Review: ‘Batman & Robin’ #1 Face A New Beginning

There’s something to be said about a Batman that smiles. It all depends on the reason, and in Batman & Robin #1, we get to explore a Batman that seems… happy.

Joshua Williamson, Simone DiMeo and Steve Wands put Batman and Robin in a good place for once.

Bruce and Damian Wayne have put their differences aside, finally working back together for the first time in years. They need to rebuild their heroic relationship and their home life, all while dealing with the new Gotham under Catwoman’s rules as the city’s kingpin. But they’re about to uncover a strange new plot- the monsters of Gotham are banding together, and that makes them even more dangerous.

This book is a lot of fun, and I think that’s exactly the purpose it serves. Batman is the action heavy book for longtime fans. Detective is the cerebral thriller for the more mature fan. Williamson has crafted a high energy, easily accessible story, that mixes in enough continuity to satisfy the harcore fans, while easily serving a new reader. This honestly is the first Batman book in a long time that I feel like I could hand to my kids as an entry point. It’s not totally all ages, but it’s close.

That does mean that it has some faults though. Bruce’s characterization is a little off- he’s a bit too cheery and outgoing. Part of that might be how DiMeo draws him and Damian interact, but there’s a tone to Bruce’s voice that could work if he was in a better place. The issue is, this story is very firmly set in current continuity, at least with Zdarsky’s Batman, and Bruce is in a tough place with his mental health. It creates a tonal whiplash between the two that will make it harder for a Batman fan to get into it. I liked it, but it’s trying too hard to be both a continuity book and an entry point book.

DiMeo’s art is good, but unfortunately is a bit busy. The action scene that opens the issue is chaotic to a fault, with messy layouts, and figures and backgrounds that blend together in some places and clash in others. The art improves over the course of the story, but it does have a lot of energy that makes for a disorienting read more than once. His colors are uniformly great though, and makes Gotham feel incredibly real and lived in.

I like Wands’ letters. He makes things clear, and easy to read, while playing with some fonts and sound effects for the monsters. He does make a few pages a little too busy in some exposition heavy pages, but overall, he does help make the issue extremely readable.

Batman & Robin #1 is available now from DC Comics.