For The Love of Comics

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Before I dive into this one headfirst let me start with this (Click to enlarge):

That my friends [What are you, John McCain? ~D] is the LATEST teaser image released by DC Comics, courtesy of Newsarama, which was attached with a question from Dan Didio: “Can you find all the clues in this image?” I don’t want to ruin the fun by telling you guys what clues I was able to find, but I would like to talk about what has all of us Batman fanboys quaking like crack fiends in between fixes. Who will be The Bat?

Thankfully, Grant Morrison will not be penning this one, which I’m sure puts Dustin’s heart at ease [I think Peter Tomasi should write this and anything having to do with Dick Grayson.  Ever. ~D again]. Tony Daniel will be taking over here in both the writing and art aspects. (Let’s be honest, he can’t do much worse than Morrison did.) So, before Battle for the Cowl officially kicks off in March, let’s take a look at the possible competitors:

Dick Grayson
The Prodigal Son. Dick Grayson has been at the side of the Dark Knight longer than anyone has (Aside from Alfred of course). Following the tragic death of his own parents Dick Grayson was taken in by a sympathetic Bruce Wayneamd soon became the first Robin. [Actually, depending on the continuity, Bruce was the first Robin ~D] After stepping out from beneath the shadow of the Bat, Grayson became Nightwing and set out to become his own man. Over the years Nightwing has really come in to his own.  It would be a shame to see an end come to the Nightwing identity, but can you really see the next Batman being anybody other than Dick Grayson?

Tim Drake
Over the years since Tim Drake put on the red tights he has really come in to his own. When I think of Robin I think of Tim Drake; Drake is the definitive Robin, but is he strong enough to become more than that? In recent months we’ve seen Robin go through hell and have to be Gotham’s only protector in the absence of Batman, battling off gang wars, Jason Todd, Lynx, Anarky, and a fake Red Robin, mostly arranged by Spoiler in an attempt to make Tim “better.” After handling all of this at once and doing pretty good at it, has Tim proven himself capable of being the next Batman?

Jason Todd
Jason Todd has always been the black sheep of the Bat-Family. He was taken in by Batman with the idea of making Todd into something better and channeling his rage for a better cause. Despite Batman’s best efforts, the second Boy Wonder was always a loose cannon. During A Death in the Family, we saw an angst filled Jason Todd searching for his mother only to be captured by the Joker and brutally beaten to death with a crowbar. Later, Jason Todd was brought back to life by Superboy’s reality punch only to fall out of the public eye almost entirely. But is it possible that Jason Todd could surprise us all and win The Battle for the Cowl?

Ted Grant
Even Wildcat has a stake in this fight. As an expert martial artist and master of countless fighting styles, Ted Grant definitely has the moves. Having trained Batman himself, Grant shares the same will and is obviously capable of carrying on the mantle. But will he?

Thomas “Hush” Elliot
Thomas Elliot, in my opinion, is one fucked up dude. Over the short amount of since his introduction into the Batman Universe, he has gone out of his way to tear down Bruce Wayne and destroy everything that he loves. It all started in Hush when Elliot exploited his friendship with Bruce Wayne and the death of Jason Todd to launch a devastating attack on Batman.  Most recently he was the main villain in the Heart of Hush story arc in which he removes Selina Kyle’s heart from her chest while keeping her alive with technology given to him by Mr. Freeze then performs plastic surgery on himself to look exactly like Bruce. Now that he has the mask of Bruce, will he be able to take on the face of Batman?

Harvey Dent

Former District Attorney Harvey Dent has always been a wild card. With all of his actions decided by the flip of a coin, Two-Face is an erratic man of chance. For a time, he was cured of his split-personality disorder, had his face restored by plastic surgery, and stood in for Batman during his year-long journey of self-discovery [See 52 ~ the indomnitable D Man]. Upon Batman’s return, Dent was reunited with his “darker” personality and re-scarred his face himself to again become Two-Face. Now that Batman appears to have left again, will Harvey Dent once again become the protector of Gotham?

Out of this list of competitors who will lay claim to the cowl? The Prodigal Son? The Boy Wonder? Perhaps someone darker? No one know until Battle For the Cowl kicks off in March. Until then we’re all left asking ourselves: Who will be the Batman?

Honorable Mentions:

Damian Wayne
Though Damian is an underdog here there is still a chance -  there are some crazy writers out there, after all. I think it’s fairly safe to  say that Damian WILL have a substantial role in the Battle for the Cowl and that his future is almost certainly as the next Robin.

Katherine “Kate” Kane
Katherine Kane, the current Batwoman, deserves some mentioning here. Though I find it doubtful she will have much of a role in Battle for the Cowl, she has really come into her own. Who knows, maybe she’ll become an official member of the Bat-Family?

Selina Kyle
I really don’t see Catwoman vying for the cowl, but I do see her interfering with Thomas Elliot’s efforts. She could be a huge factor in the story.

Alfred Pennyworth
Former spy in the Queen’s service, expert medical training, mechanic, chef, Father Figure to Bruce, and he does windows!  My money says “Watch Alfred.” I obviously don’t think he will be fighting to become the next Batman but I am interested to see who he throws his support behind.

Harleen Quinzell
I’m honestly not entirely sure why she has been in the current solicitations from DC but she has my attention. What role will she have?

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First of all, I’m very sorry for the radio silence lately. Life has been very hectic, with the fiance and I merging two households and me going through a career change. I realize none of you want to hear my excuses or whining, but I feel that I at least owe you somewhat of an explanation.

Anyway, I’m mostly back and have a few quick bits of news that I wanted to throw out there. Hopefully regular, full posts and reviews will resume shortly - once I actually make a dent in my read list. On with the show!

~ David Goyer is telling Newsarama that Warner Brothers is pushing ahead on the Supermax/Green Arrow movie that he’s written a script for. For those not following this story, the original title of the movie was Supermax and is reported to feature Oliver Queen getting locked up in a Supermaximum Security prison and having to work with some supervillains to escape. The film is rumored to be filled with easter eggs and fan shout-outs, presumably with plenty of supervillain cameos.

~ Hollyscoop is spreading the rumor that producers want Johnny Depp to play Riddler and Phillip Seymour Hoffman to play Penguin in the next Batman movie. Put me down as “skeptical” on this one - I seem to recall hearing Christopher Nolan saying he wanted to stay away from the Penguin and I hope they’ve learned from Spider-man 3 that two villains in the third film is a bad idea. For further proof of this, see Batman Forever and Batman and Robin. The history just doesn’t look good for this idea, folks.

~ Newsarama has somewhat dispelled another Batman casting rumor, tracing the evolution of Julie Newmar’s stated opinion that Angelina Jolie would make a good Catwoman all the way to reports that Jolie is in final negotiations to crack the whip.

~ Okay, so I’m a bit Bat-happy this evening, can you blame me? The Dark Knight was awesome! So awesome, that while it may not be able to top Titanic’s $600.8 million, Variety believes that The Dark Knight could easily top $500 million, putting it into the number two spot in all-time box office earnings.

~ In even more Batman news, apparently some people aren’t terribly happy with Neil Gaiman’s upcoming “What Ever Happened To The Dark Knight?” story coming up after R.I.P.. Gaiman responded to one of these people in his blog:

I hope this reaches neil himself. Never have i ever known of anyone as full of himself as well as shit, than you. Now another milestone in your over-hyped career, Writing Batman. Not only are you under the impression you can write, but write batman? Fuck You. You Tried before and it sucked. It was just gaiman… With Batman in it. Fuck You.

If I’d known that Secret Origins of Batman Villains #1 had made that much of an impression on people, I would have… actually, probably not done anything different, really. I was rather fond of it.

If you think you won’t like the Batman comic I’ll write, probably you’d be best off not reading it. It’ll just be a two part Batman comic, you can save your money. Although if you’d bother to write me a letter like that you might buy it just to prove to yourself that you hate it as much as you know you’re going to…

~ Okay, last Batman rumor for now. Rich Johnston thinks he knows the future of Batman in his latest LITG column. He could be wrong, but it sounds totally plausible, so I’ll warn you to skip the following blockquote if you want to avoid even the possibility of being spoiled.

I understand that following the events of “Batman RIP,” both main Batbooks will be put on hiatus for a short period, replaced by a new title, “Battle Of The Cowl” by Grant Morrison.

We’ll see a struggle for the legacy of the Batman after the events of the “Batman R.I.P” storyline, between the likes of Robin, Jason Todd, Nightwing, Damien and who knows, maybe Azreal and Bat-Mite while they’re at it.

So “Nightwing” will be renamed “Red Robin” while “Robin” becomes… “Batman And Robin.”

It looks like Nightwing will be the new Batman with Jason Todd becoming Red Robin.

This sounds pretty plausible to me, since that is the one person I could actually conceive being Batman and there have been clues indicating the second part of this. Of course, we all know Bruce will take back the cowl at some point.

~ Finally, I’ve been asked to pass on a request for support. A group of fans are trying to get 80stees.com to make an Aquaman hoodie and need 200 people to sign this petition-type thing saying they’d buy one. I support this cause because, you know, “Yay irony!” and maybe, just maybe, if Aquaman gets some support, he won’t be so damn stupid.

And that’s all I’ve got for now, folks! I’m off to read some comics and, hopefully, something will strike me enough to review it soon.

Technorati Tags: Batman, The Dark Knight, Neil Gaiman, Riddler, Penguin, Catwoman, Angelina Jolie, Johnny Depp, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Aquaman, Whatever Happened To The Dark Knight, Battle For The Cowl, Green Arrow, Supermax

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