Return of Bruce Wayne #4

[sherkahn]

Two more pages behind the cut. I will give my opinion about it also behind the cut.



I was hoping for better, but most of you called it. The art just plain sucks. There is no drama, no emotion, nothing that made this book nothing more than an Elseworlds title that needed to be forgotten.

This is one of the TRINITY flagship characters of DC making a dramatic comeback, with a (arguably) respected writer behind it. Put some damn effort into it, DC. How the hell did this pass through editorial and feel that this was WORTHY of seeing paper?

An example below: The girl who was kidnapped from during my preview post turns out to be a Miagani tribe descendant that blended in with Gotham's society, rather than live as a "hidden tribe". And she knows the secret of opening the Bat-box of doom.

Of course, Bruce comes in for the rescue against ... wait for it.. Vandal Savage (again) and his men.


REALLY?
All the images of showdowns in the Wild West and noir movies and samurai movies and THIS is what you come up with?
Where is the drama? Where is the emotion? where is the tension? where is the iconography? And so much space WASTED on the page. All of you who took art class know of what I speak.

FAIL!
No, this level of the-suck! deserves to be called out in formal terms as a textbook example of what NOT to do and not waste a reader's time. The terms abortion, flop, botch all come to mind, but this is truly an example of "subnormal quantity and quality; insufficient and unsuccessful of established goals".

Yes, keeping the bar high for The Return of Bruce Wayne would have been hard, but this just reeks of pathetic attempts. I could post this page as a challenge on DeviantArt and get better results within 24 hours.

More evidence of the failure of the title. The writing and plot.

What we have is a Vandal Savage... with stomach cancer. What?
Dr. Thomas is finally shown, but with no introduction. And he is describing events that through off the reader who is not familiar with the most minute of Batman mythos.


Oh come on.. at least tell me you saw some Deadwood. The language wasn't THAT bad.Oy vey.

All this time, Thomas Wayne did not attempt to research the language?
Learn it himself, instead of relying on others?

Vandal Savage afraid of pain?

Batman letting villains kill each other?

And then all of a sudden, near the end, another Wayne ancestor comes into play, out of nowhere?

No no no no no. This was an insufficiency of quality and quantity, and not worthy to be added to the legacy this time in Batman's history.

Everyone who was involved with this. Hang your heads in shame.
"You have forgotten the face of your fathers."

Do I have to tell you what actually happens in the title? I think your own imaginations would have been better.

suggested tags:
title: Return of Bruce Wayne
character: Batman/Bruce Wayne

creator: Grant Morrison
creator: Georges Jeantry
creator: Walden Wong

Comments

[nickfury90]

I'm a huge fan of Morrison's Batman run, but this Return of the Bruce Wayne shit can kiss the blackest part of my ass. I'll stick to the monthly amazingness that is Batman and Robin, kthx.

[keeva]

i still can't understand why everyone is complaining about the art. it looks okay to me.

[sherkahn]

Where do I start?

- Dramatic perspective.
- Facial expressions.
- Facial continuity (is Thomas Wayne fat or thin?)
- Physics.
- Sense of motion and direction and kinetics.
- Attention to detail (more is spent of the frills of the girls dress and on the buildings then on the actual character expressions).
- A sense of "air", depth and space.

[keeva]

yeah, like i said, i can't understand why everyone is upset.

and this attempt at explanation didn't really help me either.

[tsunamiwombat]

Let me boil what he said down then.

It sucks and it's generic.

[keeva]

i.e., you don't like the artist's style

but it's actually not poorly done and the man is not unskilled

pretending otherwise -- moaning on as the OP did about "YOU RUINED YOUR FLAGSHIP CHARACTER'S COMEBACK WITH UNSKILLED ART WORSE THAN DEVIANTART" and throwing around terms like "abortion" and "flop" and whatever -- is pretty damn ignorant, and just sounds like the kind of pathetic fanboy ranting you don't expect to find here that often

[tsunamiwombat]

I actually don't mind the style, but something about it seems to lack...gravitas, western tension. It lacks ...Clint Eastwood and Ennicio Morricone.

[nezchan]

"Bland" isn't a style.

[auggie18]

Don't get me wrong, this is fairly generic art, but I'm with keeva here. I don't get why everyone is kvetching over this.

Yeah, it's static. Yeah, it's boring. But it isn't terrible. I can tell the difference between characters. The expressions seem fairly clear. The movement is a bit awkward, but there's certainly worse examples of movement out there.

[icon_uk]

Agreed, it's generic and lacks "zip" but it's adequate art (It's the colourist I have more of a problem with personally), and if the artist had spent three pages on the "quick draw" scene he'd have been accused of wasting too much time on a cliche.

I personally don't like this whole concept of a story, since it seems to be aiming at making Bruce becoming Batman an overly complex predestination paradox, as opposed to a simple moment of inspiration, which has worked fine as an origin to me,

And "char: batman/peter parker" made me smile if nothing else.

[yaseen101]

I agree with you as well.

[jlroberson]

I agree. It's baseline-DC and I never like that.

And all those that had knives out for the quite brilliant Frazer Irving not long ago: and you can tolerate THIS?

[thebigapricot]

I still hate Frazer Irving's art but I admit he does have his moments. But this? This was just pedestrian and uninspired. What's even sadder is that Cameron Stewart was supposed to do this issue. That, I am sure, would have been amazing.

[jlroberson]

Okay, now that you told me THAT, I dislike this art even more, because this is totally a fill-in job then, and with something like this you shouldn't have that.

I swear, it's as jarring as, way back when, the transition between Quitely and Igor Kordey.

[sherkahn]

You mean something like...

THIS?



This had style! This has weight! Geometry, symbolism. You can feel a presence, kind of make out a lone guitar and lone whistler theme that you know will lead to Sergio Leone style big brass as the exciting cliimax occurs.

This should have been Batman, the "Man in Black" issue.

[jlroberson]

Yeah, this is very BLUEBERRY. This would have worked. Reading the story again, I also notice it's kind of hard to tell who certain people are--Thomas and some other Wayne who also shows up at the end out of nowhere. And is it a box or book? And how deep is the box anyway? Look carefully. The artist sure doesn't know!

[keeva]

I sure haven't complained about Frazer Irving, so watch your strawmen -- it seems the same people who hate Irving's art also hate this.

[starwolf_oakley]

Batman letting villains kill each other?

What Bruce remembers is being left very nebulous. It could be as simple as "I save lives and stop criminals" and anything about stopping criminals from killing each other he's "forgetting."

[acton]

I was disappointed with this issue. It isn't terrible, and the art's not bad. Otherwise . . . there isn't much substance. No highs. No lows. Nothing that makes an impression on me.

[jlroberson]

It suffers from the dangers of being an in-between issue that takes care of developmental exposition. The problem is that certain things were starting to need explaining. And it has a first draft feel, the total opposite of the stately feel of the first two and the high-octane fun of the last one.

[irrelevant]

Eh, not impressed with the story, but I haven't been with the rest of the series, either. Art's okay, imo, not fabulous but not terrible. Overall rating: meh.

Morrison is picking and choosing his pieces of Bat mythos to fit his story, as does every other DCU writer. Which doesn't, sorry Morrison fans, impress me. He's one more mediocre Bat-writer in a line of 'em, and there's no need to get all het up about him. He'll go the way of the rest eventually, and then we'll get somebody else of questionable talent. Ho hum.

[espanolbot]

*raises hand*

Err, I thought that the witch hunter guy from issue 2 was Hurt?

[darkknightjrk]

Nope, that was just a regular member of the Wayne family. This guy, Thomas Wayne, is Hurt.

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[sherkahn]

No, I actually have read Dark Knight, Dark City. It's in my head as it has some really well written moments (trying to save the baby's life with the tracheotomy).

But my impression from other Bat fans in other discussion groups, 70% have no clue of that story and keep mistaking Barbathos of a sibling of Etrigan (they are not).

Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[jlroberson]

I agree this issue, which was obviously a place for Morrison to take care of a bit more development of this backstory(which I find intriguing), was a bit disappointing, having a very in-between feel to it and a very confusing ending, given what we've seen Bruce doing up to now. I was especially disappointed in the art because there's been a high standard of that till this issue, while this, at best, is somewhat clumsy, bland baseline-DCU art that I never usually like. And didn't here. And Bruce is feckless in this issue and for Grant, that's not forgivable, because I believe he and his artists usually create a very definite Bruce. (I am a Grant fan, and I do not share your apparent readiness to attack him, but there is plenty to criticize in this issue without going all break-his-baldy-fingers ;))

That said, it's not Grant's fault that you never read Peter Milligan's excellent "Dark Knight, Dark City," because you should. And I like what Morrison has done to expand on that fertile ground untouched all this time. And more than that, I'm laying bets now. The Wayne you see here? The one who was part of the Barbatos ritual, and therefore is immortal? Who's referred to pointedly as a doctor, as a gambler, and who is a sadist and is very interested in the contents of that box?

Dr. Hurt. He's not Wayne's father. He's Wayne's ANCESTOR.

But more. It would be really weird if he were both.

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[icon_uk]

I genuinely don't think Morrison would change who Bruce's father was.

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[jlroberson]

Well, I enjoy the fact he makes me doubt that. That's what I always like about him when he enters the everything-goes-to-hell mode with his storylines--he genuinely can make you believe, wherever you don't think he'll go, he will. (Planet X and the end of Doom Patrol being two other examples. Or ZENITH, which is his template, including the Black Sun, a Nazi mystic concept also appearing right now in TOM STRONG, in the insignia Albrecht uses) He may not always pay off--though I'll be really pissed off if the climax of this is less than grand and epic--but the ride is always fun. I like a story that makes me wonder about where it might go.

But this is totally Hurt at this point. It could be the witchfinder but that would then be due to the curse.

Or could Gotham have its own Lazarus Pit?

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[tsunamiwombat]

*confused sleep deprived ramble*

Confusing Bruce Waynes father is so much FUN though. One of the best conversations reguarding this I had with my friend, followed a simple question - What if Thomas Wayne didn't actually die?

(this was a little more mindblowing at the time, bear with me, it's 5 am, and you had to be there)

What if he faked is death, and lost his mind, after the world and the city and the people he worked so long and selflessly for turned on him, murdered his wife, 'murdered' him?

Someone whose come to believe good is irrelivant, stupid, fake, because the natural state of humanity is entropy, chaos, and misery?

What if he painted on a mask, to mock the world that robbed him of everything he had?

All one.
big.
joke.

ahahahaahAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

*/ramble*

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[jlroberson]

See, that's what I mean. It causes fun and suspenseful wonderings in one's head. Isn't that what writers are supposed to do?

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[icon_uk]

If Bruce had died too, perhaps, but he didn't, and Thomas Wayne loved his son.

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[jlbarnett]

then I would say "what the hell is wrong with this writer?" and impatiently wait for someone to retcon some sense into the story,

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[darkknightjrk]

Yeah, I think this issue pretty much confirmed that this Thomas Wayne from the late 1700s is Dr. Hurt.

Re: Ya bastard, I was just about to post this.

[jlroberson]

Wait...then he shoots Dick because...

Oh. The binding of Barbatos. For which you need the sacrifice of a "Bat-Person." Perhaps it doesn't need to be a knife.

[jlroberson]

Because everyone should read this Milligan/Dwyer story anyway: what they're talking about. The Barbatos Ritual.

[benicio127]

I don't know why I keep buying this series. The last two issues haven't held my interest in the story long enough to actually -want- to read the story, which IMO, isn't a good thing.

This is exactly why Morrison is so hit or miss for me!

Also a little only slightly off-topic story (or why I love S_D so much): so there's a rape trope in this (in the beginning, a woman is saved from being raped, that's the subtext there). So I sometimes go over to CBR to check out what they're saying there. whitesycamore does as well, and she brought up the rape trope. I checked it out and agreed with her that it can be a bit frustrating to see and it's why I didn't pick up GA #1 (the preview has a woman running for her life from potential gang-rapists; Ollie saves her). So that's two women voicing frustrating over seeing a rape trope occur on a noticeable enough basis.
I said "it's more about seeing it often enough in a medium where women are already highly sexualized. It does get a little frustrating after awhile. Sometimes it doesn't bug me, sometimes it does."

We were told to grow up and then, because my avatar is Outlaw's rack (see icon), I got this comment: says the chick with titties in her avatar which really upset me.

While I can't say for certain comments like those aren't going to happen here, I can't imagine the second comment in particular going unchecked. Thus endeth my little off-topic rant. So thanks, S_D. :-)

[jlroberson]

Well, in a Western that's not at all an unusual trope. (See SOLDIER BLUE sometime, or any Peckinpah) Though this is more like an "Eastern" if this is Gotham. Thing is that Morrison isn't sure whether to make it Eastwood or McCarthy. So it's kind of an incoherent pastiche, at odds with the solidity of the previous installments, each of which stick in the mind and stand well as singles. But I'm not sure if the western is within Grant's skills, really--that's more of an Ennis thing.

But if you think this is harsh(and I really didn't get the feeling what happens at the start had to do with rape), read SAINT OF KILLERS. Eesh. As good as it is...eesh.

But "saved?" She's not saved from anything. They pretty much do what they came to do. They hang her husband, shoot her son, and kidnap her daughter, and Bruce only comes in long after the assassins are gone, after she prays for the "darkest angel" to come and avenge all this. The daughter is only "saved from rape" because one of them wants to and the other won't let him. Not exactly the same thing. As for herself, as far as you can tell, she is. Then Bruce comes along. No rescue.

[liara_shadowsong]

This is bland. If I had to describe it in one word, it would be "meh". That being said, it's not bad, per se. It's just too boring to be good. *yawns*

[airawyn]

I'm still stuck on the idea of setting a Western story in New Jersey.