BATMAN #299 and down (reviews by Hoosier X)BATMAN #291 to #294
"Where Were You On The Night Batman Was Killed?"
I.
I was just going to summarize this famous (or infamous) 1977 Batman storyline, but I started thinking about it and realized there is just too much to say. So I decided on something a little more elaborate, starting with some general comments on the series as a whole and then continuing to the first part of the story ("The Testimony of the Catwoman") through to the conclusion ("The Testimony of the Joker").
Here's the basic set-up: Batman has disappeared and the rumors flow through the Gotham Underworld that the Darkknight Detective has been killed, possibly by one of the city's most famous crime figures. So they all meet at the secluded estate of someone named Col. Jake "The Claw" Van Cleve to sort out the claims of the various crooks who want to be acclaimed as the killer of Batman. Two-Face will act as "prosecutor," Ras al Ghul is chosen as judge and a jury of "six peers" is quickly selected: The Mad Hatter, Poison Ivy, the Spook, the Scarecrow, Signal Man and Mr. Freeze.
And the stage is set for "The Testimony of the Catwoman" …
II.
This is one of my favorite Batman stories. I bought most of it brand-new off the spinner rack at the local drug store.
I had been collecting comics for a few years by then but I still wasn't buying very many DC comics yet. I was almost solely devoted to Marvel. I bought the last three issues of The Joker (in 1976, I believe) and I also became a big fan of The Secret Society of Super-Villains from the moment I saw the second issue on a spinner rack, and I never missed an issue after that. And I think I had one issue of JLA, and also one issue of Superman because of Solomon Grundy, who I had seen in a JSA reprint.
And I had a few issues of The Brave and the Bold mostly because of the Jim Aparo art but also because I liked seeing characters such as Mister Miracle and Wildcat and Man-Bat. I would occasionally buy Batman or Detective Comics if I recognized the villain from the TV show.
Which is why I picked up Batman #292 (with "The Testimony of the Riddler" chapter). Because there was the Riddler! Claiming he killed the Batman! Geez Louise! I wouldn’t be surprised if I forgot to buy any other comics that day because I was in a daze and I probably had to go back to the drug store the next day to get Hulk and The Avengers and Marvel Team-Up.
I had completely missed the first part, "The Testimony of the Catwoman," in the previous issue. Remember back in the old days when we didn't have The Comic Shop News and the Internet and all that other stuff to keep us informed of things like that? And since I didn't read very many DC comics, I had missed the in-house announcements. But I managed to find Batman #291 at a used-book store. By then, the used-book stores were taking better care of their back issues, putting them in bags and displaying them in comic-book boxes. (And charging a little more than cover price instead of selling them two for a quarter. I think I paid 45 cents for my Batman #291.)
The third part was "The Testimony of Lex Luthor." I was a little peeved about that. I was not a Superman fan and the only reason I had read even a single comic book with Lex Luthor was because he was in Joker #7 (which has been my favorite Lex Luthor story for almost 40 years) and he was in a few issues of The Secret Society of Super-Villains. I was actually fairly indifferent to Lex, but I thought Batman had plenty of villains who could be taking that spot! I wasn't reading Batman to see Superman villains! Geez Louise! (I've warmed to Superman and his ginormous supporting cast in the intervening years, but I still dream about one more chapter in "Where Were You On The Night Batman Was Killed?" Something unexpected and weird. Maybe "The Testimony of the Spinner." How about "The Testimony of Mr. Polka-Dot"? I know! "The Testimony of Catman"! That would be AWESOME!)
Of course, the fourth and concluding part was "The Testimony of the Joker." That's the one we had all been waiting for!
III.
I have a bit of a confession to make: I was actually a little disappointed by the time it was over. Yes, I had loved the first two parts. ("The Testimony of the Riddler" is my favorite chapter.) But I didn't much like the Lex Luthor chapter for reasons that have nothing to do with my apathy for Lex and Superman. And the conclusion left me a bit cold at the time. (I'm not going to go into it until we get to the specific chapters. I’m trying really hard to avoid any spoilers in my general comments.)
I think maybe I was still taking comics a little too seriously. I could only suspend my belief a certain distance and no further. And DC comics just pushed me too far a little too much of the time.
I eventually started buying Batman and Detective Comics regularly. I had most of the issues in the 1980s during the period when the continuity ran directly from Batman to Detective Comics, so it was kind of like reading a bi-weekly comic book. This was the era of Killer Croc, Jason Todd, Nocturna and … Julia Remarque Pennyworth.
At some point in the early 1990s, I was looking at my late-1970s Batman collection and I was reading some of the issues I had been reading every so often since 1977 – like that great Riddler story in #279 and the amusing Penguin story in #287 and #288 – and I realized I hadn't read "Where Were You On The Night Batman Was Killed?" from start to finish for a very long time. I would read the first two parts pretty regularly, but I usually skimmed the conclusion and I couldn't even remember what happened in the Lex Luthor chapter.
So I read the whole thing as a young adult and really loved it from start to finish! I still preferred the first two chapters, but I was now able to appreciate the skill of the writer in pulling this crazy thing together and getting so much of it right. And I had learned to appreciate Superman and his arch-enemy, so I was able to enjoy the Lex Luthor chapter a lot more.
And I still read it every so often, every two or three years, and it still holds up as one of the great Batman stories of the late 1970s. (It hasn't been that long since the last time I read it, and I'm having no trouble reading it again for this review.)
IV.
Before we wade into it, I want to address something that used to bug me a little bit as a kid about the storyline in general. I had completely forgotten this issue, but after I read the first chapter, I walked the dogs and while I was walking around the neighborhood and thinking about how I was going to organize the essay, I remembered a lot of things that I hadn't thought about since the 1970s.
When I was a kid, some things used to bother me about comics. The main reason I shunned so much DC was the overwhelming nature of the many really stupid things in DC stories that bugged me. Ye gods! When I think about how much I hated Terra-Man! Nothing would ruin my day as fast as one of my friends trying to get me to read a comic with Terra-Man! (Nowadays I think he's hilarious!)
In "Where Were You On The Night Batman Was Killed?" I noticed a problem with the motives of some of the villains claiming to have killed Batman. The reader knows from the start that nobody killed Batman! But we have four villains who are claiming to have done the deed. (There were more claimants, but at some point in the story, Ras al Ghul notes that some of the villains who had put forward affidavits claiming responsibility have changed their minds about enduring Two-Face’s harsh interrogations (like when he lashed the Riddler to a stack of dynamite).)
Somebody must be lying. Maybe somebody has made a mistake. (Somebody has.) Maybe somebody has been deliberately tricked as part of an elaborate Bronze Age comic-book scheme. (Yes, somebody has fallen for a very intricate, overly-complex plan.) These two options are understandable.
But is it at all likely that all the villains are such fools? No. So somebody must be lying. And 13-year-old Hoosier X had to ask: "Why would they lie?" Somebody must be telling the truth. And whoever is telling the truth is going to expose the liar and he or she might be angry at the liar. Lying could be a VERY BAD option for the villain trying to get away with something. And the rewards don’t really seem worth it.
As an adult reading "Where Were You On The Night Batman Was Killed?" this problem didn't bother me at all. I didn’t even remember these concerns until just a few days ago! But recalling my childhood problem with the premise, I actually came up with some rationalizations that make the story work (for the most part). As I'm still concerned about spoilers in this introductory comment, I won't talk about my genius rationalizations until the appropriate chapters.
V.
I wanted to say a few words about writer David V. Reed before concluding this overview. Reed wrote a lot of stories for Batman and Detective Comics in the late 1970s, and though "Where Were You On The Night Batman Was Killed?" is undoubtedly his masterpiece, it's not his only great story from this period. On the surface, they might seem a little old-fashioned to modern readers, but I don't remember ever thinking that when I first read them. It's only in retrospect that I'm noticing the solid plotting and the attention to detail that's utilized here to complement the necessary contrivances of this kind of storytelling.
I didn't find out the real truth about David V. Reed until much later. He wrote a lot of classic Batman stories in the 1950s! Among his better-known stories are "Two-Face Strikes Again" from Batman #81 (1954) and "The Gorilla Boss of Gotham City" from Batman #75 in 1953.
And then there's another one that I like, "The Boy Wonder Confesses," also from Batman #81. This one is famous for the one and only appearance of one of my favorite lame Batman villains, Mr. Camera.
He's no Zodiac-Master! That's for sure!
That's enough information for an introduction! Now brace yourselves for a closer look at the first chapter of one of the greatest Batman stories of the late 1970s!