Batman: Turning Points

The Comicologist — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 06:05:41 +0000

Batman: Turning Points was a five issues mini-series focusing on the symbiotic, yet sometimes strained, relationship between Batman and Commissioner Gordon. The five issues have been collected in trade paper back form.

The five issues cover five distinctly different stories and time periods throughout Batman's career. The first issue finds Batman attempting to build up a level of trust with Gordon. The second involves Gordon attempting to reconcile in his own mind the moral implications of allowing Batman to take on a younger side kick, Robin.

The third, and perhaps most interesting story takes place shortly after the events of the classic one-shot "The Killing Joke" in which the Joker had shot Gordon's daughter in the spine, paralysing her, in an attempt to prove his point that anyone can be driven to insanity if they have "just one bad day". In this story, Batman is having trouble dealing with the guilt associated with these events, ignoring his "obligations" whilst a serial killer roams free in Gotham.

The fourth issue takes place after the events of Knightfall, in which Batman is recovering from a heavy defeat, and Azrael is temporarily standing in as Batman until Bruce Wayne can get back on his feet. This story had a couple of flaws, the major one for me being that for some reason Gordon wasn't able to identify that the 'new' Batman, was not the one he had been dealing with for years.

The fifth issue connected back to the first story, however, to be blunt, not a lot happened.

Overall Batman: Turning Points was an average collection. DC clearly called in the who's who of writing talent with Rucka, Dixon, and Brubaker all contributing, which is perhaps the most disappointing aspect with regard to Turning Points. Even with all that talent on board, they still only managed to turn out an average collection. The artwork is most definitely "old school". The cover is a good indication of what you'll find inside. If that annoys you, look elsewhere.

What did I learn? Sometimes you really should judge a book by its cover.

Would I recommend it? I wouldn't recommend this to the casual reader or Batman fan. Arguably this collection is for the Batman 'completests' only.