In my latest podcast episode, I looked at three issues of Batman that came out between A Death in the Family and the Year 3/A Lonely Place of Dying storylines, which are about the death of Jason Todd and then the introduction of Tim Drake. Of course, Tim doesn’t officially become Robin until about a year and a half after Batman #442, in which he puts on Jason’s old costume and we have the iconic George Perez cover of him swinging into action. But once that happened, everyone more or less knew that Tim was going to be the next Robin.
What I had wanted to see was how the Batman was handled in those three issues, which were #430-432 of his main series (and if you listened to the episode you know that I mentioned The Many Deaths of Batman but it seemed more like a fill-in arc and less of an “in-the-moment in-continuity” storyline) but had to skip Batman Annual #13, which came out during that period but is not available on DC Infinite nor was collected in the trade paperbacks I own from that era (it is available in Batman: The Caped Crusader Vol. 2, which also reprints Year 3 but omits Lonely Place, probably because that has been folded into the trade for A Death in the Family). Well, I was at my LCS the other day and decided to see if they had it and lo and behold a copy in very good condition was available for $1.99, so I grabbed it and decided to offer up a review of it here as an addendum to that podcast episode.
I could go into a whole history of comic book annuals, which began back in the 1960s (I believe) and very often reprinted old stories. They were always bigger than the regular issues–about two or two-and-a-half times bigger–and cost about as much. Batman had seven annuals published in the early 1960s (which were about twice a year and therefore semi-annuals) and then those editions as we know them began in earnest with Batman Annual #8 in 1981. DC would begin crossovers and themes with the annuals in 1991 with Armageddon 2001 (a story near and dear to my heart that I may get around to one day), but during the 1980s, the books were simply oversized stories that sometimes had backup stories and extra features. All had similar trade dress and for 1989, that trade dress was a bar running down the left side of the cover with a rundown of the creative team and what was in the book.
For this annual, the copy on the left side advertised a story by James Oswley (now known as Christopher Priest), with art by Michael Bair and Gray Morrow; a backup story featuring “secrets of the DC Universe” told by Kevin Dooley and Malcolm Jones III; and a set of updated Who’s Who entries (which Rob and Shag covered years ago on the Who’s Who podcast). The cover is by George Pratt and fhows Batman sitting on a snow-covered rooftop, a picture that is slightly obscured by snow blowing around hiim, but we can certainly see the blue and gray uniform of our hero. Personally, I think it looks pretty cool and while it is more of a pinup and has nothing to do with the story inside (as opposed to the Detective Comics annual that year, which had a Klansman on the cover because the Klan were the villains of that book), I’ve always been drawn to it. I don’t know why I always thought this issue was somehow special because of that cover, but it felt that way.
Anyway, the main story, which is what I would have covered on the show, is called “Faces” and the creative team I mentioned above is accompanied by Augustin Mas on letters, Adrienne Roy on colors, and the editorial team of Dan Raspler and Denny O’Neil.
We open with a flashback to a number of years ago where Batman and Commissioner Gordon are at the scene of an explosion, which happens to be the home of a Gotham City police officer named Anthony Wells. According to Gordon, he was a good cop. The suspect they’re looking for is Freddie Richards, who works with Two-Face; apparently, Wells was undercover in Richards’ gang and they suspect blown cover led to his murer. Gordon lays out all of the other details and Batman silently enters the house as Barbara shows up. She’s walking but Gordon mentions that she’s been retired from crimefighting, and Mike’s Amazing World places this right before Secret Origins #20 and the Batgirl Special that came out in March 1988 and was titled “The Last Batgirl Story” (check out Stella’s Batgirl to Oracle archives for more).
Batman sends Robin after Freddie (and Jason is wearing pants because it’s cold, btw) and tells him to lure him into an alley, which he does using snowballs he throws from a roof. Two-Face shows up to confront Robin and realizes that Jason’s not the Robin he was used to fighting. He throws Jason off the roof anyway, but our hero survives and then has to take on a gang of street punks. Thankfully, both Batgirl and Batman show up. They take out the punks and then are able to hand over both Freddie and Two-Face to the police.
We then flash forward to the present day and on the front page of the Gotham Gazzette is news that Freddie Richards is set to be executed. Gordon calls Bruce on the anniversary of his wife’s death and mentions “what happened to Barbara and Jason” to more or less put us in the present. Later, Batman visits Jim and Barbara (who is in her wheelchari) at Mrs. Gordon’s grave. At the site, Batman says that he needs permission to release Two-Face from jail for 72 hours because he’s sure that Freddie is innocent and needs his rival to help with the case. Gordon simply says “No” and we have a couple of narration boxes that read: “For many years, he’s regarded the masked man as his friend. His ally in the war on crime. Recently, something has changed. The old soldier hardly even knows him anymore.”
So what Batman does is break Two-Face out of Arkham (which isn’t that hard, to be honest) and they eventually head to Santa Prisca, where Anthony Wells is in hiding. He faked his death years ago and what Batman wants is to bring him back to the U.S. to stand trial for his crimes, which was essentially participating in the very crimes he was investigating.
As is the case with most hero-villain team-ups, things go sideways for our hero and Two-Face turns on Batman. But here it’s a little different because this is actually Batman’s fault. He’d switched Harvey’s double-headed silver dollar with one that was clean on both sides; this way, Two-Face can’t kill anyone. Harvey winds up reacting in the same way Chris Farley did when his coffee was switched with decaf crystals and goes off to kill both Wells and Batman. So it becomes a race against one another to see who can get to Wells first.
The crooked cop, who is now working for the Santa Prisca police force, arrives at his office to see Two Face sitting at his desk. Just as Two Face says he’s going to kill Wells, Batman smashes through the office window. He takes both of them out, commandeers a police car and then takes the both to the airport. As Batman puts Wells in the plane and talks to the pilot (named Irv, which is a nice pull), Two-Face gets out of his restraints and attacks Batman. Wells kicks him in the face and takes off running. Two-Face heads in the other direction and as a result, Batman has to make a choice of who to bring in. He chooses Wells, since his capture will help free the innocent man facing execution.
Back in Gotham, Freddie Richards is not executed, but Gordon is not happy because Two-Face is free and it’s only a matter of time before he kills someone again. His tone with Batman is confrontational and Batman is silent; we dont know if Bruce feels guilty for what he did and that he’s betrayed his friend’s trust, but that’s probably the case. Gordon asks “How many people do you think Two-Face will kill before he gets nabbed again?” Batman flies sliently into the night.
I said on my episode that Priest didn’t do many other Batman stories after this and it’s a real shame because he wrote the character really well, especially during this period where there is a lot of tension surrounding Batman. What he does here is kind of gives us a classic The Brave and the Bold story where Batman has to team up with a villain instead of a hero, but with a little more grit to it instead of some of the Zany Haney stuff we were used to in the Bronze Age. And Two-Face is the perfect character for this because of Harvey’s history as a crimefighter. He and Bruce were friends and this particular era of Batman sees Bruce continuing to try and find some sort of redeeming quality in the criminal even though he is too far gone at this point (and on a side note, the following year’s annual features Two-Face and presents an updated origin, which is an outstanding story that you should go and read). And it’s not a monumental story in any way, but they don’t need to be in order to be great.
Where the art is concerned, I really liked it as well, although I will confess that this might have looked better on better quality paper. This was around the time that a number of DC’s newsstand titles were beign printed on newsprint that seemed to be worse than usual, so there are many points where the artwork is not just really muddy, but almost kind of smeared on the page. Baxter paper or something similar may have helped, although sometimes that wound up making things too bright. Either way, Michael Bair and Gray Morrow do a great take on Batman and his characters. I’ll admit that I’m not the biggest fan of the way they draw Batman without the “white eyes” on the cowl, but that’s a minor quibble because what you’ve got here is a nice midway point between the artwork of the two Bat titles of the time, which were drawn by Jim Aparo and Norm Breyfogle. I can also see some of the Frank Miller influence here, but not so much that it distracts from the story or takes away from it.
Gray Morrow was a veteran artist (both penciller and inker) by this point, had a number of credits for both DC and Marvel, and would contine to work with both of them until his death in 2001. Michael Bair had been all over DC in the 1980s, working a lot with Roy Thomas and also doing a lot of Who’s Who and Secret Origins work. He wound up having a run at Marvel throughout the 1990s and then came back to DC later in the decade as a steady inker. I’m actually surprised that he didn’t become a bigger name as DC’s post-Crisis era rolled on and didn’t get a significant run on a Batman title (maybe if he’d stayed with DC, he would have had the chance to do Legends of the Dark Knight or Shadow of the Bat from tie to time). His Batman is imposing yet human looking; his Robin (with pants!) looks like a tough kid, and his Barbara Gordon/Batgirl is, I have to admit, pretty hot. This does feel like a 1989 comic, though, because there is real commitment to the story rather than the flashiness of the following decade (although Batman didn’t get the wannabe Image Comics treatment that other heroes of the time wound up getting). In fact, the one splash page is of Batman busting through a window and on the previous page, there are four panels that are drawn from outside the window as Two-Face confront Wells and the Batman’s shadow gets closer and closer to the window. It’s a great segment that reminds me of Marshall Rogers’ and Terry Austin’s work on the character in the late 1970s.
Okay, so now that I’ve talked about how much I liked the annual, does it have anything to do with the two storylines which this is between? Well, there is the mention of both The Killing Joke and A Death in the Family, and Gordon does wonder what is going on with Batman lately, but the most important thing here is Two-Face’s escape at the end of the story. In Batman #440, which is part one of A Lonely Place of Dying, Batman steps into Gordon’s office through the window (to which Gordon says, “You do know I’ve got a door”) and once Batman says, “Two-Face”, Jim replies, “You mean the man you broke out of jail and then let escape from a Caribbean island? That Two-Face? What about him?” Not that I wouldn’t expect an annual to be in continuity or anything, but there were a lot of annuals published during the 1980s that didn’t seem to be too vital to the storylines of their characters. Or maybe I was just spoiled by the three New Teen Titans annuals that wrapped up storylines as if they were huge season finales of TV shows?
Anyway, this not only gives us a reason as to why Harvey Dent is not in Arkham at the start of the next big storyline, it also helps set up tension between Gordon and Batman as the latter continues to push himself and ignore whatever feelings have come up with the death of his son and sidekick. And looking further into Batman’s history, Santa Prisca–which Denny O’Neil and Denys Cowan created in the 1987 Question anual–becomes importat to the Dark Knight in the Nineties as it is where both the drug Venom and the character Bane originate.
The other story in the annual (the supposed “secrets of the DC Universe” is an Alfred-starring story from very early in Batman’s career where we see how he more or less came to be a member of Batman’s “team”. It’s a nice story that adds a layer to the rebuilding of the Dark Knight’s origin, and the suggestion Alfred has at the end of the story for Bruce to drop his voice an octave when he’s being Batman was funny. The Who’s Who entries are well done, too. Batman gets two pages (although they aren’t facing) drawn by Art Thibert and Dick Sprang; Rick Stasi does the entries for both of the Robins; Joe James and Denis Rodier handle Alfred Pennyworth; Fred Butler draws the entries for both Jim and Barbara Gordon; and Bove handles Vicki Vale, who was being brought back into the Bat books at this point because of the 1989 movie. All are really solid, although I think I like the Commissioner Gordon one best with the Dick Sprang picture on the Batman entry coming in second (no shade on Art Thibert, but it didn’t do it for me).
So I’m glad I was able to track this down and put it here to make up for its absence in the podcast episode where it put one last point on the character during this transition period. And like I said, it was easy to find–my LCS had several copies–and not very expensive, which makes grabbing it even more worth it.