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A review by thecommonswings
Batman Arkham: Black Mask by Judd Winnick, Klaus Janson, Tom Nguyen, Doug Moench, Tom Taylor, Rodney Ramos, Tom Mandrake, Ed Brubaker, Doug Mahnke, Luciano Del Negro, Trevor Scott, Bill Willingham, Tom Grindberg, Jon Proctor, Cameron Stewart, Fabrizio Fiorentino, Robert Campanella, Cully Hammer, Ibraim Roberson, Tony Bedard, Marcos Marz
3.0
Well Black Mask is a character I don’t know, and it’s an interesting introduction to him but one that’s fatally flawed. By starting with two engaging “introductory” stories that actually develop properly and are of the more urban, realist end of the Batman spectrum (the one I like considerably more), the book then really struggles because 1. it includes issues with absolutely no wider context of the plots around it and 2. has an absurd and awful looking caper issue which sticks out a mile because it’s all daft and ridiculous and has Black Mask as some kind of flying baddie for reasons the book doesn’t bother to explain
Still, the best is very good - the original stories are fantastic, Moench getting the tone perfectly, with lovely scratchy art that suits the story wonderfully. In fact almost all the art is fantastic apart from the Night and the City issue which has life airbrushed out of everything and just lies, static on the page. It’s probably intended to be a primer on the character but instead is just very revealing of the issues around long running comics like Batman: the tone weirdly varies from caper to hard boiled to gothic and never quite settles at all. And there’s very little consistency in how the character is portrayed either, which again is an unfortunate response to this being the first time I’ve heard of the character. Decidedly mixed
Still, the best is very good - the original stories are fantastic, Moench getting the tone perfectly, with lovely scratchy art that suits the story wonderfully. In fact almost all the art is fantastic apart from the Night and the City issue which has life airbrushed out of everything and just lies, static on the page. It’s probably intended to be a primer on the character but instead is just very revealing of the issues around long running comics like Batman: the tone weirdly varies from caper to hard boiled to gothic and never quite settles at all. And there’s very little consistency in how the character is portrayed either, which again is an unfortunate response to this being the first time I’ve heard of the character. Decidedly mixed