With nods to Batman ’66 and Batman: The Animated Series thrown in for good measure…
I don’t read ongoing series very much anymore. It’s not a knock on the creators by any means, it’s just that the storytelling style, decompression, event intrusion, and whatnot generally don’t leave me satisfied. With a couple of exceptions — Nightwing by Tom Taylor and World’s Finest by Mark Waid, and their artistic collaborators — I tend to stick with self-contained, limited series, where you can rely on a beginning, a middle, an end, and a consistency of approach.
That’s one of the major reasons I’m so excited for the upcoming Batman and Robin: Year One, by Waid and Chris Samnee, and Batman: The Long Halloween — The Last Halloween, by Jeph Loeb and a cast of thousands that kicked off in full this week.
But there’s now a third limited series that’s entered the picture that has the potential to play with those big boys — Batman: Dark Patterns, by writer Dan Watters, artist Hayden Sherman, colorist Tríona Farrell and letterer Frank Cvetkovic. That’s a pretty bold statement considering the pedigree of the first two maxiseries I mentioned, but check out this description from DC that was released with this month’s solicitations:
Main cover by Hayden Sherman.
“Set during the early years of Batman’s career, Batman: Dark Patterns delves into four mysterious cases as he attempts to cement his place as Gotham City’s protector while the city itself fights back against him. This is the Dark Knight Detective at his most stripped-down core, a man relying on his wits, his skills, and little else as he tackles some of the most twisted mysteries Gotham City and its protector have ever encountered,” the copy, which describes the series as “lo-fi” and “mystery-focused,” reads.
Sounds an an awful lot like a contemporary take on the earliest 1939-40 Batman stories from Detective Comics, doesn’t it?
Love Tríona Farrell’s flat colors.
“I love the strangeness of Batman. A man dressed as a huge, gothic bat, solving crimes in a hostile city of black magicians, mad scientists, and superstitious, cowardly criminals. I’ve always wanted to write a series of mystery stories that would home in on that aspect of the character—a dweller in the shadows of Gotham’s towering, dilapidated spires,” Watters said.
“After watching The Batman, this desire was reaffirmed. Batman: Dark Patterns explores the pulpiest part of the Dark Knight’s rich history and gives readers an entirely new perspective on the early years of DC’s Dark Detective,” he added, using the term coined by legendary Bat-writer Steve Englehart.
It’s that “new perspective” that intrigues me. There have been a lot of great re-tellings of Batman’s early, “mysterioso” days — Matt Wagner’s Batman and the Monster Men and Batman and the Mad Monk are two sterling examples — but they tend to give us updated takes on classic villains or storylines. This year’s rock solid The Bat-Man: First Knight by Dan Jurgens and Mike Perkins trod similar ground but actually took place in 1939.
Dark Patterns, on the other hand, promises something modern couched in the ’39 Batman sensibility — but with flourishes from other aspects of Batlore, including the 1966 Batman TV show and Batman: The Animated Series.
Shakespeare head!
A Batmobile that combines elements of the Batman: The Animated Series and The New Batman Adventures versions.
So long as we don’t get some unnecessary and trite “Earth-shattering” retcon of Batman’s origin that promises to “change the Dark Knight’s life forever,” I’m down for the ride.
The 12-issue series comprises four, three-part standalone stories. The first mystery, “We Are Wounded,” involves a series of appropriately gruesome murders that may be the work of a serial killer — or something even worse.
Stevan Subic variant
Batman: Dark Patterns #1 is due Dec. 11.
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MORE
— FIRST LOOK! The BATMAN AND ROBIN: YEAR ONE Trade Dress and Color Pages. Click here.
— 13 THINGS We Want to See in BATMAN AND ROBIN: YEAR ONE — RANKED. Click here.
