Batman #667-671

Batman #667-671

Originally released in 2007

Written by Grant Morrison

Art by J.H. Williams III

I started Grant Morrison's Batman run a while back; I found it a bit slow, but I'm going to try it again.  Picking up where I left off, Batman and Robin (Tim Drake) are attending a meeting of various Batman-inspired figures from other countries. (I'm guessing this is taking the premise of a silver age story and extending it)

Naturally, all of these crime fighters are gathered in one place because there has been a murder, and it's up to them to figure out which one of them is secretly a killer before they become the next victim.  As a mystery, it doesn't seem to work well in comic form since it relies on Batman knowing a ton of details about these characters that we, the audience, have no possible way of knowing, such as who's left-handed or the love lives of the people involved.

Still, as an introduction to a criminal (and apparently gambling-themed) organization The Black Hand, it's a solid one, with great artwork and chaotic paneling that does a good job at capturing the feeling that the situation is spiraling out of control.

For the other crime fighters, they could have easily been written as caricatures, stereotypes, or lesser imitations of Batman (something that Tim pokes fun at them for during the story), but it's clear that Batman respects them, and much like Batman, they're heroic figures and skilled detectives in spite of their flaws. (drinking problems, gluttony, obvious jealousy...)  They kept meeting regularly even though Batman only attended the first meeting, so they're dedicated to the cause even if they aren't as effective as Bruce.

Issues 670 and 671 are about the resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul after a death that was apparently permanent thanks to the destruction of his body.  Ra's transferred his consciousness into one of his minions, but before that happened, the minion betrayed him by poisoning himself. Now he needs to possess someone else, and despite looking down on Damian for being created in a test tube rather than being born naturally (referring to the boy as "it", for example), he will have to do.

While this story is spread out over several series (Batman, Robin, Nightwing, and Detective Comics), I'm just going to read the ones from Grant Morrison's Batman run. It's easy enough to follow what's going on, even with me jumping from a prologue to part 4 - by the time of issue 671, Ra's has Damian and Tim as hostages, threatening to possess one of them and not really caring which one.

Batman finds a third option, offering to use the power of a city known as Nanda Parbat to restore Ra's body and save him from the poison. Meanwhile, a man known as Sensei who took over the League of Assassins in Ra's's absence is attacking Nanda Parbat, intending to poison the healing well. He anticipated Ra's coming here and planned to remove his one chance of recovery.

I've thought of Ra's as being something like Batman's equivalent of what Darkseid is for Superman - the most dangerous foe in the heroes' rogues gallery, but one who was introduced much later and prefers to stay in the background rather than getting directly involved.  Here, there's another parallel: much like how Darkseid's father Yuga Khan is the one person that Darkseid is afraid of, Ra's Al Ghul's father is enough of a threat that Batman and Ra's work together to stop him. (Though in this case, it's more that Batman knows where to go to heal Ra's and he presumably doesn't trust Ra's to leave him unsupervised)

Given that Ra's has survived for an insanely long amount of time and is barely hanging on by the present day, I'm surprised his father (who would be even older) is not only alive but apparently doing better from a physical standpoint. (Maybe he lives a less risky lifestyle, or maybe both of them fight over the Lazarus Pits, explaining why there aren't many left in the present day)

So far, this isn't my favourite of Morrison's works (I prefer Animal Man, All-Star Superman, and (despite its flaws) Final Crisis at the very least, though I get that I'm only seeing a small part of a much larger story), though I feel like I'll change my tune by the end of this run. Maybe those series just set a high bar; this was all right, but not great, though my lack of familiarity with Batman's history might play a part in my opinion.