The prevalent angle
newspapers are using when reporting on "Batman Begins" is that the film "returns the hero to his comic book roots."
But what are those roots? Batman has been many things in comic books over the years: A grim-faced crimefighter (1930s), smiling adventurer (1940s), spacefarer and time traveler (1950s, 60s), back-to-basics crimefighter-man-of-the-people (1970s) and--currently--a humorless psychotic ninja.
Reports indicate the film lifts a lot of its inspiration from Frank Miller's "Batman Year One" with a dollop of Denny O'Neill and Neal Adams' bronze age run (it features Ras Al Ghul, after all).
I guess that's all fine. But the gist of these articles is that the comics offer the "real" Batman, whereas, current comics actually seem to be more confused than Hollywood about what to do with the poor guy.
For 20 years, the comics have been pretty much retreads of and variations on Frank Miller's "The Dark Knight Returns," itself originally a one-off "imaginary tale" that took a "what if" look at one of the Caped Crusader's possible futures. The take has gotten pretty old. Any shred of humanity or humor the character held is pretty much gone.
A recent bright spot, though, is the "Dark Detective" mini-series DC is currently running. Featuring script and art from the classic Steven Englehart-Marshall Rogers team of the late 1970s, it's the best-of-all-worlds take on the character. This Batman is tough, dark, but feeling. He cracks the occasional joke and smile. He has a love life.
Englehart draws much of his inspiration from the late 40s Batman, when the character was lightening up from his grim beginnings but not ready to blast off into space quite yet. O'Neill and Adams took much the same approach when they handled the character in the
early 70s.
I don't know for sure which Batman "Batman Begins" features, but if he's anything close to this one, that's great. He's a Batman I'd like to see a lot more of.
