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Home , 30 Days of Night, Alan Davis, Barry Kitson, Ben Templesmith, Brian Bolland, Dave McKean

Complexity in the Comic and Medium: Inquiry Through Bestselling Stories

PAUL A. CRUTCHER

DAPTATIONS OF GRAPHIC NOVELS AND FOR MAJOR MOTION pictures, TV programs, and video games in just the last five Ayears are certainly compelling, and include the X-Men, Wol- verine, , , , Spiderman, Batman, , Watchmen, 300, , Wanted, The Surrogates, Kick-Ass, The Losers, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, and more. Nevertheless, how many of the people consuming those products would visit a shop, understand comics and graphic novels as sophisticated, see them as valid and significant for serious criticism and scholarship, or prefer or appreciate the medium over these film, TV, and game adaptations? Similarly, in what ways is the medium complex according to its ad- vocates, and in what ways do we see that complexity in Batman graphic novels? Recent and seminal work done to validate the comics and graphic novel medium includes Rocco Versaci’s This Book Contains Graphic Language, Scott McCloud’s , and Douglas Wolk’s Reading Comics. Arguments from these and other scholars and suggest that significant graphic novels about the Batman, one of the most popular and iconic characters ever produced—including , , and Lynn Varley’s Dark Knight Returns, and Dave McKean’s , and and ’s Killing —can provide unique complexity not found in prose-based novels and traditional films.

The Journal of , Vol. 44, No. 1, 2011 r 2011, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

53 54 Paul A. Crutcher

Validating the Medium and its Complexity

It is not particularly difficult to see Versaci and other writers at the margins of (see also Beverly Clark 2003; Lawrence Sipe 2008; Maria Nikolajeva & Carole Scott 2006; Perry Nodelman 2008; Seth Lerer 2008) as on noble adventures, ill equipped, against insurmount- able odds. Advocating that the picture book be validated and put alongside Milton, for instance, elicits smirks or stone throwing. The ivory towers housing the literary canon, sculpting pedagogy, and safe- guarding all media do not readily see children’s and adolescent liter- ature as complex, sophisticated, or worth critical attention. Versaci’s Graphic Language deals with the comic book’s descent into the juvenile, subsequent exclusion from Literature, and immediate exclusion from Art. In describing the reception today, he writes, ‘‘There are these who look at the medium and scoff at comics’ obvious inferiority to the novel or film’’ (6), that many hold an ‘‘assumption . . . that comic books are a juvenile medium that can only trivialize serious matters’’ (9). His de- fense of the comic medium relies on proving it not only as equitable to literature, art, and film, but also, and more importantly, as unique or superior to those media. To that end, Versaci claims that comics are ‘‘both surprising and subversive,’’ that the medium ‘‘challenges our way of thinking,’’ and that it does these things ‘‘in unique ways’’ (12). Comics ‘‘call attention to their own making,’’ and they have a ‘‘self- consciousness’’ not often found in literature or film (12). The comics medium goes beyond that reflectivity by promoting critiques of ‘‘how the world is represented in texts of all kinds,’’ largely because readers ‘‘see’’ and ‘‘read’’ comics in different ways than either literature or film, and, more generally, in ways ‘‘differently than we do either words exclusively or pictures exclusively’’ (13– 14). More specifically, Versaci constructs arguments that comics contain a ‘‘unique form of narrative,’’ and further ‘‘allow for additional methods of narrative that are highly sophisticated and unavailable in other media’’ (16). Part of that sophistication comes through ‘‘multiplicity of perspectives and layering,’’ or ‘‘smaller narratives within a larger one’’ (23). He further explicates those ‘‘layers of meaning’’ through comics’ ability to present more content at any singular moment than either literature, art, or film (16). Indeed, Versaci notes that comics ‘‘invite us to think more deeply about how literary merit is accorded and why this is a worth pursuing,’’ something that goes beyond equality Complexity in the Comic and Graphic Novel Medium 55 and superiority, to a holistic critique (28). Versaci explicitly intends for Graphic Language to frame comics as subversive, as a subversive cri- tique, and through instantiations, like subversive journalism. He writes that comics provide in the latter case a ‘‘viable vehicle for sub- versive and even incendiary political messages’’ (27). In one of the case studies provided in Graphic Language, Versaci claims that the political comics of the 1940s and 1950s were ‘‘more visually and politically sophisticated than war films of the same era’’ (27). In perhaps more intuitive claims, he states that ‘‘the very nature of the medium allows comic book memoirists to explore various issues of self-representation in ways not fully available to writers of prose memoirs,’’ something that can be seen quite readily through a graphic novel like Miss Re- markable and Her Career (26). Finally, Versaci juxtaposes Art Speigel- man’s Pulitzer Prize winning Maus with the literature and photography of the Holocaust:

Using the comic book form allows Speigelman to approach this difficult topic in ways unavailable to those recounting their Holo- caust experiences in traditional prose, and [. . .] Speigelman uses comic book art to rethink what has become the Holocaust’s de- fining—and silencing—representational feature: its photographic images. (26)

McCloud’s seminal Understanding Comics should be included in any serious discussion of the complexity of the comics medium. McCloud writes, ‘‘I realized that comic books were usually crude, poorly-drawn, semiliterate, cheap, disposable kiddie fare—but—They don’t have to be! The problem was that for most people, that was what ‘comic book’ meant!’’ (3). In his effort to validate the medium, McCloud sees it metaphorically as a ‘‘vessel’’ which visibly holds more actors and con- tent than would exist in or be necessary to compose literature or art, if not film (6). He highlights the that there’s been ‘‘critical ex- amination’’ of all mediums, including literature, music, theater, art, and film, but not of comics (6). In a claim not echoed by Versaci, McCloud discusses the ways comics can uniquely engage all five senses. In probably the most original and oft-cited McCloud point, he argues that no medium can present time in the myriad ways possible through comics. For McCloud, single comic frames may or may not depict singular moments, illustrators can adjust time through spacing and framing and detail, comic pages can exist in multiple temporal places 56 Paul A. Crutcher at once, motion can be represented in comics as vividly as in film, and more. Ultimately, in a claim that neatly summarizes Versaci and other scholars, McCloud argues that the medium ‘‘offers range and versatility with all the potential imagery of film and painting plus the intimacy of the written word’’ (212). David Peterson, creator of Mouse Guard, worked to validate comics through ties to various mythologies, and, like McCloud, to early civ- ilizations and the earliest mediums for communication. In addition to the nonlinear narratives and the profound malleability of time, Peter- son forwards the idea that comics are unique to literature and film in the use of texts, fonts, sound elements, images, and more, all to create a unique and sophisticated balance. He argues that comics are in ‘‘pitch’’ format (the movie storyboard format expected when pitching an idea to a studio, precisely how Berger saw Morrison’s for Arkham Asylum 2004). Following implications from others (including Versaci), Peter- son also posits that comics are more direct than literature and film, the latter almost always needing to go through multiple layers of revision before consumption (films, e.g., suffer through translation from prose to screenplay, screenplay to a comics-like storyboard, and on, including actors’ interpretations of scripts and characters). Peterson’s most strik- ing point came through his experiences with , in situations where teachers have looked beyond stigma to use comics to connect with reluctant readers, for instance, or to develop the story- telling and predicting literacy abilities of developing readers. While filmmakers and novelists may evoke ‘‘essence’’ from a fixed and definite moment captured on film or in prose (i.e., ‘‘Photographer Captures’’), Versaci, McCloud, and Peterson argue that comics ulti- mately do more and evoke more. Wolk joins them, and adds new perspectives to this discussion of the complexity of comics:

The most significant fact about comics is so obvious it’s easy to overlook: they are drawn. That means that what they show are things and people, real or imagined, moving in space and changing over time, as transformed through somebody’s eye and hand. [. . .] Film and photography intrinsically claim to be accurate documents, even when they’re not: they always have the pretense that they are showing you something you would have seen exactly the same way if you’d been present at the right time and place. (118, emphasis in original) Complexity in the Comic and Graphic Novel Medium 57

Many scholars and writers also discuss the communities of comic scholars, creators, and fans. Wolk and Peterson explicitly discuss what might be termed the fourth dimension—the social spaces that add an additional point in the argument about the complexity of the comic. Both Wolk and Peterson introduced this dimension through ’ , a character has purportedly identified as ‘‘every comic-bookstore guy in America’’ (‘‘Comic Book Guy’’ n. pag., emphasis in original). Versaci details the rise of the independent and dedicated comic book shop and the view that comic book readers are juvenile, immature, socially or psychologically mal- adjusted, but he does not experience how those two phenomena in- tersect, because his comics arrive on his doorstep via Amazon, and he consequently does not meet Comic Book Guy. Independent comic book stores may be frequented by communities that typify the appearance and attitudes of Groening’s iconic stereotype, but these stores are complimented by broad pop culture conventions (e.g., Comic-Con). Further, neither the stores nor the conventions are limited to singular stereotypes, but support diverse interests and communities. For in- stance, in what analogous medium-based social space, like a movie theater, do manga cosplayers, Spiderman illustrators, political writers, and tenured professors coexist around the medium? Thus, this fourth dimension also reasonably distinguishes the comic from literature, film, and art in terms of complexity. Those communities come together in more than just social ways. Ryan Claytor, an artist, argued that there is a constant need to defend comics and work with comics, particularly as something as compelling or more compelling than more traditionally respected visual mediums. Peterson made a similar claim, and Gary Hoppenstand, a scholar, built on that claim by suggesting that the academy is slowly coming to understand the medium and that this current and increasingly recep- tive environment needs additional scholarship on comics. That is not to say that scholarship does not exist, but it certainly is limited.

Defining and Validating the Medium Through the Batman Inquiry Through the Batman Beyond McCloud, Versaci, Wolk, and the others noted above, for the more specific inquiry into how those theories and arguments play out 58 Paul A. Crutcher in Batman narratives, there seem to be only two scholarly sources: Roberta Pearson and William Uricchio’s Many Lives of the Batman and Will Brooker’s Batman Unmasked. Both works are very much invested in three areas: popular culture studies, popular culture as it relates to marketing and consumerism, and the nature of the comic publishing industry. With Batman Unmasked arriving at the millennium mark, though, scholars and advocates are left with a wide-open space for work. Additionally, the space between Brooker and today also includes the controversial Batman and Philosophy and many reprints and com- pilations by DC. The existence of Batman and Philosophy suggests weight and complexity, especially when filled with PhDs discussing Kant, , and Nietzsche; and the detractions support the argu- ment that more directed, purposeful scholarship is needed. McCloud acknowledges that some may define comics as the Batman (9). His point is clearly critical of narrowly defining the medium through superheroes, but the Batman one of the most popular and iconic products of the medium. Dark Knight Returns, Arkham Asylum, Killing Joke, , and others comprise some of the bestselling and most revered story arcs. Two major areas of complexity emerge from reading and analyzing the Batman and his world. Medium is the form of these graphic novels and embodies much of the theory and scholarship. Stories are the narratives presented in these graphic novels, partly at least through the layering described by McCloud.

Medium Brooker argues that the comic and graphic novel has ‘‘a role perhaps equivalent to film scriptwriter, director and editor—at once the author of dialogue and voiceover, the architect of the plot, the supervisor of action and the organiser of shot sequence’’ (270). He nevertheless also underscores the many ‘‘authors’’ in this medium. Batman: Knightfall is a clear example of this point. While no authors are listed anywhere on the covers or spine, 16 people are given some authorship on the main title page. An additional 25 names make the copyright page, and that number would surely balloon if graphic novels went into the amount of detail that film credits do. These people collaborate in a complex medium, and these collaborations are signifi- cant enough to deserve attention. The medium’s complexity can be seen through control, layering, atmosphere, and craft, implicitly and Complexity in the Comic and Graphic Novel Medium 59 explicitly intersecting with arguments made in the existing theory and scholarship. Versaci, McCloud, Peterson, and Wolk all discuss the ways that the comic medium allows creators (and readers) control, particularly of pac- ing, not afforded to literature or film. Brooker argues, for instance, that

Moore’s characteristic use of a strict grid system in The Killing Joke, dividing the page into regularly sized panels, lends the story a sense of order and measured pace which matches this conception of the Batman and echoes Moore’s controlled, structured approach to writ- ing. The layout and page design is ‘‘neutral’’, designed not to be noticed; our eye flicks easily from frame to frame, taking in the panel’s content rather than its form. (270)

Moore notably manipulates that pacing in the scenes in Killing Joke where the attempts to drive Commissioner Gordon mad. More than the panels moving beyond the six- or nine-grid system that seems to typify Killing Joke, in these scenes, , photos of Gordon’s brutalized daughter, and Gordon’s screams break panel borders and therefore disrupt the pacing (see Figure 1). Brooker remarks that an analogous technique happens in Dark Knight Returns when Miller transitions from varying grids, panel shapes, and discourses to splash panels, full-page images that depict the Batman in ‘‘mythic’’ propor- tions (270). Further, McKean’s style in Arkham Asylum ‘‘suggests an- archy rather than control’’ (272). In Hush, this control seems to occur in the panels themselves: while most are neat, occasionally Jim Lee pulls the pacing taut with frenetic and bold panels that do not hold straight edges. Mike Barr and exhibit this type of control in Bat- man: Full Circle by transitioning to interlocking, overlapping, and otherwise hurried visuals. Throughout Dark Knight Returns, Miller and Varley manage to keep a host of monologues and voices sorted. These are distinct in a number of ways, including the shape or style of the dialogue or thought boxes, the colors inside the boxes and the colors of the text, and the styles of the text fonts, to say nothing of the character styles and nuances that should naturally distinguish one character’s dialogue from another character’s (see Figure 1). Beyond being able to easily distinguish be- tween Superman, Gordon, a priest, and a businessman on a single page in Dark Knight Returns, Miller and Varley construct the pages so that the reader can do so without requiring a corresponding visual of the 60 Paul A. Crutcher

THOUGHT 2

Thought 1 Panel 1

Voice 1 VOICE 2

Thought 1

Panel 2

Voice 3

VOICE 2!

Panel 3

FIGURE 1. An example of an excerpt of a comic page showing how authors, illustrators, and can impact pacing while maintaining multiple nar- rators and voices (omitting the additional factor of action). In panel 1, Char- acters 1 and 2 are narrating and speaking; in panel 2, Character 1 is narrating and Character 3 is speaking; and in panel 3, Character 2 has broken the panel borders. speaker or narrator. Similarly, Brooker argues that in Arkham Asylum, the ‘‘Batman’s voice becomes unmistakable, a dark imprint across all the scenes he walks through’’ (275). McKean provides dramatic voices Complexity in the Comic and Graphic Novel Medium 61 throughout Arkham Asylum: Joker, Maxie Zeus, Mad Hatter, , and Professor Milo all have unique voices. Indeed, famed comics writer Denny O’Neil explains that the lettering is now contributing to the sophistication of the medium and that it can be powerful enough, as in the cases of Dark Knight Returns and Arkham Asylum, to be ‘‘‘part of the story’’’ (qtd. in Brooker 275). Beyond being capable of maintaining multiple narrators in this complex way, comics also manage layering. This layering certainly happens in Dark Knight Returns, but a strong example comes also in Frank Miller and ’s Year One. A tale of Gordon and dueling in the Batman’s formative encounters, Year One manages these intersecting stories with single- panel dual narration, including contrasting fonts, narrative boxes, col- ors, and more (including the actual dialogue in the same panels). Control and layered voices are functions also of the visual characters themselves, and that these characters may produce as much atmosphere in the comic as anything else. For instance, ‘‘always draws Batman as a demonic creature with a cloak made up of jagged shadows and ears like scimitars extending some four feet from the top of the cowl; whatever measured, rational tones an Alan Moore put in this Batman’s mouth, he would still look like a crazed vampire’’ (Brooker 273). In fact, this visual atmosphere created through the character is very much what makes Red Rain, Bloodstorm, and Crimson Mist reason- able. The same phenomenon makes ’s Batman the unim- posing, defeatable foe he is in Knightfall. In Dark Knight Returns, the coloring and shaping add to the atmo- sphere. Notably, the bold blue that distinguishes Superman’s narration fluctuates with his relative strength, the Batman’s narration comes to mirror the Joker’s dialogue as the latter is dying, and the Batman’s narration similarly moves from neatly boxed to jagged frames. Miller and Varley do more: as Brooker describes, the colors in Dark Knight Returns ‘‘undeniably contribute to the book’s feel of ‘gritty realism’’’; the color ‘‘suggests a psychological and physical state, as when sick and staggering Batman sees his world in shades of muddy grey and dull crimson’’ (274). Something dramatically different occurs for the Batman in Arkham Asylum, yet it is something produced by the same complex atmospheric compositions. In one of the novel’s most striking scenes, as the Batman attempts to negotiate the unclear split between past psychological horrors and present circumstances, the rich red in the blood-only panels 62 Paul A. Crutcher contrasting the indefinite and dully colored panels. The Batman has driven a large shard of broken glass through his left palm, and his bright, clenched teeth are the most decisive human feature on the page. Indeed, in Arkham Asylum, Morrison writes, ‘‘I wanted to approach Batman from the point of view of the dreamlike, emotional and ir- rational hemisphere, as a response to the very literal, ‘realistic’ ‘left brain’ treatment of superheroes which was in vogue at the time, in the wake of , Watchmen, and others’’ (n.p.). Brooker reasonably captures this visual dynamic: ‘‘McKean’s Batman is a devil-eared shadow rather than a concrete human figure, while his Joker, all swirling florescent hair and gleaming white face, remains a blur who refuses to be pinned down’’ (272). Nevertheless, McKean does far more than create wraiths. The psychological warfare occurring in Arkham Asylum (between and within the characters) draws the reader into a rather inverted space, one McKean constructs partly by con- trasting the world outside the asylum in rough and uncolored pencils and inks, while the world inside is rich and textured (making the pseudo-reality or hyper- of the asylum more ‘‘real’’ than the stark reality of the world outside it). McKean certainly creates a complex space in Arkham Asylum, but effective versions of creating atmosphere can be found in other graphic novels. Lee and Williams manage to shift settings, times, and attitudes in Hush, for instance, as does Bolland in Killing Joke. While some might argue that distinguishing a flashback without a jarring textual reference is often accomplished in film, McCloud, Peterson, and others remind us that a to this complexity argument is that the comics medium allows multiple atmospheres, multiple times, even multiple versions of characters and narrators simultaneously. For several pages in Hush, for example, the sophistication and uniqueness is not found in the bottom panel’s coloring shift to flashback but in the fact that at any given moment the reader is simultaneously in three different places, in three different atmospheres—something inordinately difficult, if not impossible, in film, and certainly impossible in literature. The unique complexity of the comics medium is found not only through control, layering, and atmosphere, but also through craft- based factors. Versaci, Wolk, and others argue that one of the craft-based factors comics employ is ‘‘self-consciousness’’ (Versaci 12). Crimson Mist includes apparently random images that resemble dull red stamps on apparently random pages. Is there some meaning in the Complexity in the Comic and Graphic Novel Medium 63 skeleton and wolf stamps on page 199 or the spider and flea stamps on page 254?—almost surely. Were the creators infusing Crimson Mist with mixed media to heighten the novel’s atmosphere, or were they adding satirical or thematic elements in a way to hit readers with their contributions and the very act of contributing? More directly, using something very much like the self-aware metafiction in literature, like Francesca Block’s Dangerous Angels, or in film like Marc Forster’s Stranger Than Fiction, Bolland puts himself directly into the end of Killing Joke and ultimately kills the Batman. Moore and Bolland also have an exhausted and dissatisfied Joker say to the Batman, clearly identifying the reader within the process, ‘‘Why don’t you kick the hell out of me and get a standing ovation from the public gallery?’’ (2008). Additionally, one of the most compelling reasons to read Understanding Comics or McCloud’s other work is that they are graphic novels in which McCloud fundamentally narrates directly to the reader how to read and understand comics and graphic novels. Second, this medium easily extends its complexity over literature and film through its ability to employ mixed media. Beyond arguments that might arise from Moore’s use of ‘‘savage and powerful’’ songs (‘‘based on Brecht operas’’) in his upcoming Century 1910 graphic novel (Brophy- Warren, W2), McKean and Arkham Asylum provide compelling evidence for this point. In Brooker’s terms, ‘‘McKean’s paintings [. . .] mix me- dia—pencil sketches, photographs, collages of lace, hessian and nails’’ (272), but captures the sophistication more completely, writing that it was McKean’s ‘‘expert mix of media—paintings, pho- tography, sculpture, assemblage of odd objects—that created such a resonant and powerful look to this haunting and horrific tale’’ (Morrison and McKean, afterword). Berger goes on to note her awe at McKean’s work on Arkham Asylum, which all took place ‘‘precomputer age’’ (Morrison and McKean, afterword). This media complexity can be seen throughout Arkham Asylum. In fact, Arkham Asylum should itself be evidence enough to validate comics and graphic novels as something at least as worthy of critical attention as literature and film.

Stories

There is something truly ironic in the fact that the comics medium underwent the massive censorship of the 1950s and 1960s for including 64 Paul A. Crutcher content inappropriate for children, yet the medium remains understood as something juvenile. When a graphic novel becomes graphic, does it not at a minimum suggest that the perceptions of the medium as crude and childish be revised? DC has stamped ‘‘Suggested for mature readers’’ in bold caps just above the ISBN on Killing Joke. The graphic nature of Killing Joke, though, certainly exceeds that of Batman—Vampire, even though the latter contains hundreds of pages of rampant and indiscrim- inate throat-tearing and decapitation. Killing Joke is more psychologi- cally intense, and it employs ethics, humor, and duality in ways that far exceed many of the mediocre products in the medium. More than blood-spattered panels, the content of comics and graphic novels—the stories—are not juvenile, but deeply complex. Arkham Asylum creates the wicked and surreal, but, as Brooker rightly notes, it also manages to involve ‘‘psychology, literature and mythology, draw- ing parallels with Psycho, Alice In Wonderland, the Bible and the Tarot’’ (272). The convoluted plot in Hush constructs a legitimate mystery. Interestingly, Miller satirizes the Batman’s inordinately fixed moral compass, one seen in Batman—Vampire when even as a vampire he manages to kill only the villainous undead or the living on behalf of moral justice; when in Dark Knight Returns the Batman drives a spe- cialized dagger into the Joker’s right eye and breaks his neck, the Joker mocks the Batman for being incapable before he manages to twist his neck further and kill himself. One could reasonably argue that the most complex topic a writer or artist might engage is the human social condition. Part of the discontent that fans of the Batman felt derived from the camp, but also from the linear, crime–villain –battle –win storylines. The fan-voted of , the second , for instance, is indicative not only of the fan interest in darker and more complex stories, but also of the serious friction that plays out between the Batman and his confederates. Todd’s death certainly torments the Batman, as evidenced in Hush, and any companions are viewed with suspicion or subject to extreme danger (such instances can be seen in Alfred’s beating in Knightfall 2000, Alfred’s death in Vampire, Robin’s position in Dark Knight Returns, Superman in either Hush or Dark Knight Returns, Gordon’s and Gordon’s daughter’s brutalization in Killing Joke, the madness inflicted on Ruth Adams or Harvey Dent in Arkham Asylum, etc.). Comics and graphic novels also sustain the Wayne/Batman charac- ter, engaging the deeply problematic experiences of autonomy and Complexity in the Comic and Graphic Novel Medium 65 identity, longing, trust. In Year Two, for instance, Wayne’s romantic expectations are largely ruined by actions he takes as the Batman through an ideological stance that is essentially asocial, secretive, cyn- ical, and fiercely dogmatic. The conflicts in Hush are more striking and include the radical struggles Wayne/Batman endures, particularly when longing for the love and companionship of . Near the graphic novel’s conclusion, he explains, ‘‘Having friends. Partners. It all ends in betrayal and death’’ (Loeb et al.). Putting aside witnessing his parents’ murder, friends’ murders and brutalization, being a bil- lionaire, and working as a dramatic , Wayne sees the world in very human ways that resound through dramatic human media. No- tably, Alice, Natalie Portman’s character in the award-winning and acclaimed film Closer, faces a similar situation at the close of that film, one where she seemingly comes to understand her role as an auton- omous and lonely object, an idea. In the National Book Award Finalist and New York Times Notable Book Feast of Love, the implicit message is precisely that the human social condition is fraught with suffering, that while cynicism is in ways brutal, it could also be seen as prudent. Ultimately, the fact that the Batman is not leading an arch villain to a police car at the end of Hush, that instead he is trying to negotiate a deeply human but astoundingly complex task with a woman he likely loves, exemplifies the sophistication of graphic novel content, of its stories. Versaci, Peterson, and others posited a subversive potential in com- ics and graphic novels, and Dark Knight Returns fulfilled that potential by challenging norms in the comics industry and tropes in the Batman universe. More politically savvy writers have analyzed the subversive- ness and impact of Dark Knight Returns on cultural consciousness, politics, and more, but Moore and Varley may also be understood as producing the Batman as a densely muscled gray-and-navy 60-year-old as blatantly obvious subversion (to expectations for the Batman). Nev- ertheless, in Dark Knight Returns, politics runs first. Moore and Varley create a Superman who has become a government assassin of sorts and a who is not only elderly, but vulnerable enough to be brutalized and hogtied with her famous lasso. For anyone who knows Watchmen, this should sound familiar, because beyond using original characters, Alan Moore and do some strik- ingly similar things in that iconic graphic novel, as does Mark Millar in Wanted. Even the most subdued tales of the Batman position him as 66 Paul A. Crutcher a lawbreaking vigilante. This antihero construction sparks centuries- old dialogues on ethics, the kind of business that comprises the bulk of Batman and Philosophy. But readers of the Batman also have Cult. This graphic novel works in the same politically subversive manner, but toward different ends. entitles his foreword ‘‘Burn This Book,’’ for instance, and the foreword explains his position on and the ways Cult works against the censorship of free speech. He also engages religious zealotry and the potential fac¸ade of religion. In Cult, he po- sitions ‘‘Deacon Blackfire masquerading as a religious leader, hiding behind moral self-righteousness while he furthers his own private agenda’’ (Starlin). The Batman struggles in Cult in ways similar to how he struggles with psychology in Arkham Asylum and with companionship in Hush, perhaps also in ways analogous to Starlin’s own activist and political struggles. The suggestion that Wayne is psychologically unhinged is not new, but these graphic novels engage psychology in complex ways that are at least equitable to the methods used in literature and film. For instance, Dark Knight Returns, Arkham Asylum, and Killing Joke are all rather sinister and work with deep-seated psychological issues in compelling ways. In Killing Joke, for example, the Joker and Batman end the novel laughing at a (funny) joke, this after the Joker has shot and presumably raped Commissioner Gordon’s daughter, violated him, and killed a number of people, all in an attempt to prove that someone can be driven crazy through one bad day. But that shared explores the connection between these two archenemies, one that is most profound in Arkham Asylum, in which Morrison and McKean (and the Joker) compel readers to see how very similar Batman is to the deranged psychopaths he fights; while charging through the asylum on a psychotic trip, Batman rages and battles and is ultimately released only through the unrequited benevolence of Harvey Dent. Notably, Arkham Asylum also shows that Harvey is constantly returned to his criminality by the existence and pressure of Batman. Beyond phobias and fears, these graphic novels create complexity through the cumulative psychology in the Wayne/Batman binary and the Batman’s duality with his villains. The first challenge—successfully maintaining multiple personas—was partly problematized by DC writ- ers with the introduction of , the third Robin and a kid who deduced the Batman’s day role (when hosts of villains and police officers could not). The second duality, though, is potentially more compelling. Complexity in the Comic and Graphic Novel Medium 67

The Joker’s voice and the Batman’s monologue become essentially identical in Dark Knight Returns. The Batman in Full Circle decides not only to spare the Reaper’s life but also to leave him with his son. This Reaper is revealed to be the son of Wayne’s parents’ murderer, seeking revenge for the death of his father, despite the fact that the original Reaper killed his father (in Year Two), all against the backdrop of murdered parents and orphaned children—creating the complicated circular metaphor of the title. Add the multifaceted nature of Batman’s love interests with the daughters of Gordon, the original Reaper, and Ra’s al Gul, and the Batman duality becomes increasingly intriguing. In Year Two, the Batman offers Gordon a new pipe, that it should ‘‘help’’ with Gordon’s efforts to quit smoking (Barr et al. 23)— paralleling the suggestion in Hush that Batman created and perpetuates the Joker, in Arkham Asylum that the Batman perpetuates at least Dent/ Two-Face. The Batman’s link with the Joker is exampled in Dark Knight Returns when the Batman cannot actually kill the Joker. This Joker dynamic is the most storied and frames Killing Joke. In it, the Batman bookmarks the novel with appeals to the Joker to understand that their relationship will be ‘‘fatal’’ to one or both of them and to resolve their differences. But the joke about ‘‘two guys in an asylum’’ also bookmarks the novel, and contributes to an understanding that the Batman and the Joker are a singular psychological and character spec- trum divided in two (something seen in Arkham Aslyum when Wayne/ Batman engages Dent/Two-Face). That is not to say that the Batman does not try or even succeed in killing the Joker. In Hush, Catwoman tries forcibly to stop him from killing the Joker (the Batman fights Catwoman and knocks her unconscious). He is only stopped when Gordon shoots the Batman twice (in the forearm and in one of the cowl ears, ripping it off ) and warns of vital shots if the Batman does not release the Joker. Perhaps most fittingly, in Cult, the Batman imagines hacking the Joker to bits with an axe, and says, ‘‘Too bad it’s just . . . a ’’ (Starlin). Prominent writers and creators for DC spoke of this complex duality in Gotham Knight. They argued that villains are part of the character of the superhero, that villains are ‘‘mirrors’’ for the character ‘‘the villains help define who the hero is’’ that this dynamic creates ‘‘textured, lay- ered characters’’ and that ‘‘the complexity and depth of each individual villain shows even the multiple complexities and depths of our lead hero.’’ They argue that the Batman and his villains represent ‘‘two parts 68 Paul A. Crutcher of the same brain.’’ Thus, these graphic novel stories not only present complex narratives of social characters and their psychological chal- lenges, but also a running metanarrative in which the character col- lective explores the human condition.

Conclusion

This comics medium managed to create and sustain an iconic character across temporal, visual, and setting spectrums (Book of the Dead; Brooker 318; Gotham by Gaslight; Holy Terror; I, Joker; Reign of Terror; Scar of the Bat; Thrillkiller; Two Faces; Year 100; Versaci 32; and many more)—something that should speak to its comparable if not unique level of complexity when compared to literature and film. While many prefer the visuals in the Watchmen film to Bolland’s artwork in the Watchmen graphic novel and prefer the visuals in the 300 film to Miller’s graphic novel, one’s personal preference for the radical visuals in the 300 or Watchmen films does nothing more than attest to the complexities in the original graphic novels. Imagine what 300 would be like without the innovative artwork in the graphic novel that framed much of the film, and consider what was lost in the same conversion for Wanted. While film director Zack Snyder and even Watchmen illustrator Gibbons have purported that much of that graphic novel’s content is included coherently in the film’s almost three hour running time (‘‘Watchmen—Creators’’), it is notable that Warner Broth- ers has released two of Watchmen’s subplots (‘‘‘Tales of the Black Freighter’ Getting DVD Release’’; Watchmen: Tales of the Black Freighter & Under the Hood) not included in the film and a ‘‘’’ that takes the graphic novel, animates the stills, and adds voices and other sound effects (Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic). Warner Brothers also plans to subsequently ‘‘splice’’ those two subplots in a future DVD (Watchmen Movie vs. Graphic Novel). The running total, then, is a complete and complex graphic novel that through at least four motion pictures and DVD hybrids (and video game) cannot even be ‘‘spliced’’ together to match the single graphic novel. And just as importantly it is difficult to fathom how the sophistication in Miss Remarkable, Dark Knight Returns,orArkham Asylum (or any number of the Batman graphic novels) could possibly be captured by either traditional lit- erature or film. Complexity in the Comic and Graphic Novel Medium 69

In more formulaic terms, comics and graphic novels can provide unique complexity not found in prose-based novels or traditional films, and they therefore deserve critical and scholarly attention. That com- plexity came through the (a) medium: the way writers, , col- orists, and other involved in the production of a graphic novel impose control, create layering, build atmosphere, and highlight artistic craft; (b) stories: how graphic novels work well beyond the superficial, delv- ing into the human condition, political and cultural subversion, psy- chology, and the duality of persona; and (c) character: creating and sustaining icons that cross myriad temporal, visual, and setting ranges while paradoxically remaining coherent. While an inquiry into this complexity may have focused on a more diverse spectrum of graphic novels, the one seminal Watchmen, or various other graphic novels in the Batman universe, fans and scholars should appreciate working with an iconic character and some of his bestselling and most acclaimed stories. Moreover, fans and scholars should see how such an inquiry fills the gap left after Brooker’s Batman Unmasked, while in concert with theoretical arguments from Wolk, McCloud, Versaci, Peterson, and others.

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Paul A. Crutcher has degrees in philosophy, composition, and women’s and gender studies. Paul has published in a variety of mediums on diverse subjects, and researches in areas of popular culture and transcultural empathy as they interact with socialization and other forms of education. He is currently a doctoral candidate in Curriculum, Teaching, and Educational Policy at Michigan State University. Copyright of Journal of Popular Culture is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.