Chapter By Chapter (usually) features me reading one chapter of the selected book at a time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as read-along book club.

PART 2: KNIGHTQUEST

In the last two chapters we focused on Sir Hemingford Gray, who is totally not Bruce Wayne except for the fact that he is, getting closer to finding Shondra and Benedict as well as learning their depressing history because this is a novelization of a 1990s comic so of course it is. Can our hero stop them from killing again?

Like I said, this is a 1990s story, the “dark age” of comics. This is when they started taking the kids’ toys away from them. Even in the Bronze Age (or is it the “Copper Age” since someone stuck that period title in on my at some point?) stories could be more serious but not necessarily chase kids off. As longtime readers may be sick of hearing, my first Batman comic involved a homeless person being murdered and Batman looking to avenge her. The murder weapon was a poison-laced gold coin, the poison absorbed through the skin. Back then you just fall over dead. Had that story come out in the 1990s she would probably be bleeding out the eyes or something. It’s like writers got sick of being accused of writing kids stories because they worked in comics, didn’t bother to educate them, and decide to prove comics didn’t have to be for kids by making comics as kid unfriendly as they could get away with. By then the Comics Code Authority was a total joke and when that finally got a mercy killing it only got worse. It makes me sad as someone who got into superheroes as a kid to not see many superheroes for kids, and even less in comics. Dogman is all you have, and really he’s just a dog in an anthropomorphic world from what I can tell.

The deaths in this sub-arc are from “overhealing”, however that works, and so probably weren’t that bad…though we aren’t done and the 90s only got worse from here. Regardless, let’s return to the book and see what is about to happen.

Bruce’s events bookend this chapter but let’s start in the middle. This storyline is supposed to be our Not-Batman after all. I’m not trying to trash Jean Paul Valley as a character mind you. Not being Batman is kind of the point of this story, remember? It’s important to note here as he gets a vision of St. Dumas, part of that brainwashing that was done to him, the so-called “System”. “St. Dumas” is upset that Jean Paul, his Azrael, has taken up Batman’s mantle and is associating with Harvey Bullock (more on that shortly). “He” reminds Jean Paul that Azrael is an avenger, not a protector, and that’s really the big difference here and why Valley is such a bad choice. I know a big deal is made about “I am vengeance, I am the night”. It was a line quoted in the ads for Batman: The Animated Series by Fox and was also used in ads for the tie-in toyline.

In context, this is when Scarecrow’s “fear toxin” was giving him images of his father being disappointed in him, brought on by someone critical of the Bruce Wayne persona of “millionaire playboy”, unlike the doctor/businessman Thomas Wayne was. While I’ve started questioning the whole “Bruce is the mask, Batman is the real man” theory I have to question this perspective. Yes, he will get vengeance, or rather justice for someone who didn’t deserve to die, like the homeless lady I mentioned earlier. That’s the difference, though. Bruce’s goal with Batman is that nobody else becomes like him. His wards he doesn’t want to be like him. He doesn’t want another child to go without his or her parents like he did. Batman is not about revenge. Azrael is. Batman’s main role is, like most DC heroes, a protector. It’s why he’s part of a group called the JUSTICE League, because he seeks justice. Azrael is more like what you think of when you hear “vigilante”. He wants to punish criminals, and he doesn’t care about protecting the people those same criminals are after, believing just making them pay is enough. That’s not what Bruce is, and thus isn’t what Batman is.

Not surprising that Bullock likes this new, more punchy Batman. He likes making “punks” pay, like an overweight Dirty Harry who isn’t fit enough to go that far. Now they’re working together on a case involving a family that was murdered for no determined reason. They even killed the children, because it’s the 1990s and the “Dark Age” of comics. If they would kill off more prominent kids like Lian Harper and Cat Grant’s son Adam, you think no-name kids aren’t going to die horribly and bloody? It was only a decade or so before Professor Pyg would be created. It started early. You can bet Jean Paul is thinking more about making the killer or killers pay than stopping them from killing again. He may have taken on the case because Bruce would but he isn’t going to do it Bruce’s way.

Speaking of Bruce, he’s in the hospital. His back is worse than ever. While Alfred tries to help him be comfortable and take it easy, Bruce’s acceptance that the trail is going to grow cold before he’s better is interrupted by Asp, using yet another assumed name, threatens to kill heads of state if his demands aren’t met, and mentions the English town Bruce and Alfred tracked him to. He also makes the mistake of listing Sir Hemingford Gray among the dead. This gives Bruce an opening to draw Asp out, but in his condition Alfred thinks it’s a terrible idea. The thing is they’re both right. Sure, Bruce could call one of the other detectives, like Ralph “Elongated Man” Dibney, but he’s already got the Hemingford identity going, and having him raise a ruckus will draw Asp out. On the other hand Alfred has a point as well. Bruce is too injured to do much and even if Asp doesn’t try to use Shondra again there are other ways to kill a man and Alfred doesn’t want to watch Bruce destroy himself.

Here we get an extra peek into Bruce’s attitude. He won’t sit around and do nothing. If he’s going to die, he’s going to die for something. It’s just in his nature to try to stop a villain before he kills again, even if it costs him his life. He should call in back-up. Again, Ralph or maybe Nightwing (despite their being on the outs with each other) or even Robin. He still needs to be part of it but this is Bruce’s case, Bruce’s responsibility. It’s just he’s self-destructing and if Alfred can’t stop him he really doesn’t want to be part of it.

Alfred quits!

I’m talking legit quits. I don’t think we see him again until the Nightwing one-shot, Alfred’s Return, besides a brief appearance next chapter. Bruce is now on his own. What will he do? Find out next time. This was a good chapter. There’s a lot to discuss as you can tell, and it shows you the difference between how Bruce and Jean Paul fight crime. One protects, the other avenges. That’s their goal. Bruce will try to stop another death from happening. Jean Paul will only go after the “sinner” after committing their crime. Which is better? That’s what this story will soon examine, but right now we’re getting an overview of the two men’s approach. Stay tuned to see where this goes. Or go get the novel/comic and find out. Either way, I wouldn’t mind a bit of comment chatter. Is anybody reading along in either form? I’m always curious about that. Likes are great but I’m looking for readers of these stories and their opinions.