Batman: The Dark Knight Strikes Again

I’ve avoided reading DK2 for years. I hate me for that. I’m sometimes (oftentimes) way too influenced by product reviews. And there’ve been lots of snarky responses to Frank Miller’s 2001ish sequel to his 1986 Dark Knight Returns. And I really like DKR, enough so that I’ve been operating under the preposterous presumption that a poor follow-up would irrevocably tarnish my impression of the original. And I’m really cheap.

So I didn’t buy it or read it for like 10 fucking years now, which is just so astronomically stupid, because I finally did both of those things and I fucking love it.

I mean I’m not big on smarts, but in my rinky dink mind, DK2 is so much more artistically bombastic and comically significant (you know, comically like in relation to comics, not comically like funny ha ha – that word probably doesn’t work that way) than its predecessor. But I guess people don’t like the writing or the arting? I dunno, I think Frank Miller & Lynn Varley are the bee’s knees & this is my favorite of their collaborations & poor Todd Klein did the letters but you don’t care about that, do you!

Yeah, me neither :)

But Miller’s frenetic lines and Varley’s kaleidoscope colors really are absolutely glorious, and more people should like them more than they do. Pfff.

And the script is way ambitious and grandiose to boot. Miller writes the bumpy return of superheros period, not just Bats. Supes gives the sex talk to his Amazonian/Kryptonian daughter (Never with Terrans. They're fragile.) Dick Grayson is fucking crazy. The president does not exist! And when Hawkman’s enraged son bashes in Luthor’s skull with a ball & chain, Bruce cheers,

Way to go, kid! That was great!

Barry balks, but Bruce says back to him, he says,

Get used to it, Barry. These youngsters play it rough. It’s a whole new ballgame.

Those are pretty prescient words considering the predominance of ultra-violence in comics lately. I’m not saying DK2 ushers in a new era of excess or anything like that, but it does at least acknowledge it & I do appreciate a moment as startling as Bruce gleefully basking in that sort of overkill, as an aged cape reborn in blood.

And I should’ve been there to appreciate it 10 fucking years ago!