A couple things: First off, this will be spoiler-free, but contains SOME spoilers in regards to the ending of Dark Knight Returns.
Those of you who know me know that I am a rabid fan of The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller. It is the book that got me back into comics, and is still one of my favourite graphic novel; whenever I’m bored or have nothing else to read, I know I can always go back to my trusty copy of Dark Knight Returns. It was with great curiosity and fear, then, that I finally picked up a really cheap copy of the sequel, The Dark Knight Strikes Again, released in the year 2000; let me just say that it was a good thing that I only spent 10 bucks on it.
For those not in the know, the landscape of comics was changed in the 80s with the release of a few works that ushered in a new age for the medium. Stories like Alan Moore’s Watchmen, Art Speigalman’s Maus and, of course, Dark Knight Returns were darker in tone and more thematically complex than the simple, feel-good Bronze Age of the 1970s. Dark Knight Returns chronicles the return of a 50-something aged Batman from decades of being away from the costume as he deals with his old foes and allies, and tries to clean up the now-dilapidating cesspool that is Gotham City. The miniseries is a stroke of brilliance, filled with really great, stylized artwork, brooding, noir-ish atmosphere, and signaling a somewhat more critical view of Batman as someone who is vaguely psychotic; this idea is nothing new to Batman these days, but it was pretty revolutionary when Dark Knight Returns was released in the late 80s. The comic is not dated in the slightest and remains a fantastic read.
The Dark Knight Strikes Again, however, lacks most of the qualities that made the Dark Knight Returns so great, and was the first work to usher in Frank Miller’s new “half-parody” form of writing that he’s stuck to for the past decade or so. I struggle with Miller’s newer writing; I can never tell if he’s joking or totally serious, and most of his newer work just seems like a parody of his older, better, smarter work. His work has only become more adolescent and over-the-top, in a bad way. This really shows through in DKSA.
The Dark Knight Strikes Again takes place three years after Bruce faked his own death at the end of Dark Knight Returns. The world has become a different place while Batman’s been away, super-saturated with advertisements and superhero wannabes. In short, it’s a really extreme version of (gasp!) our own world. In these last few years, Bruce Wayne has been building an army of soldiers. His goal? Save the world from the police-state dictatorship of Lex Luthor.
First off, you’ll notice from the above plot synopsis that the story is generally a lot bigger than the first Dark Knight series. Batman’s team isn’t just himself and a sidekick, but a menagerie of trained soldiers and other superheroes; Bruce Wayne is no longer just trying to save Gotham City, but the ENTIRE WORLD. This, overall, is rather goofy and silly – the whole thing reeks of misplaced self-importance. Most troubling, however, is Miller’s characterization of Batman himself. In Dark Knight Returns, Batman was certainly troubled, but he was still a good person, concerned with bettering society. In this book, Batman is a self-absorbed asshole; he’s trying to save the world more for his own kicks than for the good of mankind. Worse, he’s close-minded in a much more absolute way than he’s ever been shown in print. Batman has always had a sense of stoicism and unflinching ideals, but this is ridiculous; the primary problem is that Batman is absolutely no better than his enemies in Dark Knight Strikes Again – hell, he may actually be worse. This would not be a problem if Miller scrutinized Batman for this, as he hinted at in Dark Knight Returns, but it’s written in such a way that he clearly wants us to root for Batman, to get off on his ludicrous, dictator-like quest for “justice”, as other superheroes praise him for doing what they cannot do. There’s a reason they can’t do what he does in the graphic novel; because it’s fascism, and it is neither super nor heroic.
Not helping matters is the fact that a lot of the writing is just plain lazy. Miller has a habit of repeating simple phrases ad nauseum to take up space and cover up his lack of writing direction. For example, in an early scene, Carrie Kelly (Robin in Dark Knight Returns, but now with her own identity as Catgirl) attempts an infiltration mission to rescue The Atom and Plastic Man. Throughout the mission, she continuously repeats the term “It's a piece of cake. It’s easy”. While at first this works pretty well, displaying Carrie’s nervousness towards being on a mission by herself, it quickly becomes distracting and repetitive. This wouldn’t be such a big problem but EVERY character does it at some point in the story; it makes the writing incredibly awkward and unnatural.
Carrie Kelly, now as Catgirl. Note the grossly Photoshopped background. Yuck.
Say what you will about Miller’s writing, but he’s always been a reliable artist. He’s got an extremely unique style, and he’s especially great with panel construction and action scenes. In fact, once you see Frank Miller’s stuff, you start to realize how bad a lot of other artists are at drawing action. Unfortunately, Dark Knight Strikes Again is without doubt Miller’s weakest work of his career. It’s extremely ugly, lacking the polish and breathtaking spreads of his older work. Character proportions are all off, faces of the same character look extremely different from one panel to the next, and the whole thing just has a very sloppy, unkempt look, at times looking more like fan-art than the work of an artist who’s been in the industry for 20+ years. Even worse is the fact that Miller’s usually lovely action scenes are now totally distorted and unclear. Most of the scenes are befuddling; I had to look at single pages for minutes at a time to discern what the hell was going on, and this was a continuous problem. Part of the blame goes towards frequent collaborator Lynn Varley, who decks out the work with extremely saturated and downright cheesy coloring. Everything is very bright and fluorescent, a very clear contrast to Dark Knight Returns’ subdued, dark coloring. The combination of Miller’s unusually weak artwork and Varley’s just-plain-gross colours creates something that’s pretty hideous. You could make the argument that this is a purposeful effect, but on-purpose or not, this is simply a bad looking book.
Here's Batman fighting Superman from the first Dark Knight....
...and here's a similar fight from Strikes Again. Quite an aesthetic change. This is one of the better pages from the book, too.
Overall, Dark Knight Strikes Again is a pretty huge failure. I struggle to think of a single successful element in it – there’s one neat action scene involving Superman, and at times Miller’s dick-ish characterization of Batman actually kind of works, but overall, it’s a big, putrid mess of a story. The writing is weak, the art is weak, and worst of all, it’s rather dumb. If you’re a fan of Dark Knight Returns (like me), you’ve probably already heard how bad Strikes Again is, but you’ll probably also be curious enough to check it out. I understand this, and can confirm that it is, in fact, as bad as you’ve heard, but it’s probably not going to stop you anyways. For everyone else, just don’t read this, quite frankly. In fact, I’d suggest not reading much of any Frank Miller from the past decade. Just go to your nearest book/comic store, pick up a copy of Dark Knight Returns, and read away. And if you liked it, avoid Dark Knight Strikes Again like the plague.
Stuff That I Liked:
- Some good ideas
- A couple funny lines
- Cool fight with Superman
- The Flash's new costume
- Plastic Man
Stuff That I Didn't
- Amateurish, ugly artwork
- Annoying, wholly unlikable interpretations of well-known DC characters, most notably THE MAIN CHARACTER
- Lazy writing
- Doesn't fit with the feel of the original Dark Knight Returns
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