SuperHeroBooks - Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
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List Price: $14.99
Our Price: $7.87
Your Save: $ 7.12 ( 47% )
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Manufacturer: DC Comics
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 741.5973
EAN: 9781563893421
ISBN: 1563893428
Label: DC Comics
Manufacturer: DC Comics
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 224
Publication Date: 1997-05-01
Publisher: DC Comics
Release Date: 1997-05-01
Studio: DC Comics
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS by Frank Miller, Klaus Janson and Lynn Varley
Comment: The Dark Knight Returns was written and drawn by Frank Miller, inked by Klaus Janson, and colored by Lynn Varley. It was originally published as a four-part series in 1986.
Here, Bruce Wayne is in his fifties, and he hasn't been Batman in ten years. A massive crime wave drives him back into action. There's a lot going on here: crime is out of control, Commissioner Gordon is retiring, superheroes have been done away with, the Cold War is escalating, several of the old, classic Batman villains are on the loose, and Batman's not what he used to be.
The story here is so multi-layered, so complex, and Miller does an excellent job of keeping hold of all the threads. He also does a great job of blending old, classic characters with new ones. Miller's one-page vignettes with crime victims make the story personal.
Miller likes to give us characters' internal narration of events. This works most of the time, but once in a while it's just too much ("I get sick of the arm...and kill it below the elbow."). Miller typically does this when the artwork doesn't show us all he wants it to, and he feels compelled to tell us the rest. This is the most obvious weakness in Miller's work.
Miller's art isn't pretty. It's dark, it's sloppy at times, and it's often downright ugly. But it fits the story, and it, along with Janson's inks and Varley's colors, really sets the mood. Even the layout of the panels, which are often cramped and crowded together, add to the story's smothering feel.
There's so much here, and Miller gives the reader a lot to think about. All told, The Dark Knight Returns has held up over time, and is one of the two or three greatest comic works ever created, hands down.
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Summary: great true batman darkness and toughness
Comment: shows the real man behind batman and yet proves why he's the best comic character to some of us. a great graphic novel that incorporates a new robin and a reluctant batman that's doing his job and an awesome showdown with mr. superman at the end that has a great twist that'll make you appreciate batman's logic and strength even more. it's cool to see how some details are taken from the novel (and Year One) and incorporated into batman begins and the dark knight movies. this is the end of batman's career, and batman:year one is the beginning, both are must haves for any batman fan.
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Summary: Stupendously entertaining.
Comment: I've been a Batman fan for as long as I can remember. Had the toys, watched the movies a million times, the Adam West TV show, the Animated Series. I loved it all.
As a kid, I was big into comic books. I consider myself fortunate to have come of age in the late 80s/early 90s when the medium was really exploring the darker aspects of these characters people have loved for decades. Bane "breaking" Batman. The Killing Joke. Robin dying. Batman vs. Spawn. The death of Superman (a pretty big deal with my peers). Grim stuff, but I ate it up. Years passed and I eventually just stopped reading. I remained a Batman fan, but I simply got out of buying comic books. Most of what I was into is a big blur now.
In anticipation for Christopher Nolan's new Dark Knight movie, I went on a Batman binge. Trouble is, I already have most of the DVDs (and that's a lot of DVDs). What else is there?
I wasn't even aware of this book's existence until AFTER I got over comic books. How can that be? I have no idea. Apparently, it was a pretty big deal twenty years ago. Yet I was into the big deals of the time and somehow The Dark Knight Returns slipped from my grasp. I suppose I have no excuse. So, finally, after over a decade of not even so much as looking at a comic book, I ordered this (plus a few other Batman tales).
My order arrived today. I spent my evening reading the entire book. Know what? I absolutely loved it. Frank Miller has a fairly chaotic way of telling a story. He throws so many ideas into this graphic novel and not a single one of them bogs the story down or seems out of place. It's a long read (at least in my comic reading experience), but I enjoyed every minute of it. I even caught myself laughing out loud a few times. In lesser hands, this story might seem disjointed or even absurd, but Miller knows how to tell it right. Great artwork and great text. Also a lot of fun to see what became of some of Batman's rogues gallery's biggest baddies.
So, is this the book that will get me back into comic books as it did for so many people twenty years ago? I guess that remains to be seen. No matter what, I'm certainly glad I finally read this. A good story is a good story and The Dark Knight Returns excels.
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Summary: A great man once said...
Comment: That all you need as moral guides on this earth are The Dark Knight Returns, Kingdom Come (another graphical novel) and the Holy Bible. While I would probably omit the latter and include the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius or Plato's Republic I can surely concur with the first two selections as being critical in developing a tempered moral compass. While this might come off as an exaggeration, it is only barely - the three works offering quintessential guidance in times of befuddlement while also offering inspiration to trudge forward in times of injustice and betrayal. All the great questions of life are encountered by the protagonists and a righteous code of ethics is codified in response, inspiring the reader to be greater than what he was before by observing the examples of heroic conduct and so being transformed.
The Dark Knight Returns is by the standards of today primitively drawn and inked, but this fact is irrelevant as the graphics are well enough to keep our interest drawn to the engrossing moral lessons and satire. Each page of this precious work is chocked full of words and intelligently written dialogue, historically serving as the first serious "graphic novel" - an expanded literary comic that was intended to be read by adults and to have included in it serious subject matter. While most comics are centered around the plates (the art), graphic novels were supposed to be primarily stories, with the artwork intended to support and not overshadow the core writing, all originally starting off as novellas rather than storyboards. This being said, I will not hover too indulgently over the topic of the art - which is presented in stark, grimy, dark, vile environments, contemptuous caricatures of pop culture figures and lingering, desolate existential stages.
The story focuses on the question of what justice is while also (perhaps more importantly) criticizing the irrationally bellicose cold war climate and its corresponding destructive materialism, untempered indulgence and superficiality, issues which are very much still afflicting our society today as we rot in the wake of renewed imperialism and corruption. Bruce Wayne is presented not as a flawless super hero but rather as a broken and doubting latter-day Cincinnatus being summoned to once more repel the enemies of justice and civilization. Labeled a vigilante terrorist by the police and ostracized as a dangerous and unstable sociopath by the morally bankrupt public and their "expert" talking heads, the Batman heroically serves an ideal of justice in hopes of restoring reason and truth to a diseased, collapsing society bent on global nuclear destruction, all while expecting no reward and never abusing his power. Through Bruce Wayne's selfless sacrifice and devotion, the people of Gotham City are inspired by example to off their complacency and take back their city from the drug dealers, pimps, corrupt officials, thieves and rapists, all the while developing a sense of fidelity and brotherhood to one another.
Ultimately The Dark Knight Returns is about the proper conduct of a human being: even though the people around you may be corrupt and morally bankrupt, and even though they may have surrendered their faith to denial and apathy, and abandoned their community - a true man does not, even if he must be stabbed by a thousand blades in a day or swim through a lake of fire. While Bruce Wayne at times feels that his efforts to bring order to the lawless and miserable Gotham City are futile he continues to do what is just and good, in the face of all possible rejection and criticism. The reward for acting like a human being is not riches, or fame, or even respect of your peers, but rather the fleeting satisfaction in knowing that the people left in your wake would have been treated justly, and maybe, just maybe, would so be inspired to treat others with justice, breeding a righteous culture.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Brilliant.
Comment: I picked this book up in an earlier edition when I was in high school. I was a semi-fledgling to the world of the Bat, but I found myself easily drawn into the story. It's easy to read even if you aren't as knowing of everything as others are.
The idea of a semi-apocalyptic future with no real superheroes is a grim one. The only superheroes that exist are there merely to look good and even Superman is strangely muted in this world. Nearly everything is corrupt, whether people realize it or not. It's into this that Wayne decides to take up the mantle of Batman once more & free Gotham from the crime sprees. However he's not the only one who has once again taken up his old job...
I REALLY enjoyed this book. It's one of my favorites & always will be. I loved the female Robin, the neat artwork, and the story... the story was just about perfect!
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Editorial Reviews:
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If any comic has a claim to have truly reinvigorated the genre, then The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller--known also for his excellent Sin City series and his superb rendering of the blind superhero Daredevil--is probably the top contender. Batman represented all that was wrong in comics and Miller set himself a tough task taking on the camp crusader and turning this laughable, innocuous children's cartoon character into a hero for our times. The great Alan Moore (V for Vendetta, Swamp Thing, the arguably peerless Watchmen) argued that only someone of Miller's stature could have done this. Batman is a character known well beyond the confines of the comic world (as are his retinue) and so reinventing him, while keeping his limiting core essentials intact, was a huge task. Miller went far beyond the call of duty. The Dark Knight is a success on every level. Firstly it does keep the core elements of the Batman myth intact, with Robin, Alfred the butler, Commissioner Gordon, and the old roster of villains, present yet brilliantly subverted. Secondly the artwork is fantastic--detailed, sometimes claustrophobic, psychotic. Lastly it's a great story: Gotham City is a hell on earth, street gangs roam but there are no heroes. Decay is ubiquitous. Where is a hero to save Gotham? It is 10 years since the last recorded sighting of the Batman. And things have got worse than ever. Bruce Wayne is close to being a broken man but something is keeping him sane: the need to see change and the belief that he can orchestrate some of that change. Batman is back. The Dark Knight has returned. Awesome. --Mark Thwaite
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