40 Years Later — After Reboots and Retellings — BATMAN: YEAR ONE Is Still the Dark Knight’s Quintessential Origin Story
An ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION of the comic-book landmark… By AARON HAMMONDS In 1986, DC Comics was in the midst of rebuilding their continuity from the ground up in the aftermath of Crisis on Infinite Earths. DC saw this as an opportunity to give a facelift to some of their oldest characters, and the first to receive this treatment was the company’s flagship character, Superman, with John Byrne’s The Man of Steel miniseries. Next up on the revamp agenda was Batman. Batman was riding high in the fall of ’86; earlier in the year, Frank Miller had shared with us his grim vision of an older Batman coming out of retirement after Gotham had gone to Hell in a hand basket in The Dark Knight Returns, which had attracted attention not only among comics fans, but the mainstream press (receiving write-ups in publications such as The Village Voice, Rolling Stone, and The Los Angeles Times). DC was eager to capitalize on the success of DKR and tapped Miller to give us the post-Crisis version of Batman’s origin story, to be told within the confines of the hero’s flagship title. Since Batman was already pretty popular just the way he was (in the early days of comics’ “grim and gritty” era), Miller wisely chose to avoid going the Man of Steel route and rewriting Batman’s entire history; instead, he focused on Batman’s first months in Gotham, as he identifies the city’s problems and forges the alliances he’ll need to fight them. Miller was also influenced by real-world events: Since this was being written in 1986 and was going to be based roughly 7-10 years earlier, that would put it in the mid- to late-1970s, a time when urban decay and rising crime was being felt in every major metropolitan area in America. Thus, Batman: Year One was born. (NOTE: Spoilers abound in this article; hey, the story is 40 years old — Batman #404 was released Oct. 21, 1986.) — Batman #404’s Part 1 sets up a parallel narrative that will last throughout the story: Lieutenant Jim Gordon, until recently a cop in Chicago, is arriving in Gotham City by train, having transferred to the Gotham Police Dept. after a scandal of an unexplained nature, while, high above, idle rich jet-setter Bruce Wayne flies back to Gotham after having spent 15 years...
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