Comic Info
Comic Name: Batman (Volume 2)
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Scott Snyder/James Tynion IV
Artist: Greg Capullo/Jonathan Glapion/Rafael Albuquerque/Jason Fabok/Becky Cloonan/Andy Clarke/Sandu Florea
# of Issues: 6
Release Date: 2013
Batman #8 Variant
Reprints Batman (2) #8-12 and Annual #1 (June 2012-October 2012). The Owls are attacking Gotham and Batman is out to stop it! As Batman hunts the Owls, he faces off against his nemesis Mr. Freeze and learns who is really behind the Owls and how it could tie to his parents. Meanwhile, Harper Row sets out to find out all she can about the Batman…and nothing is going to stop her.
Written by Scott Snyder with co-writing by James Tynion IV, Batman Volume 2: The City of Owl continues DC Comics’ New 52 relaunch of the DC Universe. Following Batman Volume 1: The Court of Owls, Batman 2: The City of Owls ties into the bigger “Night of the Owls” storyline which ran through all the Batman Family titles. Batman (2) #8-9 and Batman (2) Annual #1 were also included in the Batman: Night of the Owls collection.
The New 52 really invigorated Batman for me. I never hated Batman but even as a child, Batman was never my favorite. The goofiness of the ’60s Batman combined with the popularity of the Superman movies led me to always lean toward Superman in the world of DC…and the constantly brooding Batman that began in the ’80s didn’t really help endear him to me. The New 52’s plan to streamline their comics peaked my interest (since Marvel was making no attempt at continuity) and I decided to give it a try…and I enjoyed it.
Batman #10 Variant
This volume continues Snyder’s fun run on the title that has shown shelf life. The Night of the Owls storyline however does read better as an event comic, but Snyder did make the stories in Batman stand-alone enough that they didn’t confuse readers not reading the other titles. If you have a choice, read Batman: Night of the Owls, but if you are simply reading the Batman title, this will work for you.
The art for the series continues to be top notch. I really love Greg Capullo’s version of the Dark Knight and have liked how he taps into Mark Miller’s Dark Knight look to bring it back to the mainstream DC universe. The Batman of this volume looks like an inbetween for Miller’s Batman: Year One Batman and The Dark Knight Returns Batman…and that is a great thing.
Batman 2: The City of Owls continues one of DC’s better series right now. It is smart, edgy, and is both readable as a collection or as individual issues. I like that the DC kicked off the Batman series with a “big event”, but hope that they don’t overdo it. The next big Batman event is covered in the next volume with the Joker’s return. Batman 2: The City of Owls is followed by Batman 3: Death of the Family.
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