“Next time a horse tells me he knows a short cut, I’m ignoring him.”
The Batman Adventures #32
DC Comics (June, 1995)
“A Soldier’s Story” WRITER: Dan Raspler ARTISTS: Mike Parobeck & Rick Burchett COLORIST: Rick Taylor LETTERING: Richard Starkings & Comicraft ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Darren Vincenzo EDITOR: Scott Peterson
Batman comes upon a group of dead men, shot by muskets and wearing 19th Century French military replica costumes. During his investigation he learns two old men whose way older fathers just mysteriously died at roughly the same time. These two are rather disturbed and are using local Gotham criminals as part of their armies to live out an actual military war game scenario. Now he has to stop them from filling Waterloo park with even more dead bodies as part of their final gambit.
What they got right: As a guest writer Raspler seems more knowledgeable about how the show works than the usual writer (I think Paul Dini only did the annual at this point). And this was the man who created Young Heroes In Love, a teen soap opera about a bunch of superheroes. At least that’s what I’ve heard about the comic. The problem is that, especially in later years, the tie-ins to the DCAU didn’t match the tone of the shows. The comics played to a younger audience and in the case of Superman Adventures and the Justice League titles most notably took on a Silver Age tone, while the shows were at least Bronze Age. Death was a part of the story, as were the guns sounding real until it moved to Kids WB. This is closer to the show than usual at this point.
What they got wrong: I have no complaints except that space didn’t allow this to be much of a mystery for the audience to solve.
Recommendation: While still not one of the great Batman stories, it’s one that was closer to the show and a fair showing for Batman. If you come across it give it a look but I’m still waiting for a real must-own issue in this series.
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