Batman #404-407

Batman #404-407

Originally released in 1987

Written by Frank Miller

Art by David Mazzucchelli

After Crisis On Infinite Earths rebooted DC's continuity, time was taken to established a simplified origin for Batman in a story known as "Batman: Year One".  I had heard a lot about this storyline, though to my surprise, Batman shared an equal amount of focus with another character: Jim Gordon, who's established here as a recent transfer from Chicago who arrives in Gotham at the same time that Bruce Wayne returns from his trip around the world.

Bruce Wayne putting what he learned into practice and trying to clean up Gotham's streets is paralleled with Gordon trying to navigate through Gotham's openly corrupt police force.  Meanwhile, Bruce's actions as Batman inspire Selina Kyle to take on a costumed identity of her own.

I could definitely see where movies like Christopher Nolan's "Batman Begins" or Matt Reeves' "The Batman" took their inspiration from this comic, and I thought that the art here was a lot better than the art in Miller's other iconic Batman story "The Dark Knight Returns". (the ugliness of the artstyle in TDKR fit the tone of the story, but it also kept me from getting into the series for years)

For me, the biggest surprise was Jim Gordon. (who's just Lieutenant Gordon at this point; he hasn't risen through the ranks to get his famous Commissioner title yet)  In most of the adaptations that I'm familiar with, he doesn't get much focus - he's consistently portrayed as one of the few honest cops, or even the only honest one, in Gotham, but he's not all that fleshed out.  Nolan's trilogy of movies comes closest, portraying him as one of the only comforting figures in Bruce Wayne's life right after his parents died, but the only hint of moral ambiguity comes from him covering up one person's crimes for the greater good of the city.

Here, his flaws are more apparent.  What starts as hints of adultery turns into him having a full-on affair with his co-worker Sarah Essen, while his wife is pregnant with their second child.  This forces him into a situation where he can only sit back and watch as corruption runs rampant throughout Gotham, as the vile police commissioner Loeb uses this affair as blackmail.

The art and colouring paint Gotham as a city that's on the verge of collapse - grime is virtually everywhere, the police are willing to fire-bomb derelict apartment buildings just to catch one man, and most the citizens seem to be criminals, addicts, pimps and prostitutes, or apathetic.  There are exceptions to this overwhelming gloom in the artwork, but much like within the city of Gotham, they are rare.

Batman: Year One is a gritty grounded drama where the biggest threat that Batman and Gordon have to face isn't maniacal supervillains, well-connected mobsters, or corrupt police commissioners, but rather, the city of Gotham itself.  Reading through these four issues took no time at all, and I was quickly invested in Gordon's story and seeing Bruce develop his new identity.  It's commonly said to be one of the best Batman stories, so anything that I could say about it has likely already been said, but it definitely earned that reputation.