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dantastic's review against another edition
5.0
Batman By Grant Morrison Omnibus: Volume Three collects material from Batman: The Return #1, Batman Incorporated #1-8, Batman Incorporated Volume 2 #0-13, Batman Incorporated: Leveiathan Strikes #1, and Batman Incorporated Special #1.
Officially, Bruce Wayne publicly linking himself to Batman by funding Batman Incorporated is something I'm not a fan of but after enjoying the first and second Grant Morrison Batman Omnibus, I had to complete the run. I am quite glad I did.
Despite my initial poo-pooing the idea of Batman Incorporated, I loved the shit out of this. Freshly back from the dead, Bruce Wayne takes Batman worldwide and funds Batmen in places besides Gotham. You get Batman in Japan, England, France, Australia, South Dakota, Argentina, and other places. A worldwide Batman needs a worldwide foe and we get that in Leviathan, an organization with a ring of bombs around the world.
Taking on another secret organization so soon after beating The Black Glove (and probably Court of the Owls but I have no idea how the various timelines work out) seems a little repetitive at first glance but the stories aren't that similar. Leviathan has agents everywhere and a leader near and dear to Batman's heart. We get Batman and Damian dealing with their new father/son relationship while the world hangs in the balance. I also like how Damian clearly prefers working with Dick Grayson than his own father. Batman's probably as warm as Red Forman so that's not exactly a surprise.
Grant Morrison's "all the stories are true" approach makes Batman a richer character and the Batmen of many nations expand the Batman mythos quite a bit. I'd read 50 issue runs of Batman Japan or Man-Of-Bats and Raven Red. He works in a lot of callbacks to Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams run featuring Ras Al Ghul and also nods to Dark Knight Returns and Kingdom Come.
The art team knocks it out of the park. There are a lot of black haired guys in this and there's a concerted effort to make them actually look distinct from one another. I would say Chris Burnham and Yanick Paquette were my favorites but a lot of people did a lot of great work.
Taken as one work, Grant Morrison's run on Batman is one long epic about the family Batman lost and the family he built for himself to replace it. As much as I complain about modern Batman, this was a great super hero tale. Five out of five Batarangs.
Officially, Bruce Wayne publicly linking himself to Batman by funding Batman Incorporated is something I'm not a fan of but after enjoying the first and second Grant Morrison Batman Omnibus, I had to complete the run. I am quite glad I did.
Despite my initial poo-pooing the idea of Batman Incorporated, I loved the shit out of this. Freshly back from the dead, Bruce Wayne takes Batman worldwide and funds Batmen in places besides Gotham. You get Batman in Japan, England, France, Australia, South Dakota, Argentina, and other places. A worldwide Batman needs a worldwide foe and we get that in Leviathan, an organization with a ring of bombs around the world.
Taking on another secret organization so soon after beating The Black Glove (and probably Court of the Owls but I have no idea how the various timelines work out) seems a little repetitive at first glance but the stories aren't that similar. Leviathan has agents everywhere and a leader near and dear to Batman's heart. We get Batman and Damian dealing with their new father/son relationship while the world hangs in the balance. I also like how Damian clearly prefers working with Dick Grayson than his own father. Batman's probably as warm as Red Forman so that's not exactly a surprise.
Grant Morrison's "all the stories are true" approach makes Batman a richer character and the Batmen of many nations expand the Batman mythos quite a bit. I'd read 50 issue runs of Batman Japan or Man-Of-Bats and Raven Red. He works in a lot of callbacks to Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams run featuring Ras Al Ghul and also nods to Dark Knight Returns and Kingdom Come.
The art team knocks it out of the park. There are a lot of black haired guys in this and there's a concerted effort to make them actually look distinct from one another. I would say Chris Burnham and Yanick Paquette were my favorites but a lot of people did a lot of great work.
Taken as one work, Grant Morrison's run on Batman is one long epic about the family Batman lost and the family he built for himself to replace it. As much as I complain about modern Batman, this was a great super hero tale. Five out of five Batarangs.
acaskoftroutwine's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.25
I read a good chunk of these issues in the old trade paperbacks back in high school/college, but when I saw these omnibuses (and being inspired by a Batman podcast I got recommended) I decided to dive in and read through Grant Morrison's whole run.
Morrison sets up a lot in this volume, basically laying the groundwork for how they conceive of Batman and establishing what they feel are the basics of the character, as well as the contradictions. We have Batman getting over what he feels is the weight of the darkness he's been under and rededicating himself to his mission. Not the mission as written by Frank Miller, or those influenced by his work, but the mission as the superheroic ideal, an unending fight to save the world from evil.
One of the running themes in this volume, and the run as a whole, is the question of 'what do eccentric men who have everything do when they get bored?' Obviously the question fits to Batman, but it also applies to the Club of Heroes, The Black Glove and it's patrons, and even Talia al Ghul to some extent. And with that, Morrison rather subtly sets up what may be the most interesting theme of the run: the great good that Batman is capable of, but also the inherent childishness of the worldview that Batman encapsulates and how it pulls others into it.
The other theme introduced in this collection is the idea of the ultimate unknown. An unanswerable question for the ultimate detective, an enemy that he can never see coming, a darkness that may or may not even exist. The Hole in Things.
My largest problem with this collection has to do with things that are kind of impossible to avoid given the fragmented nature of mainline comics. The first part of the omnibus includes the Grant Morrison bits of 52 that deal with Batman, which are each maybe 5 pages each. They're important for both plot and thematic reasons, but they are almost indecipherable without understanding both the history of Batman for the last decade and a half and the greater plot of 52. They also included the 2 issues of the crossover The Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul that Morrison wrote, with recaps penned and drawn by Chris Burnham (which honestly is great, I wish more comic collections did something like that rather than just giving you the issues with no explanation), but the crossover is so disconnected from what Morrison is doing, and includes several plot points just to make sure they don't influence Morrison's book, that including it just feels weird.
The only other issue is that on reading it now I find the Black Glove to be so on the nose that it removes the threat of them. When I was younger it felt like they had depth, and the framing of the conflict between the Black Glove and Batman as an actual battle between good and evil in-universe felt like it gave a sense of grandeur to them, to contrast with the eventual payoff that they are, more than anything, just rich people with delusions of grandeur. But on rereading it now, they feel more like plot devices for the author, with the constant allusions to the horrible things they do in their free time feeling like a cheap way of establishing their depravity and their threat.
The art is a little all over the place. I don't dislike Andy Kuberts work, but it doesn't really stand out all that much. In contrast we have J.H. Williams III, who only works on the The Island of Mister Mayhew arc, but who is absolutely stunning as always.
5 or 6 out of 10.
Morrison sets up a lot in this volume, basically laying the groundwork for how they conceive of Batman and establishing what they feel are the basics of the character, as well as the contradictions. We have Batman getting over what he feels is the weight of the darkness he's been under and rededicating himself to his mission. Not the mission as written by Frank Miller, or those influenced by his work, but the mission as the superheroic ideal, an unending fight to save the world from evil.
One of the running themes in this volume, and the run as a whole, is the question of 'what do eccentric men who have everything do when they get bored?' Obviously the question fits to Batman, but it also applies to the Club of Heroes, The Black Glove and it's patrons, and even Talia al Ghul to some extent. And with that, Morrison rather subtly sets up what may be the most interesting theme of the run: the great good that Batman is capable of, but also the inherent childishness of the worldview that Batman encapsulates and how it pulls others into it.
The other theme introduced in this collection is the idea of the ultimate unknown. An unanswerable question for the ultimate detective, an enemy that he can never see coming, a darkness that may or may not even exist. The Hole in Things.
My largest problem with this collection has to do with things that are kind of impossible to avoid given the fragmented nature of mainline comics. The first part of the omnibus includes the Grant Morrison bits of 52 that deal with Batman, which are each maybe 5 pages each. They're important for both plot and thematic reasons, but they are almost indecipherable without understanding both the history of Batman for the last decade and a half and the greater plot of 52. They also included the 2 issues of the crossover The Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul that Morrison wrote, with recaps penned and drawn by Chris Burnham (which honestly is great, I wish more comic collections did something like that rather than just giving you the issues with no explanation), but the crossover is so disconnected from what Morrison is doing, and includes several plot points just to make sure they don't influence Morrison's book, that including it just feels weird.
The only other issue is that on reading it now I find the Black Glove to be so on the nose that it removes the threat of them. When I was younger it felt like they had depth, and the framing of the conflict between the Black Glove and Batman as an actual battle between good and evil in-universe felt like it gave a sense of grandeur to them, to contrast with the eventual payoff that they are, more than anything, just rich people with delusions of grandeur. But on rereading it now, they feel more like plot devices for the author, with the constant allusions to the horrible things they do in their free time feeling like a cheap way of establishing their depravity and their threat.
The art is a little all over the place. I don't dislike Andy Kuberts work, but it doesn't really stand out all that much. In contrast we have J.H. Williams III, who only works on the The Island of Mister Mayhew arc, but who is absolutely stunning as always.
5 or 6 out of 10.
batlim's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
5.0
ljames934's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
rocketwave's review against another edition
5.0
Great storytelling and great matching artwork.
Can't wait to read the third and last volume of Morrison's Batman run.
Can't wait to read the third and last volume of Morrison's Batman run.
rocketwave's review against another edition
5.0
Well this entire run was quite the ride.
Great conclusion to the Morrison saga.
I'm sure I've missed loads of references so I still have an excuse to re-read the series some time.
5 out of 5 batarangs!
Great conclusion to the Morrison saga.
I'm sure I've missed loads of references so I still have an excuse to re-read the series some time.
5 out of 5 batarangs!
ethandm's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
- Strong character development? Yes
4.75
groblinthegoblin624's review
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
2.5
I really wasn’t feeling a lot of this. I found in this omnibus that I don’t really gel with Grant Morrison’s very scattered writing style, where pages can be a jumble of scenes and moments only loosely connected, and for the most part I found the storylines to feel entirely too grim and edgy for my taste. I did think the tone felt at home during the And Then There Were None-esque murder mystery arc, but otherwise the story in tandem with the art made a comic experience pretty personally unappealing. I enjoyed the aforementioned murder mystery part, and came to like the culmination of the Black Glove storyline as it was happening, but pretty much hated the short story of the Joker’s comeback and the entire Final Crisis event. Tough stuff to get through. Middling comic for me and I hope that the next two volumes of Morrison’s run help me to enjoy it more. At least they’re both shorter