Detective Comics (David Lapham’s City of Crime arch)

[DJ Kenobi]

David Lapham’s current run on Detective Comics is producing the best Batman story I’ve read in years (the arch begins with issue 801, but I’m not sure when it’s slated to end). It’s a solid book, through and through.

Possibly my favorite aspect is that though there are a number of villains popping up here and there, the focus of the story never strays from the core of what makes a great Batman story: the victim, the crime, the pathos of Batman, and Gotham. In fact, Gotham is such a player in City of Crime that the whole story has an especially strong gothic feel to it, a line of thinking which brought me to an interesting concept that may or may not be intentional.

Conventions of the gothic novel typically include a romance written as a horror/suspense narrative with specific emphases on the gloom and doom, chivalry and magic, and large mysterious seemingly alive buildings. In terms of the romance, there is the gothic hero who stands mostly for power and is morally ambiguous, and the gothic heroine who struggles to win his love without being destroyed in the process. The romantic conventions are inverted in City of Crime with Batman fulfilling the thematic duties of the heroine. Gotham is the overwhelming identity that Batman must struggle to “save” due equally to guilt and love while avoiding his destruction. This is the exact same role that Catherine Earnshaw plays in Wuthering Heights. I’m not saying this approach emasculates Batman, but it does make for a fresh take on a classic character.

Page 5 of issue 804 is a prime example of this relationship:

He’s not surprised. He knows his city well. She is vain. A tease. She smiles coyly in the dark. She does not like answers. Answers would only kill the mystery. The intrigue. The romance. And Gotham, of course, is a city where romance oozes like a stuck pig.

The Batman/Gotham romance is not your tawdry paperback romance, but a doomed romance that takes all of its sustenance from the struggle of one to save the other.

All of this gothic tradition is still just an undercurrent though, the strength of the flow is crime noir, which Lapham has previously demonstrated an expert grasp of in Stray Bullets. And this brings me to giving big props to the penciller, Ramon Bachs. Though dark, the art is far from muddled by shadows. Also, he gives the architecture of Gotham the attention it deserves, especially in this story.

If there is one place where I can see some people having a problem with City of Crime, it would be that Lapham requires the reader to be patient, a quality that I fear has been sort of bred out of the comic book reading audience. Plot points won’t be tied up right away, allusions will be left hanging, and there will be some things that don’t immediately make sense. These aren’t example of poor story telling though; these are common traits to mystery narratives. City of Crime is a well-written, solidly illustrated crime noir story with heavy gothic undertones. It’s a great read. Be patient, enjoy the mystery, and you’ll love it. Well, at least I sure do.


P.S. I like this line. “The east end. Where the buildings lean on each other like drunken old men.”

P.P.S. Make sure to catch Kimo's backup story in 805. It's top notch.

[Crimson Spider]

I wrote off the Bat-titles about two years after No Man's Land. But I'll take your word for it and try to find Tec #805.

[DJ Kenobi]

I don't usually buy the Bat-titles either, but I decided to make an exception for David Lapham's run. I seem to give Batman a try every now and then, the last time being Hush. Though a darn good looking book, Loeb's story was just too weak for me and I was disappointed. Nothing is disappointing me about this run though.

[Crimson Spider]

Word. And I meant #801.

[Think Tank Bob]

Yeah, this story line definately gets my approval too. It's cool how he portays Gotham as it's own character.