Batman is stumped. It’s Chapter 9. That is: Issue #9 of The Batman’s Grave, and Warren Ellis is at the wheel.
Ellis gives us a pondering, pivoting Batman. Piecing together the clues, connecting the string, doing the thing. Detecting and suspecting. In the office, heavily guarded, cowled, and scowling Batman.
There’s a man who is waging war on the Gotham City justice system, and it’s up to Batman, apparently, to get to the bottom of this, in and around the law, skirting and skating between the cracks in the defense, the gaps in the fence.
So perhaps the bad guy is Robert Anthony, with a Scorn Army. Go ahead and prove it!
In the meantime, barring actual evidence, it’s many pages of office-bound Batman, with sudden interruptions here and there. Artist Bryan Hitch draws a fully potent Batman, ready and willing to let testosterone run rampant, angled over the barrier, and out of control. The office is detailed, the trousers are wrinkled, Batman’s trunks are shiny. All the books on all the shelves are in order, and the leaves are fully and firmly fixed to the branches, and so on. It’s high detail artwork, to be sure. Alex Sinclair gives us office lighting colour, officer colour and off the cuff colour. The cool cool blue night beckons, with its threats of orange, filled aim and fire, brightly appointed points of light that are hoping to usher a thoughtful and pensive Bruce Batman Wayne into an early grave.
DC, The Batman’s Grave #9, $3.99 for 24 pages of content. Teen +
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