Saturday Morning Batman: Detective Comics #32

Cover Date: October 1939

Plot Overview: Batman approaches a carriage that he thinks is carrying the Monk but instead finds a woman named Dala. Dala ends up being a vampire and bites Julie Madison, fiancee to Bruce Wayne. Batman confronts her and she begs for her life. She pleads fear of the Monk and Batman vows to take care of him.

The Monk captures them and hypnotizes Batman. He also summons Julie to his castle. With Julie present, the Monk reveals that he is going to toss Batman into a pit of werewolves. Batman misses a chance to escape but uses his gas pellet to knock out the wolves. Batman finally escapes using the Batarang. Batman finds a silver statue and melts it into a silver bullet. He finds the Monk and Dala and shoots both with the bullet. Julie is freed from the Monk's power as a result.

My Take: There wasn't a lot to the conclusion of the Monk storyline. My main issue with this part is that the writer's seemed to confuse vampire's and werewolves repeatedly in the story. It wasn't a deal breaker or anything but it was annoying enough to take me out of the story.

I felt the art was pretty strong in this issue and they seem to have improved that a lot over the last several issues. The writing was better overall in this issue too. They went for a little more visual storytelling and that helped overall as it cut down on the clunky writing. There were still a few random things happening though. It really just feels unrefined and really shows why comics were considered kids fare at the time.

I strangely don't have the nostalgia for the second half of the Monk storyline like I do for the first half. That's going to effect the grading of this one so...

I give this a D+ overall.

Saturday Morning Batman: Detective Comics #31

Cover Date: September 1939

Plot Overview: While Batman is doing his nightly patrols he comes across Julie Madison, fiancee to Bruce Wayne, as she is about to kill some random man. Batman saves the man and then snaps Julie out of her trance. He takes her home and tells her to tell her fiance Bruce Wayne what has happened. Bruce Wayne takes her to a doctor and he recommends a boat voyage to Hungary. Bruce realizes that the man himself is in a trance but plays along anyway.

Bruce sees Julie off and then becomes Batman. Batman reveals his new Baterang and the Batgyro. He flies the Batgyro to the ship and has Julie explain her plight to them. Just then, the Monk appears and tries to hypnotize Batman. Batman breaks away and uses the Baterang and then makes his escape.

Batman follows them and then searches Paris for Julie. He finds her only to be attacked by a gorilla. Batman escapes only to fall into a net left by the Monk. The Monk tries to lower the trapped Batman into a pit of snakes but Batman makes his escape. Batman chases the Monk but is captured in a cage. The Monk reveals that he is going to feed Julie to werevolves. Just then a rope lowers the gorilla down to finish him off. Batman evades the gorilla and climbs up the rope to safety.

Batman finds Julie and takes her away on the Batgyro. He vows vengeance as the issue comes to a close. Be here next week for the exciting conclusion to this story.

My Take: This story has a very special place in my heart. Around the time the first Michael Keaton movie came out my parents bought me a copy of the first volume of the Greatest Batman Stories Ever Told. I was a huge fan of the Superfriends and the Adam West Batman series at the time and this was my first chance to read Batman comics. This story with the Monk was actually the first Batman comic I had ever read. I carry a lot of nostalgia for this story.

As far as the writing and the art. I find the art to be really good in this story. It's moody and it's creepy and that's just the thing you want for the story that's being told. I also found the art on the regular people to be better than in previous issues. They had been really hit and miss on the art up until the last issue. The writing is again really clunky and the story doesn't exactly make sense if you take it word for word. Batman immediately running after the Monk hypnotized him was a little silly. It wasn't really explained well and you kind of wonder at face value why he just ran off. He could've at least grabbed Julie and ran.

I did enjoy the fact that his felt more like a Batman story than a rip off of some episode of the Shadow. Though there was an episode of the Shadow that used a gorilla in a similar manner as this issue did. But I don't know which came first on that front.

I'd give this a solid C- due to my personal nostalgia for it and the fact that the story isn't too awful.

Saturday Morning Batman: Detective Comics #30

Cover Date: August 1939

Plot Overview: Bruce Wayne opens a newspaper and learns that a man has died under mysterious circumstances. He determines that only Dr. Death could be behind this. Bruce visits the widow of the deceased man and learns that Death was holding them up for ransom. She says that they only have jewels. Bruce heads off and returns to the scene as Batman and lies in wait.

The scene shifts to a bandaged up Dr. Death and his new minion Mikhail. Death sends Mikhail to steal the diamonds from the widow. The widow stumbles upon Mikhail during the robbery but Batman attacks him and saves the day. Batman gives the knocked out Mikhail the diamonds so that he can follow him to Dr. Death.

Batman follows Mikhail to a pawn broker and then to an apartment. Batman knocks Mikhail out with gas and then searches the place but can find no trace of Dr. Death. Mikhail breaks up and Batman proceeds to break his neck in the fight. Batman confronts the pawn broker and unmasks him to reveal Dr. Death. Batman leaves him for the police as the issue ends.

My Take: The art seemed better in this issue for whatever reason. I enjoyed the mood of the night as Batman traveled about. I also enjoyed the story more than the last time. Don't get me wrong though. The writing is still choppy and brutal. I just found it to be amusing despite the obvious flaws in it.

Again, the biggest thing to me in these early stories is the violence and the fact that Batman kills the bad guys without a second thought. As I've said previously, these stories read a lot like the Shadow radio program from the same era did. Honestly, if you had to choose between reading these or listening to the Shadow, I'd tell you to listen to the Shadow. It has the same vibe as these stories but it has better writers working on it.

Another early Batman story down. Nothing special as far as a story goes. It was a fun little romp but I doubt I'll remember much about this story in a few weeks.

I'd give this story a C- for keeping my interested despite the glaring flaws in it's execution.

Batman and Robin #16

Bruce Wayne as Batman is back. Together with Dick and Damian they take out all of the minions of Dr. Hurt. Bruce goes after Hurt while Dick and Damian go to take out Pyg. Dick and Damian take out Pyg by turning his minions on him. Hurt on the other hand lures Bruce into one of the prisons by using Alfred as bait. Batman escapes since he built the prisoner. He pounds on Hurt a bit and Hurt claims that Bruce can't best him.

Hurt escapes as Bruce chooses to save Alfred instead. Hurt comes across the Joker and slips on a banana peel. Joker proceeds to bury him alive. Damian disarms the nuke that the Joker had set up in previous issues. The issue ends with Bruce revealing the new Batman Inc. and publicly states he's been supporting Batman for all of these years.

My Take: I'll admit it right here. I've enjoyed JLA and Seven Soldiers by Grant Morrison. I've pretty much hated everything else he's ever touched in the last decade. I hated his run on New X-Men and I can't recall anything else he's done off the top of my head. I had been enjoying this until he went back to the R.I.P. stuff. I felt R.I.P. was a poor storyline and that the only person that really enjoyed it was... Grant Morrison.

I didn't really enjoy this issue. The art was all over the place as I think three artists had to work on it to get the book out on time. Sometimes I don't notice but it was really jarring in this issue. It ranged from really good to below average throughout the issue.

I don't find Thomas Wayne/Dr. Hurt to be a particularly compelling villain. Morrison has set him up as this big bad that might be the devil himself. He's just a boring deus ex machina to me. He's really a symbol for what has been wrong with Morrison's run on Batman. He takes these obscure little Silver Age characters and then shoves them down our throat as being an important part of the Bat-verse, see also Knight and Squire.

The story wasn't awful or anything. It flowed better than the last issue did. It just wasn't of any real interest one way or the other. Bruce is back... whoop-de-do I guess.

This kicks off having like 6 Bat titles a month. I'm not so thrilled for that. I think DC would be better served to keep it to 3.

I'll give this a C for a boring story with solid writing execution.