Snyder/Capullo Batman, Li'l Gotham

Batman 25-27, 29-33

The rest of Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo’s Zero Year arc.  It fails to maintain any of the energy from the previous trade, grinding to a crawl with a weak sauce Ridder-run dystopia.  There are a few nice twists on the standard Batman origin - Gordon’s a dirty cop and his signature trenchcoat gets a less-than-legal origin story of its own; Bruce Wayne once tried to electroshock therapy away the trauma of his parents’ murder.  Really, it’s not that much darker than a much maligned reinterpretation from someone I’ll get to tomorrow.  

Poor Bruce.

Speaking of that someone, Capullo does some wonderful Frank Miller homages here:

Nice take on the SWAT scene from Year One.

Plenty more of that phrase to come...

A mashup of two DKR images.

Regret buying: No

Would buy again: No

Would read again: No

Rating: Didn’t suck

Batman: Li’l Gotham 1-6

I would never have imagined Dustin Nguyen capable of this Jill Thompson-esque Li’l look.  He knocks this out of the park, and his writing with Derek Fridolfs induces plenty of giggles from me.  Definitely sharing this with my kid.

Man, these covers!

"Turkey wrath!"

The best Freeze stories all end with quiet melancholy.

Normally, "Boingy" would be annoying, but it's super cute here.

Alfred knows kung fu!

A combination of the comic and the animated movie.

Floating Zatanna is cray cray adorbs.

What's with all the Miller homages?

Sniff.

Hee, all the boys cooking for Alfred on Father's Day.

Don't know what I like more, the fight over the bill or that Batman gets takeout.

Regret buying: No

Would buy again: No

Would read again: Yes

Rating: Nice