Batman #663 Review
Writer: Grant Morrison
Artist: John Van Fleet
This by no means is your standard comic book. There is no sequential art, no word balloons, no caption boxes, nothing. What this issue contains is prose along with some few illustrations, like out of a third grade storybook. This explanation is by no means a critique of the issue, as Morrisson has crafted a great Joker story, almost as good as Paul Dini's recent Christmas issue. Morrison has written an incredibly detailed, metaphoric, and deep story about the re-birth of the Joker. His main point here is that each time the Joker is incarcerated, or defeated, a new "persona" arises. This can possibly explain all the different Joker's we've had over the decades in Batman books. By having this new theory, Morrison makes the Joker seem even more evil and insane. I think it is brilliant. The story starts out with some old Joker henchmen dying off, clowns, the dwarfs from "Killing Joke", and a few others. They way Joker kills them is really cool, and it's more subtle than he's done in the past. But, the Joker is in Arkham recovering from being shot in the face way back in Batman #665, how can this be? Enter Harlequin and the start of what the Joker wants to be his magnum opus. Morrison really suprised me with his writing, he could almost be a novelist if he didn't use such wacked-out descriptions here. Wacked-out is putting it softly, this is pure un-filtered Morrison.
The art by John Van Fleet is digitally painted, which in the description made me think of Freddie E Williams II and Alex Ross combined, but what we get looks like bad video-game screen shots. I don't know if these are 3-D models posed and framed or actual paintings, but they look like 3-D models. What these don't do is capture any sort of drama, suspense, or action that normal comic art might do. If you don't want to read this issue, go ahead and skip it, I almost did, but be warned that you are missing out on what my turn out to be one of the new premier Joker stories of this decade. If you're interested at all on how messed-up Grant Morrison's mind is, pick this issue up. B-
I've got to disagree here. I reviewed this "comic" myself and I think it's a steaming pile of crap.
Well, that's two opinions and the rest can decide where they are at based on the two of these. I thought it was a smart story, but I disliked the art. Morrison is nuts anyway.
I thought the story could have been good but it was so shrouded in prose it was difficult to follow. Also there really wasn't much to it other than the Joker recovering and some obvious murders. I was really disappointed and expected a lot more out of the Joker's return :(
I agree that it was a tad over written in places, but all in all I liked it.
I wasn't expecting this at all, but from time to time it's nice to have a change, rather than have the same old stuff trotted out month after month. Experimentation is a good thing.
I just hope that Morrison is setting us up for bigger plans with The Joker further down the line...
Normally Joe, I would agree with you. That it was shit. For some reason I really enjoyed the book, I guess it's so much better than the shit that was his New X-Men run. I just wish the Kuberts were faster. Their dad should come in and show them how its done.
I hated this book. Notice I said book, not comic book. This was more like a short story with a few illustrations. Granted, it looked good but I wanted panel to panel comic illustrations and word ballons. This was more like a piece that should have been published in a novel collecting short stories dealing with Batman and the Joker, not published in a Batman comic book.
I really wish I skimmed through this at the store before buying it. I was totally tricked by DC. Not cool guys, hopefully Kubert will be back with hand drawn pages next issue. I'd give this "comic" a D if I were to review it. Totally blew my 3.00 with this uncool stunt.
Bought it, looked at it....yeah I haven't read very much more. Laziness on the part of DC, don't give us a freaking chapter of a book when we want a comic. Am I the only one that has been feeling as though this Batman title has been sucking large lately.