Monday, January 16, 2017

All Star Batman #5


I'm sure punching somebody six feet into the air isn't as deadly as it sounds.

Batman's road-trip finally comes to an end.

What Did Batman Learn?
Batman learned that nothing fucking matters because no matter how hard you work or how much effort you put into a five issue story arc, things just return to exactly where they were at the beginning of the five issue story arc. Bruce Wayne's secret life as Batman isn't exposed even though it looked like it was about to be discovered by the Gotham Police. Batman's search to cure Harvey Dent just wound up in Batman telling Harvey Dent that he can't cure him because it's not up to him to fight Harvey's battles for him. The people of Gotham go from not wanting to kill Batman at the start to wanting to kill Batman to save their secrets and right back to not wanting to kill Batman once Two-Face isn't cured. Although if I were Batman, I'd investigate every single one of these people attempting murder to keep their secrets. Those must be some dark, demented secrets! Also, Alfred confesses to Batman that he once put out a hit on The Joker but reconsidered a few hours later. That doesn't seem like much of a confession since Batman already knows Alfred would blow the fucking Joker's head off with a shotgun if he ever got the chance. Alfred also calls himself a hypocrite because he advised Batman as a boy not to kill Joe Chill (or Harvey's dad?). But that's not hypocrisy at all. That's just a father trying to keep his son safe and innocent. It also shows quite a bit of foresight because how could Batman go around feeling superior to all of the other Justice League members because he doesn't kill? Not that they kill either but Batman is like an alcoholic who doesn't drink telling teetotalers how it's much harder for him not to drink and thus means a lot more.

The Ranking!
No change. Fucking comic books! Shouldn't a book with "all star" in the title create some kind of actual change in the Batman's world, or at least have a little more meaning than "We all have to fight to not be bad guys and shit, dude!"? Scott Snyder has a way of writing a big story that never really has any impact on Batman when it's done. Which, really, means he's doing comic books perfectly. They're really stories about characters in amber. They're not meant to learn anything; they're meant to teach. They're morality tales told to people who probably don't give a shit as long as the art is cool and there's loads of violence. So I probably should have kept the "What Did Batman Learn?" section as "What Did We Learn?" because Batman never fucking learns a thing! If he did, he'd retire with Selina to a private island and let all of the super genius Bat-kids without death wishes and obsessive personalities keep Gotham safe.

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