Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne #1 – Review

By: Grant Morrison (writer), Chris Sprouse (artist), Karl Story (inker), Guy Major (colors), Mike Marts (editor)

The Story: A prehistoric tribe of hunters has stumbled upon some kind of rocket ship, and while reading spiritual meaning into its appearance, and against the backdrop of a rite of passage, they follow strange tracks leading away from the craft. They encounter a flock of bats and a confused man who speaks in tongues. They keep him, treating this supernatural being, partly as a ghost, partly as a pet. Then the Blood Mob Tribe attacks and it goes very much downhill…

What’s Good: When the Blood Mob Tribe attacked, I expected Bruce to make short work of them. I really, really respected Morrison for making Bruce take an arrow in the shoulder and retreat. Batman is one of the most superb fighters on Earth, but he is still a man, and so many writers forget that. When the Blood Mob Tribe actually caught him, I was even more impressed. How the heck is he going to get out of this? Morrison also did some fine voice work. The tribespeople didn’t use different words than us, but their word order and expressions were different enough to give me the flavor of a simpler, changed language of thirty thousand years ago. And he succeeded in delivering an emotional note to this story with the advice and teachings that the tribe kept giving to the boy undergoing his rite of passage. It made me care a lot more about the story. My tension rose a lot at the appearance of Superman and Green Lantern, especially since they were too late. Now I’m itching to learn more about what they were talking about.