I don't normally make news posts as this blog is about how comics affect me personally, but sometimes those two coincide. As you probably know by now, DC announced on Tuesday that they will renumber and revamp their superhero comics this September. They've trickled news about what the 52 #1s will be, starting with the announcements on Thursday of the (more or less) Justice League-related books and on Friday of the Green Lantern books. Little of this deeply affects me.
Today's announcements (of Batman #1, Detective Comics #1, Batman and Robin #1 and Batman: The Dark Knight #1), however, do affect me. I'm a big fan of Batman and his “family”, so I've been eager to see their plans.
The biggest news is that Bruce Wayne will be the only Batman after the relaunch. This really should have been expected. A (the?) major point of all this is to bring in more casual fans. Casual fans know that Bruce Wayne is Batman and he fights crime with the help of Robin, the Boy Wonder. They might know that Batgirl helps, too, and they might think of her as Barbara Gordon. Speaking of Gordons, they'll know that Jim Gordon is Batman's friend in the police force. Also, Bruce has a butler named Alfred.
Of course, most of that hasn't changed in recent years, but major things have. Babs is a paraplegic going by the codename Oracle (and has been for quite some time) with Stephanie Brown taking over the Batgirl mantle as of late. Dick Grayson is Gotham's Batman, with Bruce taking it globally. His son, Damian, is now Robin.
Well, today's press releases clearly and repeatedly state that Bruce is the only Batman. What that means for Dick, we've yet to hear. Damian is still Robin, but no one else in the Bat-family has been mentioned yet.
The Books
Batman #1: Scott Snyder is moving from Detective Comics to this title and surely taking me with him. It'll be Bruce, not Dick, under the cowl, but I've been enjoying his run on Detective Comics so much that I'll have to follow. Greg Capullo will be debuting at DC on the art. Jock and Francavilla (from Snyder's Detective Comics) will be sorely missed.
Detective Comics #1: And completing the flip-flop, Tony Daniel switches to Detective Comics from Batman. He'll be drawing this one as well as writing. I'll have to take a look with this one. I like the detective side of Batman quite a bit (which is why I currently pick this up) but I'm not sure about Daniel's Batman writing. I'll take a look, though.
Batman and Robin #1: This is where I hate/love that they made Bruce the only Batman. Dick and Damian have been building an interesting relationship over the past couple years and I hate to see that thrown out. On the other hand, it'll be really interesting to see Bruce with his son. Damian's a great character, so this is worth seeing how that's handled. Peter Tomasi and Pat Gleason (who'll be doing this book) never really got to do much with this book — they were supposed to take over after Grant Morrison, but haven't actually done many issues, so I'm not sure how to approach this book.
Batman: The Dark Knight #1: The only book that's unchanged, talent-wise (David Finch, writing and drawing — though, he'll have pencilling help from Jay Fabok), and the only one I'm still not interested in.
What about the family?
What this release says nothing about are the Bat-family books. This mentions only the ones with Batman himself as the main character. What will happen with Red Robin and Batgirl? (Stay the same, please.) Will Dick go back to being Nightwing and get his own title? What about the other Bat-books? I'm watching this one closely (much moreso than the other DC books). Stay tuned.
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