Review — Batman: City of Madness #1 — The Visions of Christian Ward
Batman: City of Madness #1 cover, via DC Comics.
Batman: City of Madness #1 — Christian Ward, Writer/Artist
Ray — 9.5/10
Ray: DC’s Black Label line continues to be a fascinating place where indie creators can put their own unique spins on DC icons, including writer-artists like Rafael Grampa and Daniel Warren Johnson. That now extends to Christian Ward, one of the most distinctive creators in the industry. And his DC debut is exactly as weird and fascinating as one would expect. Set in a Gotham that seems a lot like ours but timeless, it opens with scenes we’ve seen before. Alfred is staying up while Bruce patrols the city looking for criminals to release his rage on, and Two-Face is terrorizing the city with an attack targeting one half of a famous pair of twins in a never-completed half-finished building. Except that this time he doesn’t want money or revenge — he wants Batman’s attention, because something else is out there.
Haunted. Via DC Comics.
That leads us into the second prong of this issue, as the Court of Owls makes their move under Gotham. It’s revealed that they have their hands in big business in Gotham — so many hapless individuals are working for these monsters as their bosses. But one Court member has other plans, and they tie into the mysterious river under Gotham — which has been keeping an unspeakable being locked up for centuries. And now it’s free, leading the Court to potentially form a pact with their most implacable enemy. Given that Ward is known for surrealist comics, it’s not a surprise that whatever this thing is, it’s one of the most disturbing visuals I’ve seen in a DC comic in some time.
And then there’s the third prong of the story, and the one that really helps ground this comic in something real. A young Black boy, whose father was killed by a corrupt Gotham officer years ago, is heading to Gotham for revenge. It’s a story we’ve seen before, but this time his quest for justice will lead him into unspeakable danger, and set both heroes and villains on his path. The ending reveal takes this book to the next level, as a musing on the very concepts of Batman and a delve into Lovecraftian mythology that has only been explored in Gotham a few times — most famously by the legendary Mike Mignola. This is a wildly ambitious first issue, and its concept slowly unwinds in a way that makes it almost unbearable to wait for the next issue.
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GeekDad received this comic for review purposes.
