the art side I love how lean Hitch's Batman is, it's a modern take on the 70's look that I just adore...but although the art is solid it's just not special enough to carry on a ten page fight scene and keep my interest. There are artists who create lush worlds that can carry a book without a single word and while Hitch's artwork is clean, detailed and technically fantastic it doesn't have the depth to really make you care. Perhaps that's not a truly fair assumption, perhaps if left to his own devices he could tell a compelling Batman story with images alone, but that's not what he's put on the page so far and I'm not expecting that to change.
I keep seeing that said but it just isn't true. While stories with a lot of exposition at the start or an introspective pace can benefit from being read in a single sitting rather than an episodic release those aren't the problems that plague The Batman's Grave, if anything being collected will only compound the pacing issues we've seen so far, while ten page fight scenes make for poor episodic reading when collected together they'll create a very uneven and unnatural pace that will sure to be maddening.