Batman Volume 7: Endgame is Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo’s latest addition of their Batman series. Engame is the sinister return of the Joker after his disappearance at the end Batman Vol. 3 Death of the Family. He’s back for their final showdown. For years, the Joker has regarded Batman with a sick, twisted love, thinking that one could never exist without the other. Last time the Joker set to kill members of Batman’s team, removing a weakness of the hero but now, he’s just out to kill Batman. The Joker has returned to Gotham City with a deadlier plan than ever before and is finally going to kill the Dark Knight. Collects Batman #35 - 40.
This is it, one of the biggest Batman Joker epics ever told, for decades the Clown Prince of Crime and the Dark Knight have battled it out for years with the Joker stooping to new lows and different forms of evil. The Joker’s latest agenda is to end all that and end the Batman once and for all. He’s deadly serious this time. The Joker’s first appearance in this New 52 Batman series was The Death of the Family story arc where he had returned to Gotham City after a year long disappearance after his face was cut off and reattached with belts, wires and hooks. Batman had thought he was gone for good at the end of the story. In this sequel, Joker has re-emerged with his face somehow repaired and he’s back with a vengeance this time. This story takes place after the events of Batman Eternal, Batman has a new base in Gotham and Alfred’s daughter Julia, who now works with Batman in his new base. Things kick off when Bruce Wayne is attack by members of the Justice League and battles the heroes on the streets of Gotham. Batman is horrified to learn that the Joker is behind the attack. What follows is a creepy, and sometimes bone chilling story. As the curtain is lifted on where the Joker has been hiding all this time is the first big chilling revelation of the sinister story. New light is shed on who the Joker is, it’s a thrilling read. Writer Scott Snyder first began his comic’s career writing horror comics, his unique style of horror had carried over to his Batman work and it’s been more evident in this Endgame story arc. His entire run has been horror driven, both the story arcs featuring the Joker have had a claustrophobic setting and a callous disregard for human life.
It’s a bit of a mind flip at times, twists turns and revelations, it messes with the readers head as well as Batman’s. What you thought to be true isn’t. its incredibly satisfying that readers are right there with a perplexed batman, so often is the Dark Knight depicted as a figure one step ahead of everyone else. One of the greatest stories of Batman run by Snyder and artist Greg Capullo, his artwork on the series reaches new heights of creative and gruesome imagery in Snyder’s masterful storytelling. The art complements to the horror elements of the tale. The ending duel is one the most brutal and bloodiest comic book battles I’ve ever read, this two icons slugging it out in a bloody frenzy to the end. It will considered as one of the greatest Batman Joker stories ever told.
Death of the Family was the first Joker story of the New 52 Batman series, Endgame is a brilliant sequel to one of the most significant stories of Snyder and Capullo’s Batman series. Endgame offers up a new mysterious origin for the Joker adding new mystery to who the Clown Prince of Crime was before what happened him in Zero Year, whilst still preserving the mystique that makes the Joker who he is. Endgame is an appropriate title for the story act, not only was the story originally intended to be both the creators final arc on their four year Batman run, that celebrated both the 75th anniversary of Batman and the debut of The Joker but it’s conclusion drastically changes the status quo of the Batman universe, opening the door to many new possibilities of storytelling. Endgame reads and feels like the finale, with its call-backs to the Court of the Owls and Zero Year events and serving as a sequel to The Death of the Family made it easy to imagine this as the series finale by Snyder and Capullo, thankfully it’s not. The creators aren’t jumping ship at a time they’ve made the title more interesting. It’s their second Joker epic is a brilliant story adding new mystery to an already mysterious character.
Batman Volume 7 Endgame brings a brutal and bloody conclusion between the Batman and Joker long running conflict to a close for who knows how long. Its display of action, tension and dark moments. Even though it may feel like another Batman Joker story this is the one to end all Batman Joker stories with raised stakes than ever before. Taking what has been done before and injecting it with more excitement. Batman Endgame is the biggest, boldest story told to date and will be for a long time, a modern classic. It’s the biggest story line during the creative duo’s excellent four year run on the series. A thrilling story of the most famous rivalries in comic’s history in honour of its 75th anniversary.
Batman Volume 6 Graveyard Shift is the next collection from the foremost and greatest series of New 52 Batman by Writer Scott Snyder and Artist Greg Capullo. Following the last big event Zero Year, the next volume was due to be the subsequent big saga titled End Game, but instead this collection consists of stories that came in between Snyder and Capullo’s big sagas. The duo have been producing big epic long saga since the New 52 began, starting with The Court of Owls, Death of the Family and the epic Zero Year. The single issues collected are the short self-contained stories and are from different eras in Batman’s career; past present and near future. Written or plotted by Snyder with art by Capullo with a few guest artists, Alex Maleev, Andy Kubert, Dustin Nguyen and more. Collects Batman #0, #18-20, #28, #34, and Batman Annual #2.
The collection begins with Bright New Yesterday from Batman #0, it acts like a primer to the first part of the Zero Year that see’s possibly Bruce Wayne’s first interaction with the Red Hood Gang and his earliest attempts at fighting crime. When we first read the opening pages of Batman Zero Year Secret City Vol 4 Bruce is taking on the gang and their leader Red Hood One has previously met the vigilante, this could be that first meeting. Plus it further confirms in The New 52 universe that Red Hood One is the man that becomes the Joker. It has snippets of some great character moments for Bruce, Alfred and Jim Gordon. The backup story was an interesting feature showing how Batman indirectly inspired members of the Bat-family; the first three Robins and Batgirl in a superb framing device. The main story takes place just after Bruce has returned from Gotham for the first time in his crime fighting quest, it’s a first look at his pre Batman days continued from Batman #24 as collected in the fourth and fifth volumes of this graphic novel series of graphic novels.
The death of Robin/Damien Wayne occurred in the series Batman Incorporated #8 by Grant Morrison. The effects are felt in the Requiem crossover event that follows his demise, his father Batman and team mourn him, despite their continued commitment to fighting crime. Issue #18 is part of that event, Resolve is told from the perspective of Harper Row, a character created earlier in the series and makes her appearance in first of two of the stories in this book. In her first she is seeking to help Batman with whatever emotional problem he’s dealing with as he is becoming increasingly violent and careless. She’s the main character for the story and fulfils a familiar role as that of the third Robin Tim Drake after the death of the second Robin/Jason Todd in 1989’s A Death in the Family.
The best and biggest part of these stories is Nowhere Man from issues #19 and 20, an entertaining mystery action story with a classic Batman foe. When I first got Vol.4 of the series I was kind of disappointed it left out issue #19 from being collected. Its cover featured Bruce Wayne holding a gun to Jim Gordon was intriguing and is finally collected here. It’s a pretty straight-forward story, as it appears Bruce is taking hostages at gunpoint at Gotham National Bank. It’s a story more concerned with building a fun mystery for the readers to enjoy without having to play to a larger narrative. It also juggles to notion aspect of Batman’s secret identity being exposed, something not seen in Batman comics of recent and gives it an almost silver age feel to it. The story is the stand out of the collection and the two part back up story; Ghost Lights is a supernatural demon story with Superman checking up on how Batman is coping. It plays to Superman’s weaknesses to the supernatural and is a good read. Ages is an Arkham Asylum centric story as Batman gets himself incarnated in to test its security first hand. The story is told from the perspective of a new orderly who meets the first patient of the facility who’s angered by how Batman has changed the Asylum for the worst. It’s a good story and the opening splash page of Batman in handcuffs is great opening to an intriguing story. The Meek old fashioned dark detective story of Batman tracking a serial killer that’s targeting the patients of Dr. Leslie Tompkins. The timeline of this standalone tale takes place concurrently with Snyder’s other series Batman Eternal. Set six months after current continuity Batman Eternal breaks away from usual timeline as Snyder offers a sneak peek into a future Gotham and its criminal underworld. Issue #28 acts a preview of things to come in Batman Eternal.
Batman Vol. 6 is a really enjoyable book that enriches both the series and the character. Bright New Yesterday and Nowhere Man is the kind of story we’ve come to expect from the creative duo while other stories venture into new and different territory with guest artists. While the stories at the start and end are set six years in the past and a Gotham future yet to come, the core of the book’s stories take place in the present with the overarching theme of Batman dealing with the death of his son and crime fighting partner.
Since their debut on Batman, Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo have been almost consistently focused on telling sweeping epics; Court of Owls was almost a year long, Death of the Family was a multi-faceted Bat-family event and Zero Year is another year-long tale. Graveyard Shift takes a step back from the big stories to present smaller scale ones, these are the stories in between those big sagas that were previously missed during the earlier graphic novel releases. It’s a welcome change of pace and offers a breather before Snyder and Capullo’s next big epic; Endgame that see’s the return of the Joker for a story that’s expected to be another amazing story with some big ramifications in the upcoming next release Batman Vol. 7 Endgame.
Batman Volume 5: Zero Year Dark City is the next part of the Zero Year story line that ended on a cliff-hanger in the last collection; Batman Volume 4 Zero Year Secret City, in which Bruce Wayne became Batman and successfully stopped the Red Hood gang. After that confrontation Edward Nygma made his presence known as The Riddler and in his first appearance announcing his control over Gotham, shutting off its power and challenging its residents of to rise up to the challenge to turn it back on. Also, the Gotham City Police Department's gruesome discovery sets up the main conflicts for the concluding chapters in this large scale story arc.
Having witnessed Bruce Wayne become the Batman in the last collection, Dark City is the first big challenge in the Batman’s career. He has to save the whole city while being public enemy number one in the eyes of the GCPD. The Riddler’s blackout is not Batman’s primary concern, a series of suspicious and gruesome murders are, wherein the victim’s bones grew out of their own bodies. Doctor Death was one of Batman’s original enemies; being the very first super villain Batman faced, first appearing in Detective Comics #29 in 1939, two issues after Batman’s original appearance. Zero Year Secret City featured the Red Hood, an early Batman villain, the same trend continues here in this re imagining of The Dark Knight's early crime fighting career. Both Doctor Death and the Red Hood are important players in the whole Zero Year saga, they both go way back to the earliest Batman adventures in the Golden Age of comics. Writer Scott Snyder takes one of the first villains he ever faced and puts him into the New 52 continuity as one of Batman’s first super villains. Dr. Karl Helfern, a scientist working on a bone growing serum whose experiments have turned him into a grotesque monster. The results of which have been teased in the final pages of the preceding volume. It’s a throwback to the mad scientist style of villain, Dr. Death provides the physical challenge to Batman in the first part of the story in which The Riddler can’t give. He’s also strikingly designed by Artist Greg Capullo, this modern revamp of the character is the most monstrous, disgusting and grotesque villain created and is extremely well suited to Capullo’s artistry, a most vile creation.
Edward Nygma’s New 52 origin was revealed in the first installment of Zero Year , it reveals that Nygma was once a high level employee of Wayne Enterprises and later becomes The Riddler, causing the blackout. The groundwork had been set and initially The Riddler hovers in the background as an unpredictable threat causing chaos in Gotham. He is not a physical challenge to Batman instead possess a sharp intelligence and cunning mind used to devastating effect. It’s more that just a battle of wits in the biggest scheme in the history of The Riddler. An entirely new version of the character, it’s startling and exciting to reveal as to what this new Riddler is capable of. Snyder has taken the classic Batman villain and has made him work so well in a contemporary Batman story. Some elements of Batman’s early days are somewhat predetermined. The Riddler’s schemes are not, which effectively makes the threat of Zero Year all the more terrifying. Giving Batman challenges unlike ones he’s ever faced before: A broken city, self doubt, and challenges to the essential functions of Batman himself.
In my experience of previous Batman origin tales, Bruce Wayne had always trusted Jim Gordon to some degree. He was the one good cop in Gotham. Their trust and mutual respect was always the foundation of that partnership. In this case, Bruce loathed and hated Jim Gordon along with the rest of the GCPD. It is a terrific addition to the story, Bruce saw Gordon as corrupt, distinctive of Gotham’s law enforcement and part of what turned him into a vigilante. Dark City examines Gordon’s tenure within the GCPD and puts a face to corruption that drove Bruce into taking matters into his own hands. It is a terrific addition to the story; He saw Gordon as corrupt, distinctive of Gotham’s law enforcement and part of drove Bruce into taking matters into his own hands. Dark City examines Gordon’s tenure within the GCPD and puts a face to corruption. This offers a change in the approach of how Gordon and Batman get to work together. The other part of that legend remains unchanged; a young beat cop named Jim Gordon was first on the scene to comfort the boy after the murder of his parents. His role remains the same and the event remains fully intact, it’s what comes after their faithful meeting that is altered so much that young Bruce Wayne grows up hating him. This turn of events adds a new mystery to their story giving readers and fans a twist on their iconic relationship. In the past, Jim had to prove that he would be worthy ally of Batman, Zero Year takes things one step further, personalizing the story to Bruce. Gordon had to earn back Bruce’s trust in order to earn Batman’s. After ripping down the foundation of trust between them, readers and long time fans now get to see this iconic partnership grow once more.
While the partnership of Batman and Gordon is unquestionably vital to the mythos, no other relationship is as commensurate as the one between Bruce and the ever supportive Alfred Pennyworth. While he has often shown to worry about Bruce and his protégés in the past, we now are given a depiction of Alfred constantly against Bruce’s mission. They've always had a conflict and difference of opinions and beliefs. Eventually though, Alfred proves that he basically simply wants the best for Master Bruce, and that he’ll always be there for him. He may not always fully understand or support his Master’s mission but will be ever dependable. Infusing a great deal of meaning and significance to a already meaningful relationship by adding dramatic elements that helped unite the pair in a way never seen before /innovative manner of story telling.
Bruce Wayne of Zero Year Dark City is still a refreshing change of pace from the dark and brooding persona that we've come to know. He’s less honed and regal, taking joy in what he does, a victorious smirk creeps across his face on occasion. He takes joy in what he is doing, his remark about a newly acquired scar he received as “First real kiss of Gotham” is telling of his attitude to his chosen undertaking. Zero Year Batman is a less experienced crime fighter capable of failure, he is still learning, he is vulnerable and the task at hand is too large to do on his own, it’s nice to see emphasis on the heroes without masks that carry Bruce when he falls. This is truly an origin story that enriches Batman’s character significantly, facing his deadliest challenge in his early career. This is a Batman driven by his guilt rather than vengeance. Bruce Wayne is The Batman and not the other way around as has been established over the decades.
Earlier story arcs in this best selling and critically acclaimed Batman series by Snyder and Capullo have been ambitiously large adventures but pale contrast to the Zero Year saga in terms of its sheer scale. A rookie Batman against mad machinations of monstrous Dr. Death and the ingenious of The Riddler, with only newly founded allies of both Jim Gordon and Lucius Fox to aid him in ultimately stopping Nygma’s control over Gotham City. That moment that the story has always been building to, Gotham City in ruins and Batman about to face his foe, teased way back in Batman #21 at the beginning of this story arc.
Snyder and Capullo add plenty of Batman references/easter eggs throughout, paying homage to what has gone before his re-interpretation of the Batman. The final act has a slight reminiscence of The Dark Knight Rises film.
Whereas Batman Year One was slightly more focused on Jim Gordon, Zero Year is a Bruce Wayne story. Presenting Batman’s formative years in the face of Gotham’s biggest threat, while giving insight of both characters pasts. Origin stories can typically be a short mini series or short story arc outlining the highlights of that hero’s journey. Zero Year is a large scale story, told within the pages of this Batman series, It is the origin of one of comics best heroes. Not just how Bruce Wayne came to be The Batman, but how Batman became the protector of his beloved city in the time when it was most in need. The conclusion is a deep and meaningful ending that gives new meaning to a symbolic connection of Batman and his city.
Batman is a character that is infinitely renewable, Zero Year was never intended to override what came before it instead Snyder simply/merely wanted to give his own interpretation of Batman’s origin in a modern contemporary setting of the New 52, Refining and giving us a new Batman going forward for the 75 year old character. Before Robin, the Batmobile and The Joker there was ZERO YEAR, a new take on Batman’s origin unlike any before. A 12 issue story arc offering an expanded and broader scope of an origin story. It doesn't have the appeal of a single short trade paperback graphic novel but instead Zero Year is a large scale and grand adventure, both action-packed and clever to the end. An epic story not to be overlooked and is in my opinion essential Batman story and must read.
Batman Volume 7: Endgame is Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo’s latest addition of their Batman series. Engame is the sinister return of the Joker after his disappearance at the end Batman Vol. 3 Death of the Family. He’s back for their final showdown. For years, the Joker has regarded Batman with a sick, twisted love, thinking that one could never exist without the other. Last time the Joker set to kill members of Batman’s team, removing a weakness of the hero but now, he’s just out to kill Batman. The Joker has returned to Gotham City with a deadlier plan than ever before and is finally going to kill the Dark Knight. Collects Batman #35 - 40.
