C2E2 Report: DC Comics – Batman

Saturday was a big day for this year’s C2E2, with a lot of DC and Marvel’s biggest panels taking place. Besides entry in the morning, the longest line I saw all weekend was for this panel. Hundreds of fans filed through the doors of the convention’s largest panel space, and with good reason.

As things got started, John Cunningham, DC’s Marketing VP, introduced us to our panelists: James Tynion IV, former writer of Red Hood and the Outlaws and Talon and an architect of Batman: Eternal; Scott Snyder, writer for Batman, lead writer for Batman: Eternal, and all-around Batman superfan; Jason Fabok and Dustin Nguyen, the two artists for Batman: Eternal; Patrick Gleason and Peter Tomasi, the artist and writer, respectively, on Batman and _____; and Jim Chadwick, an editor with DC’s digital division who works on Batman ‘66, among others.

Cunningham started by reminding us that this year is the 75^th anniversary of Batman and promised a slew of celebration, most clearly embodied in a “Batman Day” sometime this July. He also mentioned the two animated shorts commissioned for the anniversary and, as a thank you, revealed that we’d be screening them before the panel began.

Unfortunately there was some technical trouble, kicking off a friendly rivalry between Cunningham and the people running the projector.

Unable to resolve the problem immediately, we turned to the comics.

The first book mentioned was Grayson, which received a warm reception, but just as quickly as it was brought up, Cunningham informed us that he couldn’t talk about it yet. Instead Scott Snyder took the opportunity to enlist the audience in a campaign to make sure that DC used the slogan that he and the other writers had come to love, “You think you know Nightwing, but you don’t know Dick.” It seemed to take off with the fans. DC had actually published the line in the Grayson #1 solicit a few days earlier, but after this panel I’m sure they were pleased that they went ahead with it.

Next on the docket was Batman and Scott Snyder’s “Zero Year” storyline, which has just entered its final phase, “Savage City”. Snyder, ever eager to share with the fans had thrown in a couple of extra slides into the presentation as a thank you. “You guys are our bosses,” he said, quoting a sentiment that drives he and Greg Capullo’s work on the title.

Batman: Year One (Film) – Review

By: Tab Murphy (writer), Sam Liu & Lauren Montgomery (directors), Bryan Cranston, Eliza Dushku, Benjamin McKenzie (voice actors)

The Story: Uplifting a depraved city takes more than just putting on some tights, you know.

The Review: No matter how grim cartoons get, we still rarely think of them as truly edgy or dangerous, at least enough to satisfy the adult palette.  Japanese animators have been doing this kind of dramatic work for years, basically, but of all the American producers, only DC has ventured into that territory with commercial success.  With each yearly release of their animated films, they’ve shown a willingness to take bigger risks, yielding more fruitful results each time.

You can see the evolution in the animation.  All-Star Superman showed subtle signs of moving toward an anime standard of production, but in this film, it’s unmistakable, beautiful, and fitting.  By now, DC has grown quite formidable at depicting action, but here they show surprising aptitude for subtle body movements and changes in expression that gives a whole new level of craft to the “acting.”  The animation itself shows emotion, even without the voice actors’ help.

But then, we’re working with a pretty excellent source to begin with.  Anyone who’s flipped through Frank Miller’s original story arc knows what a groundbreaking piece of work it is.  So much of its success derives from what Miller left brilliantly unspoken; as aggressive as it seems, most of its tension feels almost subconscious.  This film is about as faithful an adaptation of all those qualities as it can get, and remains gripping nearly its entire length as a result.

If you want to capture the Miller spirit, you better just go for it, and Murphy, Montgomery, and Liu pull no punches.  Fifteen minutes in, you’ve got violent cops, corruption almost visibly festering in all places, fist-fights with pimps and prostitutes, underage hookers stabbing men in the thigh, even (unless I misheard it) an F-bomb at one point.  Heck, you even get to see a couple stark-naked men, bound up and lying (privates-side down) around.