Batman Graphic Novels

Alan Moore's Killing Joke

Grant Morrison's Arkham Asylum

Death in The Family is pretty great if I recall correctly, but I haven't read it since High School.

BLIND JUSTICE, written by Sam Hamm and released in conjunction with the 1989 movie, is the best Batman story I've ever read.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Brendan 

What are some other good Batman graphic novels out there? Is the rest of the Hush series any good? Or the Arkham novels? I think there's one called Arkham Asylum where it just takes place in one night inside Arkham.

I thought the Arkham Asylum: Living Hell mini-series by Dan Slott was pretty good. Eric Powell also did the covers, so that was a bonus.
 

I'm very fond of Matt Wagner's work on Batman, so I'd recommend Batman/Grendel, Batman and the Monster Men, and Batman and the Mad Monk.

While I wouldn't necessarily call them graphic novels, the Batman Black and White collections are really nice anthologies with great art.

Although likely out of print, I'm fond of Night Cries by Scott Hampton and the late Archie Goodwin. It's more of a low key message story than most Batman stories, but it's well done with some really terrific art.

Peter Milligans Dark Knight Dark City is being reprinted soon, its solicitied in the latest Previews catalog.

Get it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Randolph Carter 

Peter Milligans Dark Knight Dark City is being reprinted soon, its solicitied in the latest Previews catalog.

Get it.

That storyline comprises the first Batman comics I ever bought. 

Quote:

Originally Posted by Randolph Carter 

Peter Milligans Dark Knight Dark City is being reprinted soon, its solicitied in the latest Previews catalog.

Get it.

Holy sh*t! I've been talking about this run for ages. Finally, it's getting the respect it deserves!

Its an excellent comic. I first read it when it was published here in Sweden in the early 90s.

That is great news. "Dark Knight, Dark City" is a favorite of mine. Good to know that fans who missed that story the first time will see what all the fuss is about.

JSA: The Liberty Files is an elseworlds, so you don't have to worry about running into any continuity snarls, though a basic knowledge of DC comics helps. It's sort of an ensemble piece, but Batman is clearly the main character and the story is told primarily from his point of view. It manages to be dark without being "grim and gritty" and it's quite clever. It's worth a look, at any rate.

I really recommend finding Greg Rucka and Ed Brubaker's Gotham Central trades. It's pretty much Homicide: Life on the Street in Gotham City with Batman as a mere periphery character(the whole series is mainly from the viewpoint of Gotham Police Department). The 4 issue Joker storyline might be my favorite arc of the villian, and it beats Nolan's unexplained "agent of chaos" angle by a good 5 years.

The only thing is that there's some Final Crisis bleed through, but it's very minimal. I don't follow those huge comic crossovers either, and the one issue that has the GPD deal with that crap is just that: one issue. It didn't really hamper my enjoyment one bit.

BATMAN: VENOM is a great little five-issue collection, and would make a sound basis for a Nolanesque film. The Bruce/Alfred relationship is rarely better depicted.

Brian Azzarello's JOKER is pretty great. Batman doesn't factor into it much, but the Joker story is so compelling you won't mind much.

I'm a big fan of Michael Green's LOVERS & MADMEN. It's definitely polarizing - predominantly due to a controversial choice made by Batman - but it's a pretty fantastic/chilling/weird take on the Joker origin story. I actually prefer it to Ed Brubaker's  more popular MAN WHO LAUGHS.   

Paul Dini's HEART OF HUSH is pretty darn good too. A worthy follow-up to the original HUSH story. Much, much, MUCH better thanA.J. Lieberman's weak HUSH RETURNS. 

Dave Lapham's CITY OF CRIME is worth a look. It gets a bit convoluted by the end but it offers on of the most absorbingly repulsive protraits of Gotham City.

Mad Love by Paul Dini and Bruce Timm. Pretty much the definitive story about Joker and Harley Quinn.

Yeah at this point a mention of Gotham Central should be brought up by law anytime somebody mentions quality Batman works. It's so goddamn good.

Also I'll second a Matt Wagner mention gladly. I love how he's able to truly get into the pulp backdrop of the character and bring that to the forefront in his stories.

Matt Wenger's Batman-Grendel mini series is well worth your time.

Gotham Central is great, but it's not a Batman series...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Love Machine 

 

Gotham Central is great, but it's not a Batman series...

True, it's only tangentially a Batman series, but that's no reason to pass up such a consistently excellent series. Which reminds me, the first 30 or so issues of the Brubaker/Allred/Cooke Catwoman series are amazing, and any fan of the Batverse owes it to themselves to check it out.

Head's up for folks (like myself) interested in checking out GCPD:  DC is in the process of re-releasing the books.  In fact, Volume 1 was just released this past Tuesday.

ComicsAlliance's Chris Sims just did an excellent post on some "deep cuts" for high-quality Batman storylines.

Batman stories are like peanuts. You can't stop at just one. Figured I'd offer some more to the list.

Batman: Four of a Kind - Think of this collection as the b-sides to Batman: Year One, The Man Who Laughs and The Long Halloween. Back in the summer of 1995, DC decided to tell updated stories about Batman's first encounters with Scarecrow, Poison Ivy, The Riddler and Man-Bat. Pretty solid work here from Chuck Dixon and Alan Grant.

Tales of the Batman - Besides his work with Jeph Loeb over the years, Tim Sale has drawn Batman on other occasions. Tales collects those other stories. Hard to believe, but the best tale in the bunch involves Cavalier. The foppishness of the character is thankfully kept to a minimum.  

Faces: I'm guessing that Matt Wagner watched Tod Browning's Freaks multiple times before he sat down to work on this Two-Face story. Reading comics like this makes me wish that DC still published Legends of the Dark Knight monthly.

Agreed! I believe this collection has one of my favorite Bat side stories where the inmates in Arkham compete in a softball game with the prisoners of Blackgate while Arkham is getting rebuild after Bane's sieged that spurred Knightfall. Also, this is the story where I got the idea for my imaginary sketch comedy group: "The Lunatic Elite"!

Batman: Year 100 by Paul Pope.