Batman Comics
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Im an absoloutly huge chuffing fan of batman i love Arkham Asylum and all the movies and the rest of the games,. But have never read any of the comics. I know saying that probably doesnt make me sound like a fan but can anyone tell me whether i should buy them or any certain ones i should get or how many there are in total i would really appreciate it.
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You've got all the ongoing monthly titles featuring Batman, such as "Detective Comics", "Batman", "Batman & Robin", etc.; plus all the ongoing monthly titles which have appearances by Batman...
DC, like Marvel, likes to have a big "event" each year, sometimes using a limited series, sometimes using a big crossover (something I often hate, as you have to get books you don't normally get, plus it sometimes means the more fantastical parts of the DC Universe, such as aliens & metahumans, stray into Batman's world).
This year there was "Batman: RIP" & the "Final Crisis", followed by "Batman: Battle for the Cowl".
End result (for Batman) was that Bruce Wayne was apparently "killed" by the alien Darkseid :rolleyes:
Dick Grayson (the original Robin, then Nightwing) is now Batman, Damian Wayne (Bruce's son by Talia al Ghul) is Robin, & Tim Drake (the 3rd Robin) is the Red Robin. Oh, and Jason Todd, who came back from the grave after "Infinite Crisis" a few years ago is now the Red Hood.
IMO, you'd be better off starting with some of the classic Batman graphic novels & trade paperbacks, rather than trying to jump into Batman's current monthly titles.
Some recommendations (in reading order):
Batman: Year One (post-Crisis retelling of Batman's origin & 1st year, by Frank Miller)
Batman: The Man Who Laughs (1st appearance of the Joker, following on from Year One)
Batman: The Long Halloween (by Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale, set after Year One, covers the fall of the mob & rise of the "freaks", & Two Face's origin)
Batman: Dark Victory (Loeb & Sale's sequel to The Long Halloween)
Batman: The Killing Joke (classic Joker story by Alan Moore, cover's his [possible] origin, plus his shooting of Barbara Gordon [which eventually lead to her becoming Oracle])
Batman: A Death in the Family (the death of the 2nd Robin, Jason Todd, at the hands of the Joker)
Some of the others I'd recommend would be (in order, following on from the above, albeit with a gap):
Batman: The Sword of Azrael (introduces Azrael)
Batman: Knightfall (1&2) & Knightsend (Bane breaks Batman's back, Azrael takes up the mantle of the Bat temporarily)
Batman: Prodigal (Dick takes up the mantle of the Bat temporarily)
Batman: Contagion (an Ebola type plague strikes Gotham)
Batman: Legacy (sequel to Contagion)
Batman: Cataclysm (massive earthquake strikes Gotham)
Batman: No Man's Land (after the quake, & the plague before it, the US Govt. abandons Gotham for a year)
Batman: Hush (new villain appears, who seems to be manipulating other Batman villains as part of some grand scheme)
After "Hush" there's also been stuff such as "Bruce Wayne: Murderer?", "Bruce Wayne: Fugitive", "War Games", "War Crimes".
Can't think what else. I actually stopped buying the Bat-books regularly a few years ago. Was tempted to go back, but was put off by reading about "Infinite Crisis" and "Final Crisis".
Thanks alot!!! I will probably start getting them next week they sound brilliant the ones i made bold i will probably definatly read. 1 questions does Gordon and Scarecrow make an apperance i would enjoy to see them in it looking 4ward to getting them now.
Gordon appears in Year One, his story is covered greatly in it, as for the Scarecrow, they have a seperate collection called 'Scarecrow's Tale' which is a whole bunch of scarecrow's appearances in various comics up until 2002 (I think), so you might like that (although you may get bored reading the tale of Jonathan Crane in, like, 5 stories in a row)
Yep, they're very good
"Year One" & "The Long Halloween" in particular were among the inspirations for Chris Nolan's recent Batman movies.
Gordon makes regular appearances in the comics, including the ones I mentioned.
Scarecrow is in, IIRC, "The Long Halloween" & "Dark Victory".
Another I forgot to mention is "Batman: Haunted Knight". It's by Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale, & is a collection of the "Legends of the Dark Knight" Halloween Specials they had done prior to "The Long Halloween". One is a Scarecrow story. ["Legends" was a monthly Batman comic which covered his early years]
Forget Arkham Asylum the game.Arkham Asylum the graphic novel is a work of genius.:)
Is that related to the game in anyway and does that have to be read before or after any of the others.
Certainly the greatest Batman story ever told - and (fighting it out with Watchmen) probably the greatest graphic novel ever.
I have heard of it. It's meant to be brilliant do the books have to be read in order if so what should this be after
DKR's not linked to current official continuity - it's set in the future in an alternate timeline - so the order doesn't matter wrt other Bat-books.