Amph Batman Really Begins: Batman in Chronological Order: Disc. Batman Versus Predator III: Blood Ties!

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Is there a more recognizable symbol than this? Well, yeah, sure, a ton actually. But that?s no slight to the Caped Crusader, the Dark Knight, the Batman. Batman has long been the most fascinating comic book superhero to me. Perhaps it?s because he isn?t actually a superhero at all, but rather an ordinary man, with no superpowers except a huge fortune, physical perfection and the luck of the Gods. Perhaps its because he is the easiest of the superheros to really psychoanalyze. Perhaps its because of his ever shifting persona and the way that persona both reflects and distorts the era in which the character exists. Perhaps its because I?ve always been a fan of film noir and Batman is the closest comic analogue to that, or was at least.

Probably, it?s some combination of all these things. Regardless, it has long been my intention to explore Batman at great depth and length. I am wont do do those things, you know. You do know, right? Of course you do. If you?ve been around very long, you?ll know my X-Files thread, my Star Wars EU thread, my Indiana Jones thread, my Lord of the Rings thread, my 24 thread. This thread . . . is more of the same.

We?ll be looking at every appearance of Batman in the comics, but also on television, on the big screen, in novel format, in video game guise. We?ll start at the beginning and, with a methodical unhurried pace, we?ll work through the history of this character. Gunslinger, detective, scientist, hero, villain, cartoon, this Batman has been them all. He?s been a flat out heroic character, a wounded dark figure of psychological complexity, a purposely campy piece of performance art and . . . a Lego character. Elseworlds has made him a vampire, a murderer, a robot, and more. The cowl has been worn by many on, if you can keep it all straight, many different Earths. But on this Earth, he has always been a figure of archetypal myth. But even myths have beginnings.

The Case of the Chemical Syndicate ? Bill Finger, Bob Kane

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Detective Comics, #27 (May 1939)

*So, it begins. Detective Comics is, of course, the flagship comic book of DC and, it might be helpful to remember when the multiple earths start getting a little thick, the title that gave DC its initials. At the end of the day, for all the capes and explosions and such, DC is about detective stories.

*Detective Comics had been clicking along nicely for 26 issues since its beginning in 1937. And then suddenly, in issue 27, a new character appears on the cover and we are told that ?starting this issue? we will be privy to ?the amazing and unique adventures of The Batman!?

*First of all, let?s just all take a moment to consider the 10 cent price of this comic book.

*Done? Good, let?s dry our eyes and move on, shall we?

*So, this first story is a six pager; the rest of Detective Comics #27 is given over to . . . other things. I was originally going to read the entire runs of any comic series in which Batman appeared. That, even for me, was just way too much. So, as to the rest of this issue, I leave it up to you completists to fill us in.

*This story, by the by, can be found in the fabulous The Batman Chronicles, Vol. 1, along with the next several stories we?ll talk about.

*The Bat-Man by Rob?t Kane. Rob?t, huh?

*So this story begins with Commissioner James Gordon and his young friend, Bruce Wayne, sharing a pipe together and discussing the mysterious Bat-Man. A call comes in that Lambert, the Chemical King, has been found stabbed. Wayne accompanies Gordon on his visit to the Lambert mansion.

*A call comes in from one of Lambert?s partners, Steven Crane. He has received a threat on his life and fears he will be the next to die. Bruce excuses himself, knocking his pipe out against his hand.

* ?Meanwhile Steven Crane sits in his library with a feeling of impending danger . . .? I hate it when that happens.

*So, Crane gets k

 

Oh, good lord. Another one.

Love it, though. Batman is one of the great characters of pop culture and a wonderfully interesting figure. I can't wait to see your take on him.

 

I didn't read the title properly and assumed this was your Middle Earth thread ... and was curious how 'chemical syndicate' worked with Tolkien.

 

Man. So you'll be wrapping this up in...thirty or so years?

 

As with my Star Wars project, I think this will probably be incomplete when I die.

 

You're definitely crazy, but I'll be following along. Good luck!

 

Holy crap, an excuse to bust out my copies of the Batman Chronicles!

Ah, yes, the start of the other great Batman tradition: Bob Kane systematically screwing over everyone else that works with him. Right off the bat - no pun intended - we're already suffering from a decided lack of Bill Finger acknowledgement, and it only got more pronounced when Bob got rich and Bill got nothing. The saddest part of all of this is that Finger was arguably the co-creator, if not even more responsible for the iconic Batman character and look than Kane was. Fortunately we learned from our mistakes and nowadays Bill Finger gets a by-line in film credits and has a prestigious comic writing award that bears his name, but the entire debacle makes the Siegel/Shuster Superman shafting seem like child's play.

The other fun fact for this story is that Bob Kane is already relying on other people to do some of his work for him - Sheldon Moldoff did what little background art there was. This is eventually going to grow into a massive artistic cover-up where Kane starts getting people to do all of his work, whether the executives gave him permission to or not. Of course, thanks to that we have Jerry Robinson, so I suppose it's a minor trade-off.

One thing I always liked about this story that Rogue didn't touch upon - well, I guess he did indirectly - was that Batman originally showed up with no backstory at all. Why is Bruce Wayne, millionaire playboy and socialite, going around killing crooks while dressed in a goofy costume? Surely it has nothing to do with his parents.

 

What?! You can't just introduce a character in their status quo in the first issue! Haven't they seen any of the franchise-starting comic book movies from the last decade??

You mean audiences are supposed to care about who this character is in the here and now!?

How do you make a character captivating without an extensive backstory? That just seems like so much more work for the writers/artists...

 

I am so game for this thread, and have been since Rogue1.5 (whose name has too many hyphens to spell out properly) mentioned it was in the works a while back. I'm a huge aficionado of the character in most of his many, many many incarnations, and I'm really looking forward to see how Rogue breaks it down for us in his inimitable and delightfully irreverent prose style.

Darthramza touched upon the character's co-creation by Kane and Finger, and I think that bears some fleshing out. This wiki entry explains the genesis of the Batman quite nicely, and I recommend reading it to anyone intrigued by the character.

In short, in the wake of Superman's success, National (later DC) called for more superheroes for its various titles. Bob Kane -- influenced by silent films The Mark of Zorro and The Bat Whispers, and by pulp fiction character Doc Savage, comics characters The Shadow and The Phantom, and the more literary detective Sherlock Holmes -- came up with "the Bat-Man" who, in the words of Bill Finger, had "reddish tights, I believe, with boots ? no gloves, no gauntlets ? with a small 'domino' mask [like Robin's], swinging on a rope. He had two stiff wings that were sticking out, looking like bat wings...."

Finger suggested a cowl, a cape and gloves, and removed the red color, and an icon was born.

The first issue, "written in the style of the pulps" according to Finger, and which Rogue has so eloquently reviewed in the OP, was immediately a big hit, and the character, of course, remains one of the most recognizable (and financially successful!) characters in the world.

On with the show! To the bat-poles, Rogue!

 

Holy appropriate shout-outs!

 

Almost shot you a PM, Merlin, but I was like, "He'll show up." And now I see that ramza also appears to be something of an expert! So, Quest, the real question is Can R1.5 continue justifying his own bloviating in the face of, not one, but two, actual experts?!

The backstory of Kane and Finger is quite interesting; but just wait! You won't believe the amount of credit for shaping the character I try to give to Gardner Fox! But more on that later.

Frenchy Blake?s Jewel Gang ? Bill Finger, Bob Kane

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Detective Comics, #28 (June 1939)

*Another six pager. It can also be found in The Batman Chronicles, Vol. 1. This one begins with a young newsboy selling papers about a ?fifth sensational robbery.?

*The newsboy is shouting, ?Wuxtry!? He says it twice. I mean, I guess that?s supposed to be ?Extra? and I?ve heard it rendered before as ?Extry,? but what the hell is that ?w? doing on the front? Wuxtry? I mean, that?s a little odd, isn?t it?

*So, Batman catches up to two of the jewel thieves on the next job they pull. He flings one of them off the roof and knocks the other unconscious.

*I feel I should mention that in this issue, Batman does not wear gloves.

*Batman then makes the police think that he was involved in the jewel robbery. The narrator promises us that we?ll understand why this is shortly.

*So, here?s the explanation. We catch up to Frenchy in his hideout reading the paper: ?One good thing though. The cops think ?Bat-Man? is in on it. Now that means they?ll be watching for him and that leaves us free to continue our work.?

*The narrator then says, ?This is why the Batman wanted to be connected with the robberies . . . so that the jewel thieves would think they weren?t being watched and would continue giving the Batman the opportunity of their capture.?

*What the . . . ?

*Okay, whatever, let ?s just move on.

*So, Batman ends up capturing Frenchy. He ties a rope around his waist and throws him out the window and says he?ll drop him unless he writes a confession.

*It seems that this would not hold up in court. But whatever.

*Brief appearance of Commissioner Gordon reading the note that Batman pinned to Frenchy Blake?s coat when he dropped him at the police station.

*Once again, it seems that Batman has no real villains to test his mettle against. It feels a little odd to see Batman fighting simple jewel thieves. But this is hardly the oddest thing he?s going to fight in his run, I suppose.

*Also, Body Count: 3.

*Next time, The Batman Meets Doctor Death! At last, a spectacular villain. I hope.

 

That sort of gives me a Dark Knight vibe, probably because of the scene with the Joker. Interesting.


Well, as long as the bad guys can bold and dumb, Batman can catch 'em, right?

Doctor Death? Sounds interesting.

 

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The question is, can we find a weakness in his insanity, and exploit it?

 

The funny thing is . . . I'm wearing exactly that shade of lipstick right now.

 

*The narrator then says, ?This is why the Batman wanted to be connected with the robberies . . . so that the jewel thieves would think they weren?t being watched and would continue giving the Batman the opportunity of their capture.?

Minor point of pedantic nerdism here, Rogue.

Are you spelling that name correctly? In his first appearance in DC #27, the name is rendered (in all caps, of course) "the Bat-Man", with a hyphen. The next issue I have access to is #29, which gives the name "the Bat Man", with a space but no hyphen. Have you typed the name accurately, as it's spelled in #28? Or is that a bit of editorial imposition on your part?

As an aside, it seems to me that Batman's ploy to make the crooks think they could act freely, since the heat was on the Bat, was quite clever and does not invite the "What the...?" response you've given. So there, nyaa.

 

Pretty bland one, but then, it's following the introduction of the character and comes right before the first multi-story Batman villain ever so it tends to get lost in the shuffle. Perhaps rightly so - golden age Batman fought dozens upon dozens of one-shot mobsters and thieves, so the second such story isn't worth noting. Hell, he hasn't even guaranteed himself cover space yet, as you can see, so we've yet to hit the real stride. On the other hand, right now is still prime time for the non-Flanderdized, more Shadow-esque caped crusader.

Speaking of the Shadow, the pulp character was remarkable in that, unlike our Weird Figure of the Night, he was a total unknown for about half of his run - his secret identity wasn't revealed until six years after his debut (By contrast, the radio version was a millionaire socialite playboy [voiced by Orson Welles!] who went around fighting evil in his free time - that, of course, doesn't sound familiar in the least bit). He didn't show up in comics until 1940, but his influence on the medium as a whole has been pretty far reaching. You may also recognize him from a mediocre 1990s film starring Alec Baldwin, except for the pesky fact that said film never happened.

 

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I am gravely disappointed, Rogue1/1/2.. Now I must unlease my Dogs of War..."

 

That was my first thought as well - I looked at that cover and was all "what the heck - Batman isn't even on the cover of a Batman comic???"

This could potentially be the most awesome thread ever Rogue. Please don't disappoint.

 

Yeah, I just purposely decided not to worry about that. I call him "Batman" because that's easiest for me to type. In #28, he has the hyphen still: "Bat-Man" is how it's rendered. Literally, actually; the hyphenated "Bat-Man" is always rendered with quote marks around it, which is strange.

I used to listen to old radio dramas about The Shadow, some of them starring Orson Welles. I saw the movie too, which had an absurdly great cast; Ian McKellen and Tim Curry too. But, you're right, it NEVER HAPPENED.

 

The Batman Meets Doctor Death ? Gardner Fox, Bob Kane

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Detective Comics, #29 (July 1939)

*So, this begins a brief and strange run by Gardner Fox. He?s responsible for what I think is probably the weirdest scene in the entire Batman universe, but we?ll get to that later. This story also begins a new format for the stories: ten pages instead of six.

*This story can be found in The Batman Chronicles, Vol. 1.

*This one opens with a scroll card: ?The Bat Man, eerie figure of the night, has become a legendary figure in the life of the teeming metropolis . . .?

*Metropolis?!

*So, is Doctor Death the first truly great Batman villain? Allow me to quote: ?I have at last completed all my laboratory experiments. My death by pollen extract is definite.?

*Yeah, that?s going to be a no then

*Okay, Doctor Death has a devious plan: ?This man they call the Bat Man . . . He must be done away with! If I knew who he is ? but no one does. I must trap him. Perhaps we can contact him through the personal notice column in the daily newspaper.?

*Fiendishly clever plan, Doctor! Tell me, how long did it take you to come up with this plan? Three minutes?

*Even more absurd, the plan actually works and Bruce reads the personal notice and is lured to a trap in a penthouse apartment.

*Batman actually takes a bullet to the shoulder here, but he?s able to escape using his gas pellet.

* ?Guess I?d better see the family doctor at once. This shoulder is beginning to ache.? ?It?s all right now, Bruce. But how did you shoot yourself when there are no powder marks on your flesh?? ?I do funny things sometimes, Doc.?

*Oh, for cryin? out loud.

*Anyway, Batman trails one of Dr. Death?s henchmen to his lair. He strangles the henchman with a lasso and then he batters Doctor Death with a fire extinguisher, causing Dr. Death to drop some sort of chemical that starts a massive fire.

*The final image of the story is of Batman standing outside the burning laboratory musing, ?Death . . . to Doctor Death.?

*Okay, all you people who bashed Tim Burton?s movie because Batman killed people in it? You can all shut the hell up now.

*Body Count: 5 (except Doctor Death isn?t really dead, so it?s actually only 4, but we?re not supposed to know that yet, I don?t suppose)

*Well, better a guy who tries to murder people with pollen after luring them out via the personal column than some guy who wants to own a chemical company.

*Next time . . . The Return of Doctor Death. Oh, spoiler alert, I guess.

 

*Okay, all you people who bashed Tim Burton?s movie because Batman killed people in it? You can all shut the hell up now.

I'm sure you mean this humorously, but it's unkind and a little hurtful. Will you please refrain from comments like this in the future?

In the comics, Batman's no-kill code has been instituted retroactively all the way back to his origin. Even in Miller's gritty, urban Year One, which was published three years prior to Burton's first film, Batman is depicted as philosophically opposed to the idea of killing.

As a fan of the character, I fully grasp that in his early years Batman showed little or no remorse for the fatal acts of violence he sometimes dealt out to homicidal criminals. Then the character and his worldview evolved, and beginning in the 1940s Batman's conscience would no longer allow him intentionally to deal out death. In my opinion, Burton's depicting on-screen an aspect of the character that was retconned out of his milieu more than forty years prior was a mistake.

I've said my peace, and I don't mean to derail your otherwise awesome thread.

 

Like I always said: Take the original Kane/Finger incarnation of Batman, throw in The Joker from "The Laughing Fish", and you got Batman '89.