Detective Comics #647 (1992) Comic Book Review

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. Today I'm here to do a comic book review. In fact this review is going to be the first in a series of three comic book reviews that will take a look at the debut of Stephanie Brown, a.k.a. the Spoiler. This week is Detective Comics #647, next week will be 648, and in two weeks I'll be reviewing 649, as this is a three part story introducing Stephanie into the Batman mythos. So, let's get into it.

This era of Batman is my favourite. It's an interesting transition era because Tim Drake is Robin full time now and characters such as Bane and Azrael haven't been created yet, but you can see characters who would be part of the Knightfall saga start to make their debuts here, such as Armand Krol, who would be the mayor of Gotham City in Knightfall, Sarah Essen, who Comissioner Gordon would marry during this period, and Rene Montoya, who would be Harvey Bullock's partner during the mid '90s and into the 2000s, before she'd replace Vic Sage as the Question following Infinite Crisis. 

If you've been reading my blog for any length of time, you know that Stephanie Brown is not only my favourite version of Batgirl, but one of my favourite Bat Family characters of all time. But, up until now I've never read her debut storyline from Detective Comics before. I had only just started reading comic books with DC's Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation comics when this issue came out in 1992, and I think I'd only just discovered Batman through reruns of the 1966 TV series, which had just started airing on YTV around this time too. I hadn't seen any of the movies at this point. So I only really knew Batman as a TV show character, though he was all over the subscription order forms and advertisements included in all of the Star Trek comics I had. And in the 20 years or so that I've been collecting back issues of DC Comics titles, I've never come across these three issues before, until a few months ago when I found them at a local comic book store, not the usual one I go to, but its downtown location, when I was out and about with Brad one day. I grabbed them immediately. 

Stephanie's father, Arthur Brown, a.k.a. the Cluemaster is actually an old Batman villain from the Silver Age as he debuted in Detective Comics #351, which came out in 1966, near the end of the first season of the TV show. And while Cluemaster never appeared on the show, he made a few comic book appearances prior to Crisis On Infinite Earths rebooted the DC Universe, and didn't appear again until Detective Comics #607, which was published in 1989, before he reappeared here in this issue. But this issue is the first time that Cluemaster's MO of compulsively sending the police clues isn't used. Not by him anyway. Unfortunately, we as the readers find out pretty quickly who it is who is sending Gordon the letters containing the clues Batman and Robin need. Which is fine, but I kinda wish we'd found out later on. Just because Batman and Robin don't find out in this issue. I'm sure they find out in a later part of this little trilogy. 

Something else I noticed is that we see the Spoiler, but we don't know actually see Stephanie with the mask off, and we don't get any dialogue or thought bubbles or anything from the mysterious vigilante. We just see her standing there. And, actually, the way the character is drawn, you can't tell if the Spoiler is a man or a woman, so you REALLY don't know that Stephanie is the Spoiler. It's actually kinda similar to how the Phantasm was drawn in Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, which came out a little less than a year and a half later. You didn't know who the Phantasm was, until the character's secret identity was revealed near the end of the movie.

I also liked the stuff going on with Commissioner Gordon. While we've had city politicians giving Gordon a hard time about Batman since about 1971, this is the first time I recall where Batman is actually aware of the problems he causes Gordon by operating in Gotham. Because, I honestly don't remember this being a thing in any earlier incarnation of the character. Usually he seems indifferent to the whole situation. Then again Jim Gordon has become much more of a supporting character in the comics since Batman: Year One came out in the '80s. It's still interesting to see that Batman is aware of this sort of thing. Mind you, I think Krol is the last character within Gotham who opposes Batman's operations in Gotham, unless someone shows up in the comics of the 2000s that gives Gordon a hard time about Batman.

I don't have much more to say about this issue in particular. I'll do a storyline overview once I've reviewed all three issues and just give my overall thoughts on the story. This is a pretty good issue though. I really enjoyed it, and I can't wait to see how things turn out.

That's it for me for today. I'll be back tomorrow for my review of the 1990 film, Home Alone. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.