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Review: Showcase Presents - Batman and the Outsiders Vol. 1
Showcase Presents: Batman and the Outsiders Vol. 1 TPB
Written by Mike W. Barr
Penciled by Jim Aparo and Various
Inked by Mike De Carlo and Various
Published by DC Comics. $16.99 USD
It's not high praise to just say that you've finished reading a long book, I realize, but in this volume's defense, there are no other Showcase volumes that I can say that about. They're a real challenge; with bad paper and no coloring, the art and story has to be damn good to get you through over 500 pages' worth. To elaborate, I have about seven or eight others, have read part of one, and haven't really gotten around to the others, which are all Silver Age works. Batman and the Outsiders has the advantage of originally being published in the early '80s, my comics sweet spot, when I was in high school and reading comics to get me through. I never read the series then, as I was strictly a Marvelite, but a few years later I got into DC more with Watchmen and Dark Knight, as well as John Byrne on the Superman books, and I ended up following the Bat-titles a bit. I think this series was probably about over by then.
Anyway, I picked this book up because I'd since enjoyed the few Barr-written books I'd come across, I obviously like Batman, and I just has a curiosity about this book, which I don't remember every hearing anything but good things about. This volume collects the first nineteen issues of the series, the first appearance in The Brave & The Bold, and the first Annual. Barr writes all but an issue featuring the Teen Titans, which Marv Wolfman handles with a Barr co-plot, and the always underrated Aparo draws the majority of it, though not as much as I would've liked.
After a mostly plausible setup, in which Batman quits the Justice League over their putting politics ahead of justice, he finds himself pulling together a group of superheroes, three of them young and unpracticed, as well as Black Lightning, who needs something to get over his guilt from the death of a bystander, and Metamorpho, who had nothing better to do and was probably worried his copyright was going to lapse. The newcomers are Katana, an angry young Japanese woman who takes her codename from her sword; Geo-Force, the prince of far-off Markovia, who has earth-based powers that somehow include flight; and Halo, a high school-age blonde girl who uses different colored auras to do...stuff. I never got a handle on her powers.
In fact, for better or worse, Barr is nonchalant about the superpower aspect of this book, and doesn't define each member's abilities very clearly, nor explore their possibilities. Part of this may be due to the team's leader, Batman, having no powers, and Katana doesn't really have any, either. What he does focus on is that the team is a family--bonded together in most cases because their own families and loved ones are not around. Not a bad theme for a book, especially one starring Batman, the original superhero orphan-turned-father figure.
Another nice plan is to set the book apart by not throwing in familiar villains, nor tons of guest stars. There is that Titans issue, yes, but that's justified by Terra being on the team at the time, and she happens to be Geo-Force's sister.
Where the book fails is purely in execution, though it would be easy enough to call it a moderate success, at least through its first year. The nice elements are the close bond between Tatsu (Kitana) and Halo, though it can also be argued putting the two women on the team together is a matter of convenience. Batman's characterization is mainly left for his solo books, so here he's just a paternal, mostly patient leader, aside from when he still tries to boss around Robin, now leader of the Teen Titans, and that seems more Marv Wolfman's trip than Barr's. Halo is cute enough but her high school stories aren't interesting, nor is the budding romance between her and Brion (Geo-Force), which Barr seems to realize and cuts short quickly. Maybe someone reminded him that she's only 16? Actually, his ending of that subplot is kind of creepy, as Brion says he realized he didn't really love her, he was just projecting his feelings for his sister onto her.
That ickyness aside, Brion is terribly dull, and Barr seems to have little desire in changing that. There's a halfhearted scene where he attempts to call his brother, the King, and the circuits are busy. Um, why not just fly there, hero? The only thing interesting about Brion is how he spells his name, and the only change he goes through is he gets a new costume.
Metamorpho keeps his dignity for the most part, a likeable and loyal lug, an old-fashioned gentleman with a burning love for one Sapphire Stagg, whose daddy won't let the two kids get back together. Barr does little with the elemental aspect of Metamorpho's powers and instead uses him like Plastic-Man, able to turn into any giant weapon or implement you need in a fight, with his ugly mug in the middle of it. The Stagg storyline pops up briefly once or twice, then Metamorpho has enough and just goes and gets her, and that's the end of it. Barr unfortunately winds up a lot of subplots like this, as if he gets tired of them and just wants to clean the slate. The same thing happens to Black Lightning, who mopes around, though always competent, until the mother of the woman killed because of him tells him she forgives him. After that, he's just fine, and goes the rest of this volume (about six or seven more issues) with nothing happening. Barr's characterization of Black Lightning is bothersome, too. I mean, he's portrayed positively, but why the poor speech? Isn't he a teacher? Barr is more acclaimed for his solo books, particularly his Batman stories, and those are often pretty sophisticated and sometimes contain authentic mysteries, thorny plots, but here he proves inferior to many writers of team books of the period such as Chris Claremont or John Byrne, who were always adept at moving lots of pots around the stove, cooling and simmering and cooling again, until the eventual boil was right when it had to be.
And it's not like the A-plots are so compelling, either. For as laudable as the decision was to start from scratch with the supervillains, the results are less than stellar. We have one team of assassins led by "New-Wave," so-called because she has a limp mohawk and represents some new revolution in villainy...and because, "punk is dead!" And a trip to Tokyo brings the Outsiders up against a team named, like Katana, after their weapons, so we have Shuriken, Nunchaku, a dwarf named Blowdart, and a confused Viking imported from the past named Anthor Stoneaxe, I suppose because Sai was sick that day.
Aparo keeps the reader's interest probably longer than the book deserves, because he's such a pro. His panels always have depth, just enogh detail, and a keen sense of when to close in or pull back. Every issue he pencils is a modest clinic in effective, dynamic storytelling, and there aren't too many artists who've drawn a better Batman, at least over a long period of time. Unfortunately, the book gets its share of fill-in artists, and they're a painful reminder of '80s mediocrity. Steve Lightle does an issue, and I'm reminded that he was a nice cover artist but never much as a penciler. Bill Willingham's art is fine as long as you've never heard of Michael Golden. Dan Day is quite a bit like late Master of Kung-Fu artist Gene Day, except with no sense of proportion. George Perez draws the Titans issue, and does as nice a job as one would expect. Trevor Von Eeden tries out an interesting but not-yet-there style, sort of animation blocky and iconic but Sienkiewicz scratchy at the same time, which is an uneasy mix. The most disappointing issue has to be the Annual, which promises Jim Aparo after a fill-in the month before, but it's only Aparo inking a quartet of glum-making artists: Jerome Moore, Jan Duursema, Alex Saviuk and Rich Hoberg. When Alex Saviuk artwork is the high point, that's a bad comic. Aparo's inking holds it together fairly well, but he's got little to work with. In contrast, his inking over Frank Miller on the cover is a real wasted opportunity. If not for the "FM," you'd never know Miller penciled it.
By the end of this volume, only about a year-and-a-half into the run, there's still some nice warm camaraderie, like when Batman finds Halo's parents, but the stories often feel like they would work better in one issue rather than two. One of the better issues, in fact, is a done-in-one story where Geo-Force is looking for murderous vengeance and Batman calls in Superman to take him down, with an awestruck Halo as his sidekick for the night.
Overall, this is a respectable book, probably a little above average for the 1980s. It has a nice warmth to it that most team books don't have, and that makes up some for the humdrum plots and villains. Barr gives each character a moment or two in the spotlight, and during those times they're fairly interesting (aside from Geo-Force), but he's not able to keep them all interesting all the time, to juggle plots and subplots in a lively way that suggests real people with diverse personalities and lives that won't stop just because they've got someone to fight.
Written by Mike W. Barr
Penciled by Jim Aparo and Various
Inked by Mike De Carlo and Various
Published by DC Comics. $16.99 USD
It's not high praise to just say that you've finished reading a long book, I realize, but in this volume's defense, there are no other Showcase volumes that I can say that about. They're a real challenge; with bad paper and no coloring, the art and story has to be damn good to get you through over 500 pages' worth. To elaborate, I have about seven or eight others, have read part of one, and haven't really gotten around to the others, which are all Silver Age works. Batman and the Outsiders has the advantage of originally being published in the early '80s, my comics sweet spot, when I was in high school and reading comics to get me through. I never read the series then, as I was strictly a Marvelite, but a few years later I got into DC more with Watchmen and Dark Knight, as well as John Byrne on the Superman books, and I ended up following the Bat-titles a bit. I think this series was probably about over by then.
Anyway, I picked this book up because I'd since enjoyed the few Barr-written books I'd come across, I obviously like Batman, and I just has a curiosity about this book, which I don't remember every hearing anything but good things about. This volume collects the first nineteen issues of the series, the first appearance in The Brave & The Bold, and the first Annual. Barr writes all but an issue featuring the Teen Titans, which Marv Wolfman handles with a Barr co-plot, and the always underrated Aparo draws the majority of it, though not as much as I would've liked.
After a mostly plausible setup, in which Batman quits the Justice League over their putting politics ahead of justice, he finds himself pulling together a group of superheroes, three of them young and unpracticed, as well as Black Lightning, who needs something to get over his guilt from the death of a bystander, and Metamorpho, who had nothing better to do and was probably worried his copyright was going to lapse. The newcomers are Katana, an angry young Japanese woman who takes her codename from her sword; Geo-Force, the prince of far-off Markovia, who has earth-based powers that somehow include flight; and Halo, a high school-age blonde girl who uses different colored auras to do...stuff. I never got a handle on her powers.
In fact, for better or worse, Barr is nonchalant about the superpower aspect of this book, and doesn't define each member's abilities very clearly, nor explore their possibilities. Part of this may be due to the team's leader, Batman, having no powers, and Katana doesn't really have any, either. What he does focus on is that the team is a family--bonded together in most cases because their own families and loved ones are not around. Not a bad theme for a book, especially one starring Batman, the original superhero orphan-turned-father figure.
Another nice plan is to set the book apart by not throwing in familiar villains, nor tons of guest stars. There is that Titans issue, yes, but that's justified by Terra being on the team at the time, and she happens to be Geo-Force's sister.
Where the book fails is purely in execution, though it would be easy enough to call it a moderate success, at least through its first year. The nice elements are the close bond between Tatsu (Kitana) and Halo, though it can also be argued putting the two women on the team together is a matter of convenience. Batman's characterization is mainly left for his solo books, so here he's just a paternal, mostly patient leader, aside from when he still tries to boss around Robin, now leader of the Teen Titans, and that seems more Marv Wolfman's trip than Barr's. Halo is cute enough but her high school stories aren't interesting, nor is the budding romance between her and Brion (Geo-Force), which Barr seems to realize and cuts short quickly. Maybe someone reminded him that she's only 16? Actually, his ending of that subplot is kind of creepy, as Brion says he realized he didn't really love her, he was just projecting his feelings for his sister onto her.
That ickyness aside, Brion is terribly dull, and Barr seems to have little desire in changing that. There's a halfhearted scene where he attempts to call his brother, the King, and the circuits are busy. Um, why not just fly there, hero? The only thing interesting about Brion is how he spells his name, and the only change he goes through is he gets a new costume.
Metamorpho keeps his dignity for the most part, a likeable and loyal lug, an old-fashioned gentleman with a burning love for one Sapphire Stagg, whose daddy won't let the two kids get back together. Barr does little with the elemental aspect of Metamorpho's powers and instead uses him like Plastic-Man, able to turn into any giant weapon or implement you need in a fight, with his ugly mug in the middle of it. The Stagg storyline pops up briefly once or twice, then Metamorpho has enough and just goes and gets her, and that's the end of it. Barr unfortunately winds up a lot of subplots like this, as if he gets tired of them and just wants to clean the slate. The same thing happens to Black Lightning, who mopes around, though always competent, until the mother of the woman killed because of him tells him she forgives him. After that, he's just fine, and goes the rest of this volume (about six or seven more issues) with nothing happening. Barr's characterization of Black Lightning is bothersome, too. I mean, he's portrayed positively, but why the poor speech? Isn't he a teacher? Barr is more acclaimed for his solo books, particularly his Batman stories, and those are often pretty sophisticated and sometimes contain authentic mysteries, thorny plots, but here he proves inferior to many writers of team books of the period such as Chris Claremont or John Byrne, who were always adept at moving lots of pots around the stove, cooling and simmering and cooling again, until the eventual boil was right when it had to be.
And it's not like the A-plots are so compelling, either. For as laudable as the decision was to start from scratch with the supervillains, the results are less than stellar. We have one team of assassins led by "New-Wave," so-called because she has a limp mohawk and represents some new revolution in villainy...and because, "punk is dead!" And a trip to Tokyo brings the Outsiders up against a team named, like Katana, after their weapons, so we have Shuriken, Nunchaku, a dwarf named Blowdart, and a confused Viking imported from the past named Anthor Stoneaxe, I suppose because Sai was sick that day.
Aparo keeps the reader's interest probably longer than the book deserves, because he's such a pro. His panels always have depth, just enogh detail, and a keen sense of when to close in or pull back. Every issue he pencils is a modest clinic in effective, dynamic storytelling, and there aren't too many artists who've drawn a better Batman, at least over a long period of time. Unfortunately, the book gets its share of fill-in artists, and they're a painful reminder of '80s mediocrity. Steve Lightle does an issue, and I'm reminded that he was a nice cover artist but never much as a penciler. Bill Willingham's art is fine as long as you've never heard of Michael Golden. Dan Day is quite a bit like late Master of Kung-Fu artist Gene Day, except with no sense of proportion. George Perez draws the Titans issue, and does as nice a job as one would expect. Trevor Von Eeden tries out an interesting but not-yet-there style, sort of animation blocky and iconic but Sienkiewicz scratchy at the same time, which is an uneasy mix. The most disappointing issue has to be the Annual, which promises Jim Aparo after a fill-in the month before, but it's only Aparo inking a quartet of glum-making artists: Jerome Moore, Jan Duursema, Alex Saviuk and Rich Hoberg. When Alex Saviuk artwork is the high point, that's a bad comic. Aparo's inking holds it together fairly well, but he's got little to work with. In contrast, his inking over Frank Miller on the cover is a real wasted opportunity. If not for the "FM," you'd never know Miller penciled it.
By the end of this volume, only about a year-and-a-half into the run, there's still some nice warm camaraderie, like when Batman finds Halo's parents, but the stories often feel like they would work better in one issue rather than two. One of the better issues, in fact, is a done-in-one story where Geo-Force is looking for murderous vengeance and Batman calls in Superman to take him down, with an awestruck Halo as his sidekick for the night.
Overall, this is a respectable book, probably a little above average for the 1980s. It has a nice warmth to it that most team books don't have, and that makes up some for the humdrum plots and villains. Barr gives each character a moment or two in the spotlight, and during those times they're fairly interesting (aside from Geo-Force), but he's not able to keep them all interesting all the time, to juggle plots and subplots in a lively way that suggests real people with diverse personalities and lives that won't stop just because they've got someone to fight.
Posted by ChristopherAllen at 1:47 AM [Link to this post]
2 Comments:
Nice Review, I'll have to check this book out. I too hate the B&W aspect of these Showcase books but for the price they're a good value.
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http://www.bat-blog.com
It's not so much the lack of color as the quality of the paper. If it was thick and white, with a little bit of gloss to it, it would be great (and much more than $16.99 of course).
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