The standard cry of the Grant Morrison fan, when confronted with a weak or underwhelming issue, is to declare “It’s all leading up to something!” It’s certainly been an issue that’s cropped up at various points during his Batman run, with later issues opening up earlier chapters to enlightening re-reads - and now, after the distinctly filler-ish #675, we’ve finally hit the “something” that everything has, indeed, been building up to. Batman RIP is here.

And bugger me, it’s a cracking start. Yes, it’s true that a lot of it consists of recapping disparate elements of the run so far - but as it does, it highlights those parts that were significant (including bits that we may not have already flagged up, such as the arch-nemeses of the Club of Heroes to whom we’re tantalisingly introduced at the beginning) and begins to draw them all together into the cohesive whole. Not a huge amount happens, but as far as setup issues go, this is almost a textbook example of how to do them.

The best moments really come at the very beginning and end. The teasing opening splash is brilliantly bombastic and melodramatic, and is followed by our first hint of the faces behind the “Black Glove” - although both are sequences that raise more questions than they answer. And the closing few pages are superb - a genuinely disturbing scene featuring the Joker (some of it in his head, some of it in reality - it’s a bit tricky to follow on a first glance, but opens up as you read more carefully). I’m sure there are many who won’t care for Morrison’s current version of comics’ greatest villain - but I think he justified the creation of a new “incarnation” perfectly in the prose issue a while back, as well as providing a get-out clause for subsequent writers to restore him to his “classic” style. Here, though, he’s an unsettlingly twisted and demented creation, sneering from behind his scarred face and counterpointing his bloodthirsty nature with his white, almost surgical garb.

Crucial to the creepiness of the Joker is the work put in by Tony Daniel - and as he makes use of Morrison’s established themes of red and black, it’s just as memorable visually as it is for what’s actually happening. I’m extremely impressed by Daniel’s work throughout, in fact - this is the first time he’s felt to me like anything more than a “substitute” artist, and he nails every aspect of the issue, helping to define its look and feel. You suspect that Morrison is tailoring his writing to his strengths for the first time - but by the same token, he’s certainly complementing the writing, especially in that Joker sequence.

Elsewhere it’s all about the neat touches that show you how both writer and artist are in flying form. The fantastic new Batmobile finally makes its entrance (and you can’t help but feel that the line “It’s not how I saw it when I first had the idea” is a reference to the change in artist), Tim Drake gets a significant amount of time as the focal point, and there are some great examples of panel composition, especially when Bruce and Jet are at his parents’ grave. Morrison’s ideas are clearly bursting from his head at a rate of knots - the “Club of Villains” characters, not even introduced by name, are almost too much to take in at once, and he even comes up with an entertaining random rent-a-crook to serve in an early chase sequence.

This is just confident and classy comics, in just about every aspect from the top downward; and that even goes as far as the cover - not just for Alex Ross’ marvellous painting, but the entire design and layout. It’s true that we haven’t yet hit the real “meat” of the story - but what this first part does is enough to suggest that when it does arrive, it’s going to be a hell of an experience.

Tags: batman, Grant Morrison, Tony Daniel
Publisher: DC