Recently, one of the longest-running comic books achieved quite the milestone when Detective Comics from DC published issue #1100!
WHAT HAPPENED?
Here’s how this event was chronicled in a news release from DC:
In March 1937, a comic book was published that changed the world as we know it. Now, 1,099 issues later, some of comics’ top talents have gathered to celebrate the comic that birthed a legend!
Tom Taylor and Mikel Janín join forces once again to tell a heartfelt and action-packed story of Batman rescuing a young boy’s best friend. Greg Rucka and Álvaro Martínez Bueno team up for a tale that asks the question: was Gotham better off before Batman? Mariko Tamaki reunites with Detective Comics collaborator Amancay Nahuelpan for a yarn that explores Bruce Wayne’s world outside of the cowl and how his double life as Batman intersects with his alter ego’s actions. Dan Watters and legendary artist Bill Sienkiewicz bring us a story that illustrates just how similar Batman’s motivations are to the criminals he has sworn to fight and how he fights against his own darkness.
Even with legacy numbering these days, it’s something unusual when a comic reaches the issue number Detective now has reached! By the way, I did read it, and I enjoyed all the stories, but particularly that first one with no dialogue! Nicely done!
Of course, long-time Batman fans remember that the Dark Knight debuted in issue #27 of Detective Comics, which DC also recently recognized. Given Batman’s popularity these days, it’s quite the thing to see such an accomplishment taking place!
He was created in response to the development of Superman in Action Comics. The story is often told that, when the Man of Steel hit the ground running, the company wanted another character to duplicate that success. Bob Kane was approached, and he drew inspiration from Leonardo da Vinci’s ornithopter, a flying machine with bat-like wings. Of course, recently Bill Finger’s contributions to the development of Batman have received the recognition they deserve as well!
IS IT REALLY STILL ‘DETECTIVE COMICS’?
I often am a little flustered at the fact that it is still called Detective Comics even though the stories of the Dark Knight often are NOT detective tales.
Batman is often referred to as the “World’s Greatest Detective,” but his stories aren’t often focusing on him using those particular skills. Instead, they most often look at Batman more as an adventurer, chasing the bad guys instead of using his wits to figure out just who is to blame or exactly what has happened.
Look, I understand that detective stories, ones that solve mysteries, are often a lot more difficult to write than one with a lot of punching and kicking, “POW,” “BIFF,” and the like taking place. You have to know what the end result will be so you can weave your way to that conclusion. I do enjoy a good mystery, and I wish there were more stories in that genre happening in comics today. They used to be all the rage, and it’s true that some of them were kind of outrageous. For instance, a man on his deathbed would scribble “-Q” on a paper near his fast-fading body. That referred to a telephone dial which, at that time, didn’t have the letter “q” on it. The murderer’s last name was indeed Dial, pointing Batman to the bad guy. I doubt that I would, in my last moments alive, think of something so complex and puzzling in an attempt to identify my killer. But it was a fun story to follow the Dark Knight as he figured out what took place, and I learned a little fun fact that might come in handy someday.
I wish that, even occasionally, we’d get to read more detective stories in comic books!
MY FAVORITE BATMAN STORIES!
All the years I’ve been a fan of Batman, as much as I admire his ability to take on Bane and other big baddies in hand-to-hand combat, the times he’s relied on his brain have always been the ones I’ve enjoyed the most.
In the comics, I particularly enjoyed the Mark Waid JLA story “Tower of Babel.” Someone begins attacking individual Leaguers very effectively, and Batman recognizes these methods as ways he had figured out to take the other heroes down if he ever needed to. When Batman tells his teammates what’s going on, they (and many fans reading the story) were shocked that the Dark Knight had figured out ingenious ways to neutralize his teammates’ powers. If you want to know who is behind all this, you can likely pick up the trade at a comics shop near you! Batman did figure it all out, but this all led to the Dark Knight leaving the team for a while.
The next time I really enjoyed a Batman story took place in Batman: The Animated Series in the episode “Riddler’s Reform”when the Riddler trapped Batman in a building about to explode. After the place was turned to rubble, Riddler was pronouncing the Dark Knight gone when Batman barged into the room and took the Riddler down. Edward Nigma couldn’t figure out how Batman escaped, and the episode ends with Riddler in Arkham Asylum, yelling at the top of his lungs, “How did he do it? I have to know!” Luckily, Bruce tells us viewers how he did it, though!
I like it when Batman outwits others, particularly the villains!
I figure that’s how Dick Grayson learned how to lead the Titans so strategically… he saw how Bruce handled all this!
I guess short of genuine detective stories, this kind of tale will do for now!
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