Batman Incorporated v2 #8 Annotations
BATMAN INCORPORATED v2 #8
The Boy Wonder Returns
DC Comics, April 2013, Color, 32pgs, $2.99
Written by GRANT MORRISON ; Art by CHRIS BURNHAM; Cover by CHRIS BURNHAM; 1:25 Varian Cover by CHRIS BURNHAM
• Everything Grant Morrison has been planning since the start of BATMAN, INCORPORATED leads to this stunning issue!
• You must not miss this one!
Commentary
Spoilers! After the cover was leaked a couple of weeks prior to the issue coming out, the comics internet - and even DC themselves - went all out to spoil this major turning point in Morrison and Burnham's Bat-epic.
Most major newspapers covered the story of Damian's death in typical Zap! Pow! fashion - probably more fitting for this title than most - the Monday before the issue was released. Even so, this latest chapter of Batman Incorporated is a towering achievement of the form - both powerful and a little heartbreaking.
Four more to go! Or is there..?
Annotations
Cover - Chris Burnham's regular cover is a homage to Alex Ross' iconic 'R.I.P.' art, first seen on June 2008's Batman #676 and later used for the hardcover and trade collections of 'Batman R.I.P.' It was kept top secret until a few weeks before the issue shipped, then everybody and their mother posted it all over the internet. The variant - also by Chris Burnham and originally solicited as the regular cover - is a nice compliment to the broken glass motif that Burnham employs throughout the issue,
Page 1 -Picking up from last issue's conclusion, Damian is rocketing across the bay in the jet suit we first saw in Batman: The Return as Nightwing and Commisioner Gordon fend off Leviathan's mind-controlled child henchmen. I wondered last month how Morrison and Burnham would get Dick and the commish out of this pickle without having them beat on the brats...
Page 2-3 - Easy peasy. Have another 10 year old swoop in and do the beating for them (with a little nerve-pinch assitance from Nighwing). Brilliant.
Page 4 - Midtown is of course home to Wayne Tower, headquarters of Waynecorp and Bruce Wayne's penthouse, where he's currently languishing at the bottom of a swimming pool inside a safe. The geography of all of this sticks surprisingly close to Eliot R. Brown's map of Gotham from Batman: Gotham City Secret Files and Origins #1 (April 2000). There's a fascinating 'making of' piece by Brown, including lots of preliminary sketches and an account of how deeply involved the Bat-office of the time were involved in the final map here.
Page 5 - What looks like birds flocking around the top of Wayne Tower are actually Talia's ninja man-bats.
A great panel of the rain falling on the swimming pool by Chris Burnham calls to mind the opening and closing of Alan Moore and Brian Bolland's Killing Joke.
Page 6 - Does Batman always keep a lockpick lodged in his gullet in case something like this comes up? Answer: probably, yes. As we learned back in R.I.P. - "Batman thinks of everything."
Page 7 -The first of Jason Masters fill-in pages (thumbnailed by Burnham) - cannily in the same setting as his (excellent) work last issue.
"Did the clubs just get out?" Ha. After Talia's grand entrance last issue, Leviathan is firmly in control of Wayne Tower. Not for long though...
Page 8 - Nice bit of fight choreography from Masters (and it's a high bar that's been set - there's been some absolutely amazing stuff from over the course of Morrison's run which continues in this very issue)
The suits in glass tubes filling up the 'Wayne Cave' lobby include two astronauts (Armstrong and Aldrin?), a deep sea diver and an armoured infantryman. @millerunc on Twitter pegged the Crusader's armour (which we'll see in more detail later in the story) as belonging to Sir Gaweyne de Wayne, a French Knight of the Scottish Court and ancestor of Bruce Wayne, who's mentioned but doesn't appear in Alan Grant and Frank Quitely's 1998 graphic novel Batman: The Scottish Connection.
Page 9 - One of Leviathan's red archer henchmen appeared back in issue three of this volume. The guys in the white boiler suits have been around since the beginning of volume one.
I think the plane suspended from the ceiling is a Grumman F4U Corsair. It looks like the classic Batplane was based on a later Grumman model, but I don't know if the Corsair's got any particular ties to Batman. Any Bat/aviation enthusiasts out there?
Look at the panel composition there!
Page 10 - Chris Burnham picks up the baton again with a great page that really showcases how amazing the work he's doing at the moment is. Masters is a fine artist but Burnham's pages are really something else.
Damian comes crashing in through the window in a panel reminiscent of both the bat that originally inspired Bruce and future-Damian's Ro-Bat from Batman Incorporated v2 #5.
That last panel? Brutals.
Page 11 - Batman and Robin re-united...
Page 12 -"Robin The Boy Wonder, Damian". The return of the boy wonder indeed - Morrison has, over the course of his run and more than anyone since the 1960's, accentuated the 'boy' in boy wonder. Damian is a child; a super-cool, ruthless bad ass child but one who has, over the last 70-odd issues, developed into a genuine 'super-hero'. He's the sort of character comics fans often wish there were more of - one who appeals to that elusive younger audience who seem to have abandoned comic books for more contemporary pursuits - but one which apparently the industry cannot allow to live. His talk with Dick brings his death into sharp focus. As an audience who constantly demand change yet largely vote with our collective wallets for anything but, it seems we are all complicit in poor Damian's demise.
"So far I'd say you've een my favourite partner. We were the best Richard, No matter what anyone thinks." >choke<
Page 13 - The Quitely-esque sound effects integrated into the art, showcased in the initial Batman and Robin arc make a welcome return just in time for Damian's curtain call. Burnham's BOOM looks to be a homage to Quitely's from the first panel of issue one.
Once again calling back to the Adam West TV show - whose comic book rehabilitation has surely been one of the most unexpected highlights of Morrison's run - both the 'POW!' 'BIF!' 'BAM!' sound effects and the poses in the second to last panel are direct quotes from the TV show opening titles.
Page 14 -Enter The Heretic, equipped with the still-mysterious Oroboros weapon.
Page 15 -As with the integrated sound effects, the double punch is a callback to Dick and Damian's time as Batman and Robin, first seen on page 8 of Batman and Robin #1 by Morrison and Quitely. It's somewhat less successfull here against The Heretic than it was against Mr Toad back in Batman and Robin #1.
What's that in the glass case on the pillar underneath Oroboro? A crystal ball?
A better view of Sir Gaweyne de Wayne's armour there...
Page 16 - Notice the bike setting fire to The Heretic's arm.
There's a similar hyper-kenetic panel structure here as on page 9.
Morrison's gone on record in a number of interviews framing Damian's demise as a direct result of his parent's neglect - while Talia continues to punish Bruce for the slight of not reciprocating her megalomaniacal 'love', Damian is left to fend for himself and - inevitably, despite his super-assassin training - flounders. His cry of "FATHER!" here twists the knife a little more.
Page 17 - Room for one more ">tt<" as Damian springs into action for the last time...
Page 18 - A tribute to Cameron Stewart's dizzying, multi-panel fight choreography from his brief run on Batman and Robin. 20 panels!
The Heretic's attempt to break Damian, Knightfall-style, in panel 6 evidently don't work because of the robot spine Talia gave to Damian in Batman and Robin #7.
That middle panel on the bottom row has to be a nod to something. Doesn't ring any bells at the moment though.
Bruce leaping onto the back of a ninja Man-Bat to speed his passage downstairs is... awesome. But it's too late...
The original art for these pages (which are currently attracting a lot of interest on eBay) show Chris Burnham's original intent was to show Damian's death in a lot more graphic detail. I think it still works just as well as printed - that is one hell of a powerful page.
Page 21 - Love the fade to black in the tiny panels at the bottom of the page...
Unlike most comic book deaths of the past few years, prevailing wisdom seems to be that Damian will stay dead. I'm not so sure; I mean, can anybody say "Lazarus Pit"?! Anyway, only a handful of issues left now (the solicit for #12 went up just this last week - though the lack of any 'Final Issue' notification seems... unusual). See you in a couple of weeks for the next issue!
As usual, any corrections, comments or additions always welcome. Please do get in touch.
