Saturday Night Showcase> DC High Volume: Batman “Year One”

Just in time for Batman’s 85th Anniversary and Free Comic Book Day, I bring you Batman’s first day on the job.

I’m not a huge fan of Frank Miller’s work. I don’t just mean his more recent stuff where Miller fell into certain tropes, or gave us the “Crazy Steve” version of Batman in All-Star Batman & Robin. Just in general, Miller’s semi-noir style and gritty takes on characters just aren’t for me. There was a time when his writing was really good. Then there was All-Star Batman & Robin or Holy Terror. He’s made some odd choices lately, but back when he did Batman: Year One or the definitive take on Marvel’s Daredevil he was at his best. May I never become a parody of myself.

Originally intended as a stand-alone graphic novel, Batman group editor Dennis O’Neil took advantage of the rebooted DC universe post-Crisis to create not a new take on Batman but an expanded one and saw “Year One” as a good restarting point for Bruce Wayne’s history. It tells of his first meeting with Jim Gordon and his early days on the “job” as the shadowy guardian of Gotham City. He prefered to see the early, screwing up version of heroes and found seasoned hero stories boring. I tend to be the opposite, another reason we don’t see eye-to-eye in approaches. Still, “Year One”, running from Batman #404-407, back when such stories weren’t “writing for the trade”. Remember, this would have been a stand-alone graphic novel originally. The story arc has been released in trade, it’s proper format in a way, and is one of the definitive Batman stories, even getting an animated movie adaptation.

Tonight we look at a different adaptation, the first installment of DC’s “High Volume” audio drama adaptations, produced by podcasting studio Realm. It’s available wherever you prefer to get your podcasts (more info and links here), but we’re using the YouTube version for convenience and because it includes the comic art by artist David Mazzucchelli, colors by his wife Richmond Lewis, and lettering by Todd Klein. Some scenes do not have attached artwork, but not having read the comic I don’t know if these are scenes added to the audio drama or if they just didn’t put them in for some reason. I know episode one includes Miller’s re-imagine of Catwoman’s origin as a prostitute turned cat burglar, but we don’t see her scenes in the visuals. I wasn’t a fan of that addition to her origin, either. We don’t see Bruce become Batman in this installment, but we do see Lieutenant Jim Gordon arrive from Chicago and learn how things work in Gotham City as Bruce comes home to begin his mission. Enjoy.

As I write this, “Year One” is finished adapting and they’re starting the next of the chosen stories to adapt, The Long Halloween. More will come and I hope they won’t just stick to Batman.