Batman '89 (2022) Comic Book Review

 Hey everyone! How's it going? I'm doing pretty good. I'm back with a comic book review. Today I'm taking a look at the 2022 hardcover collection, and the story it collects, Batman '89 by Sam Hamm with art by Joe Quinones. I got the hardcover on Tuesday during an unexpected outing with my best friend, Brad. Because the book is still fairly new, I'm not going to give too many spoilers, if any. So let's get into it.

For those of you who don't know, for the last nine years DC Comics has been publishing comic book series based on their TV and movies based on their characters. They've kind of been doing this for years as they've been doing it with their animated shows since The Batman Adventures, based on Batman: The Animated Series, began publication in 1992, but aside from comic book adaptations of some of their movies, DC didn't publish anything based on their shows and movies until they began publishing the comic book series based on Arrow (2012-2020) in 2013. That same year DC began publishing Batman '66, a comic book series based on the original 1966 TV series starring Adam West and Burt Ward, and that's kind of where things began to kick off for comic book series based on DC's TV show and movie properties as they went on to publish Superman '78 and Wonder Woman '77 along with series based on The CW's The Flash and Supergirl. 

Batman '89 is a six issue limited series written by Sam Hamm, who wrote the script for Batman (1989) and the first draft or two for Batman Returns (1992). It's based on ideas that Hamm had come up with with Tim Burton for the movie that became Batman Forever (1995) when Burton was going to direct it and Michael Keaton was going to be Batman in it. Which is a pretty cool idea. Especially because Michael Keaton's return as Batman in the movies has been reduced to being in The Flash (2023) since Batgirl got canceled. But that's neither here nor there.

This series takes place a few years after the events of Batman Returns and Gotham has gotten worse. It's not specified how many years after Batman Returns but it's been enough time that Bruce Wayne has a bit of gray in his hair that wasn't there in the 1992 film. Though Catwoman still looks like Michelle Pfeiffer would've in 1994 or 1995, whenever her Catwoman movie spin-off would've come out had that gone forward. It's also been long enough that Harvey Dent, who was played by Billy Dee Williams in the 1989 film, has started to grow corrupt and begins to hate Batman and Commissioner Gordon. Though it hasn't been so long that Harvey looks the way Billy Dee looked in the mid to late '90s rather than how he looks now. 

Speaking of Commissioner Gordon, he was played by Pat Hingle in the four Batman movies that came out between 1989 and 1997, but the Commissioner Gordon in this series doesn't look like Pat Hingle at all. In fact he looks more like the version of the character from Batman: The Animated Series (1992-1995). Oh and apparently Harvey is dating, and later becomes engaged to, Barbara Gordon, the Commissioner's daughter, who is normally Batgirl and then Oracle in the DC Universe. 

If you've read the scripts for both movies, and the comic book that he wrote and DC published in 1989, Batman: Blind Justice, then you can tell that this was written by Sam Hamm. It's well written but things escalate pretty quickly for basically no reason and the pacing is super fast, almost as if he was writing a movie script or a one shot comic book rather than a six issue limited series. The artwork is also spot on, except for, like I said, Commissioner Gordon for some reason. 

I think it's cool that Bruce was able to fix the Batmobile since it had been pretty badly damaged in Batman Returns. I also like that Bruce still has the original Batsuit from the 1989 movie as well as the suit he had in the 1992 movie. It's in line with Batman in the comics, because he has kept every Batsuit he's ever worn and even goes back to older ones sometimes. To be clear, he's still wearing the Batman Returns Batsuit in this series, but you do see the previous suit hanging up in the Batcave as well as the Batarangs from both movies, which is neat to see. 

I don't think I have much more to say without giving away spoilers, but I enjoyed this book. It was interesting to see plans for a third Batman movie that ultimately never got made come to fruition in comic book form. Even though Keaton is returning as Batman in The Flash, it would be more difficult to do a third movie directed by Tim Burton today as the casts from the first two movies are either not with us anymore (Pat Hingle and Michael Gough) or are much older than they were thirty years ago. Oh and neither Alexander Knox, nor Vicky Vale are in this series either. I definitely recommend checking this book out if you have the chance. It's a pretty good six issue story.

That's it for me for today my friends. I might or might not be back tomorrow for a movie review. It's going to depend on whether I end up going to get my booster shot in the morning or not. If I do, my arm is gonna be stiff and sore, so I'm not going to feel like doing the review. So if I'm not back for a movie review tomorrow then have a great weekend and I will talk to you all later. Take care.