Captain America / Black Panther: Flags of Our Fathers by Reginald Hudlin, Denys Cowan, Klaus Janson, et al.

Once again, I went into a Black Panther miniseries with low expectations, and once again, I was pleasantly surprised. Captain America / Black Panther is a "flashback" story set during World War II, showing how Captain America and the Howling Commandos came to Wakanda to stop the Nazis from stealing vibranium, meeting the then-current Black Panther. This was something we originally learned about in a brief flashback story during Christopher Priest's run, here expanded to four issues. Though I think in that story, the Black Panther was T'Challa's father T'Chaka, whereas here it's T'Challa's grandfather... whose real name I'm pretty sure we never actually get now that I think about it. The Marvel web site tells me his name is Azzuri, which sounds vaguely familiar, but I don't remember in which previous story we learned that.

from Captain America / Black Panther #2

Anyway, this might be branded as a Captain America / Black Panther story, but I actually felt like neither man was the protagonist. Black Panther, as my comments above indicate, is a largely mysterious presence here. More of a heroic ally than a hero, he doesn't make any big decisions or choices, just assists the the other characters in doing what needs to be done. Captain America's role is pretty straightforward heroism, punching Nazis, etc. I did wonder if there was space to do more with him confronting racism, but there are a couple nice touches there, as Black Panther asks him to imagine what race will look like in the country the Captain goes back to after the war.

No, the real protagonist is one of the Howling Commandos, Gabe Jones. Gabe is a black man in an otherwise white unit almost a decade before the American armed forces were integrated in real life. Gabe narrates the series, and finds his loyalties tested—does he owe his allegiance to the nation that discriminates against him because of his race, or to the country where people who look like him can live in utopia? Hudlin gives us a number of interesting sequences where he weighs up the ways different people react to him, from Steve Rogers to his fellow commandos to Black Panther to the Nazis. His decisions are the most significant ones of the story, and I really enjoyed what writer Reginald Hudlin did with him, giving a real heart and emotional core to what otherwise might have been a generic superhero punch-up.

from Captain America / Black Panther #1

Denys Cowan pencils; he's done a number of Black Panther stories, and I've enjoyed his work on them, especially the 1988 miniseries, as well as elsewhere in DC series like All-Star Comics and Convergence: Detective Comics. He does great here as well, with good character focus and decent action.

I thought this would probably be generic punch-up, and based on Hudlin's other writing (which tends to neither be hit nor miss, if that makes sense), I wasn't expecting much. But this is certainly the best Black Panther comic I've read from him, with solid superheroics and using the framework of black utopianism to tell a story with surprising depth.

Flags of Our Fathers originally appeared in issues #1-4 of Captain America / Blank Panther (June-Sept. 2010). The story was written by Reginald Hudlin; penciled by Denys Cowan; inked by Klaus Janson (#1-2), Tom Palmer (#3-4), and Sandu Florea (#4); colored by Pete Pantazis; lettered by Joe Sabino; and edited by Axel Alonso.

ACCESS AN INDEX OF ALL POSTS IN THIS SERIES HERE

"Unfettered by the yoke of colonization, the African warrior nation of WAKANDA flourished and became a high-tech, resource-rich, ecologically-sound paradise—one that makes the rest of the world seem primitive in comparison. Ruling over this kingdom are the BLACK PANTHER and his queen, STORM."

Previously, I reviewed the first nine issues of Black Panther vol. 4 in two separate posts here and here. The series ran up to issue #41 (plus one annual), all of which except the last three (a Secret Invasion tie-in) were written by Reginald Hudlin. There are a number of different artists, but Francis Portela, Scot Eaton, and Klaus Janson contribute the most.

from Black Panther vol. 4 #28
(script by Reginald Hudlin, art by Francis Portela)

I always like to title my blog posts about ongoings with whatever description of the premise is given in the comic itself (I don't know if there is a technical name for these things; I'm sure there is). As the one I picked for this post highlights, the big change in this comic is the marriage of Black Panther to Storm of the X-Men. Beginning with issue #10, T'Challa starts looking for a wife; in #18, he and Ororo are married. The rest of the run largely concerns how things are impacted by their marriage, though more the world at large than Wakanda itself. They go on a "world tour" honeymoon, they poke their noses in the American superheroes' "Civil War," they serve together on the Fantastic Four while Reed and Sue are on vacation.

Unfortunately, to me, the marriage was never totally successful. Hudlin tries his best, but the relationship is largely depicted as a preexisting one, which we the readers have never seen before. (Around the same time, a Storm miniseries was published that layers in some of that backstory, but I haven't read that, though I intend to.) If it had just been a marriage of political convenience, I think I would have bought it, but the series tries to tell us it is both that and a passionate, genuine romance, and I just never could believe it.

from Black Panther vol. 4 #31
(script by Reginald Hudlin, art by Francis Portela)

I also think the comic spends too much of its time being a generic superhero comic, not playing to the strengths of the Black Panther premise. The overly long story arc about T'Challa and Storm being on the Fantastic Four is just a Fantastic Four comic with some different leads; I'm sure this was a fun thing over in the actual Fantastic Four, but fighting Skrulls and revisiting long-lost plot FF plot points from the 1960s is not why I'm reading Black Panther, you know? I also found the Civil War crossover particularly tedious, jumpy, and incomprehensible.

Hudlin tries at time to make it work, such as giving up Skrull versions of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X, or trying to focus on Wakandan politics during Civil War, but it never did much for me. Too often, the unique selling point of this comic—one that Hudlin really emphasized during its opening story arc—was neglected, which was Wakanda. Little of the action takes place there, unlike in Don McGregor's run, but in Christopher Priest's run, even parts of it set outside Wakanda never let you forget you were reading about a king doing statecraft.

from Black Panther vol. 4 #22 (script by Reginald Hudlin,
art by Manuel Garcia and Jay Leisten & Sean Parsons)

Occasionally, Hudlin does do a good job merging social commentary on the African diaspora experience into superheroics, following in the footsteps of Don McGregor's Ku Klux Klan story arc; I particularly enjoyed the post-Katrina New Orleans story arc; I really liked Hudlin's take on Luke Cage, too. 

Notably, this is the run where Shuri is introduced... in the films she's an intrinsic part of the Black Panther mythos, so I have been mildly surprised to realize how late she came to it. But Hudlin does very little with her here, also to my surprise. She would be easy to forget if this was all you ever read of her; after being set up for significance in the opening arc, she plays very little role until late in the run. I think she plays a bigger role in Black Panther vol. 5, so we'll see.

from Black Panther vol. 4 #14
(script by Reginald Hudlin, art by Scot Eaton & Klaus Janson)

I was a bit apprehensive about the final story arc, seeing as it was a crossover and by a different writer, Jason Aaron. But it had great art by Jefte Palo and even greater coloring by my fave, Lee Loughridge. It seems to me that Aaron does a Priest pastiche here, not a Hudlin one, largely depicting T'Challa from the outside as Wakanda fights off a Skrull invasion. The viewpoint characters are all Skrulls... and you actually end up feeling bad for them as they are yet another attempt to invade Wakanda that ends in failure. Well done, great stuff.

ACCESS AN INDEX OF ALL POSTS IN THIS SERIES HERE

Who Is the Black Panther? by Reginald Hudlin, John Romita Jr., Klaus Janson, et al.

While there have been some long gaps between Black Panther runs, that was not true once Christopher Preist's came to an end. Less than two years after Black Panther vol. 3 #62, Marvel debuted a new Black Panther title with Reginald Hudlin as writer. The opening story arc, Who Is the Black Panther?, carefully reintroduced the character and his setting, evidently aimed at a readership who had not previously read any Black Panther comics or only had a vague awareness of the character.

from Black Panther vol. 4 #1

Honestly, it is a bit jarring to read this coming off of Priest's run. While in Priest's run, Wakanda was a major, active force in international geopolitics, here the NSA doesn't even know that Wakanda is anything other than a "primitive" African nation. I get that a bit of a soft reset is often needed when comic titles start over, but it's made particularly jarring here by the fact that the person who delivers all of the exposition about Wakanda is Everett K. Ross, a character introduced by Priest! How can you carry over him but not the fact that Wakanda prominently annexed part of Canada and was involved in an international war with Atlantis and the United States? (Maybe a lot of time has passed? Everett K. Ross seems to be drawn about two decades older here!)

These aren't the only changes Hudlin introduces to the Black Panther mythos. This story retells how Ulysses Klaw killed T'Challa's father, the previous Black Panther, but now instead of it happening in Wakanda when Klaw stumbles in, here it happens at an international summit. (This is clearly the inspiration for T'Chaka's death in Captain America: Civil War.) It also seems that Queen Raimonda was around T'Challa's entire life; as McGregor told it, she would have been back in South Africa for some of the events Hudlin places her at here. T'Challa also suddenly has an uncle we've never seen before, who in fact acted as Black Panther when T'Challa was a child. Where was this guy during, say, all the trouble with Killmonger?

from Black Panther vol. 4 #6

The biggest change is probably the introduction of Shuri, Black Panther's sister. Since I knew the character from the movies, I've long been wondering when and how would she be introduced. Would she have been sent overseas for her own protection and brought back home? Would she be a long-lost half-sister that T'Challa suddenly learned about? Would she suddenly be added to the cast as if she had been there all along? The last one is the approach that Hudlin opts for. In some of the flashbacks this story shows us, Shuri is present at key moments in T'Challa's past, including when T'Challa ascended to the throne.

That said, of course the test of a retcon isn't how much the new continuity is different from the old, but how good the story is being told with it is. We don't get a lot of Shuri here, but what we do get is solid and interesting, as she tries to prove herself in a world that doesn't have a lot of space for her to do so, and I look forward to seeing what Hudlin does with her during the rest of his run. As for the rest of the changes, I am agnostic on them, and I will have to see how they continue to play out.

Okay, that was a lot on the continuity... what of the actual story? Well, it's okay. The first few issues alternate between exposition about Wakanda and the Klaw going around recruiting a team of villains to invaded Wakanda, along with the help of the neighboring country of Niganda. Ultimately, the problem is that the pacing seems off, there's about four issues of recruiting and two issues of invasion, meaning it seems a bit too simple and easy to fend off, and that many aspects of the story seeded in the first four parts ultimately don't really bear fruit. Why do we need to see all this stuff about recruiting the Black Knight when he barely does anything? Why all this stuff about the Radioactive Man's girlfriend when as soon as she gets to Wakanda she dies? (And grossly the male characters' reaction to her death is "at least we got to cop a feel!") Why spend so much time on the American military sending a force of cyborg zombies to "help" when all they do is show up and then T'Challa tells them to leave?

from Black Panther vol. 4 #3

Because of the structure of the story, we don't get a huge sense of Black Panther/T'Challa as a person; like in Priest's run, we mostly see him from the outside, if at all. However, in Priest's run, we often got a sense of his intelligence and canniness this way; that's not true here, where like in McGregor's run, Black Panther is often on the back foot up until he's not. Still, I'm not strongly judging here; this arc clearly had a purpose of introducing the setting and characters to an unfamiliar audience (and tweaking them for a familiar one), and there are thirty-five more issues of this series to come! Ongoing comics can't play too much of a long game, or the pleasures are eternally deferred (e.g., Marc Andreyko's Manhunter), but if we are in for the long run, I will grant you some slack to see how it turns out.

The art for this opening arc is by the famous John Romita Jr., and I think it is actually my first experience of his work.* I can't claim to be a fan of all of his people, especially their blocky noses, but his art has a strong dynamism and power that really carries you from the action on a panel-to-panel basis, so the more action there is, the better it works. The real artistic standout, though, is Dean White on colors. White's vibrant brights and lights, in particular, and strong contrasts really capture the energy and optimism of Wakanda in a world of darkness. I don't know if "JRJR" keeps contributing to this series, and I don't have a strong opinion either way, but I hope Dean White does.

from Black Panther vol. 4 #7

After the opening arc of Black Panther vol. 4 comes a single-issue story, part of the "House of M" crossover. I never read this crossover, but I think it involves an alternate timeline where Magneto rules the world? In this story, Black Panther and Storm rule Africa together, independent of Magneto, but Magneto begins to fear their power and tries to kill T'Challa; meanwhile, T'Challa recruits allies and makes his play. Probably if one read the rest of "House of M" one would care more, but parts of it were decently put together, though it seemed to me we saw more of Magneto and Quicksilver than we did of Black Panther. I did think Trevor Hairsine had some nice detailed pencil work that suited the tone of the story well.

Who Is the Black Panther? originally appeared in issues #1-6 of Black Panther vol. 4 (Apr.-Sept. 2005). The story was written by Reginald Hudlin, penciled by John Romita Jr., inked by Klaus Janson, colored by Dean White, lettered by Chris Eliopoulos (#1-2) and Randy Gentile (#3-6), and edited by Axel Alonso.

"Soul Power in the House of M" originally appeared in issue #7 of Black Panther vol. 4 (Oct. 2005). The story was written by Reginald Hudlin, penciled by Trevor Hairsine, inked by John Dell, colored Dean White, lettered by Randy Gentile, and edited by Axel Alonso.

* Actually, it looks like I have read exactly two DC books where he contributed a small amount of art, Detective Comics vol. 1 #1027 and Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 8 #9 (both 2020), but I have no particular memory of his contributions.

ACCESS AN INDEX OF ALL POSTS IN THIS SERIES HERE

Marvel Masterworks: The Black Panther, Volume 1 by Don McGregor, Rich Buckler, Billy Graham, et al.

Marvel Masterworks Presents The Black Panther, Volume 1: Collecting Jungle Action Nos. 6-24

Collection published: 2016
Contents originally published: 1973-76
Read: February 2023

Writer: Don McGregor

Pencilers: Rich Buckler, Billy Graham, Gil Kane, Keith Pollard
Inkers: Klaus Janson, P. Craig Russell, Pablo Marcos, Dan Green, Billy Graham, Bob McLeod, Jim Mooney, Keith Pollard
Letterers: Tom Orzechowski, Dave Hunt, Art Simek, Joe Rosen, Charlotte Jester, Karen Mantlo, Janice Chiang, Denise Wohl, Harry Blumfield, Irving Watanabe, Shelly Lefferman

The second installment in my series of Black Panther posts brings me to the Black Panther's first ongoing series, a run in Jungle Action by Don McGregor, which is made up of two stories: Panther's Rage and The Panther vs. the Klan! The first story takes T'Challa back to Wakanda after his sojourn to America, along with his girlfriend Monica, who I guess must be from some Avengers stories I haven't read. Panther's Rage inspired the Black Panther movie, as it's about an attempt by Erik Killmonger to depose T'Challa from the throne of Wakanda.

At the same time he wrote this, Don McGregor was also writing Killraven, of which I am a big fan, and this is very similar: wordy and portentous, perhaps verging into pretentious, with a large emphasis on character and theme. Like Killraven, it has a lot of the trappings of superhero comics, but it is not one. Panther's Rage is a war comic, a war in a nation, a war in a people, and a war in one man. He fights grotesque villains working for Killmonger, but it's more like a fever dream at times, surreal battles that are really there to illuminate what's happening inside T'Challa.

I'll take all the Black Panther vs. vicious monsters you've got.
from Jungle Action vol. 2 #10 (art by Billy Graham & Klaus Janson)

I can't say I always liked it. It gets a bit repetitive at times, and the ongoing plot doesn't move very quickly. Sometimes there were just so many words. The series had eleven different letterers across its eighteen issues, and I can see why: why do more than two issues of this when you can go letter some Captain America comic with half the dialogue and none of the narration? But Billy Graham and Rich Buckler capture power in their layouts and art, and sometimes the thing whole rises to poetry.

Monica wears the hippest outfits.
from Jungle Action vol. 2 #15 (art by Billy Graham & Dan Green)

McGregor builds up a recurring cast around T'Challa, and I look forward to seeing if future writers keep these people's lives going. Indeed, if the story has a single success, it's in convincing you that though Wakanda is a strange place, it is a real place. It is a country with people and history and geography and conflict. I suspect that will be its legacy.

Maybe my favorite part of the whole run: Killmonger's two dopey followers that the Black Panther is forever getting the drop on.
from Jungle Action vol. 2 #12 (art by Billy Graham & Klaus Janson)

This makes it all the more inexplicable that for its second arc, McGregor had T'Challa go to the American South with Monica to investigate the apparent suicide of her sister. The Ku Klux Klan plays a big role, as does a not-the-KKK organization, the Dragon Clan. Gone are all the characters and history he had so painstakingly built up; T'Challa himself suddenly feels less plausible as he for some reason never takes off his Black Panther outfit. There are still fun parts—Monica's solitaire-obsessed father—and interesting imagery, but the investigation moves at a crawl, and nothing has really happened at the point where the story suddenly ends because the book was cancelled for low sales.

The Dragon Clan outfits lack the effective simplicity of the real KKK.
from Jungle Action vol. 2 #19 (art by Billy Graham & Bob McLeod)

Don McGregor and his collaborators would be soon replaced by Jack Kirby. I will be curious if Kirby's return to the character he cocreated keeps any of McGregor's innovations, but I fear I already know the answer...

(Somewhat weirdly, Marvel would actually get another writer and artist to finish the Klan storyline in three issues of Marvel Premiere, over three years after Jungle Action was cancelled. Like, why? If it wasn't worth doing at the time, why was it worth doing years later? I cannot imagine a comics publisher nicely capping off a mediocre run like this now. Those issues of Marvel Premiere are in another Marvel Masterworks Presents The Black Panther volume, but alas that one is not on Hoopla.)

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Review: Star Trek Omnibus, Volume 1 by Martin Pasko, Dave Cockrum, Klaus Janson, et al.

Comic trade paperback, 324 pages
Published 2009 (contents: 1980-82)
Acquired June 2009
Read May 2019

Star Trek Omnibus, Volume 1

Script by Marv Wolfman, Mike W. Barr (with Denny O'Neil), Tom DeFalco, Martin Pasko (with Alan Brennert), Michael Fleisher, and J. M. DeMatteis
Pencils by Dave Cockrum, Mike Nasser, Leo Duranona, Joe Brozowski, Luke McDonnell, Gil Kane, and Ed Hannigan
Inks by Klaus Janson, Ricardo Villamonte, Frank Springer, Tom Palmer (with Marie Severin & Dave Simons), Gene Day, Gil Kane, and Sal Trapani
Colors by Carl Gafford and Shelly Leferman

Letters by Jim Novak, John Costanza, Rick Parker (with Harry Blumfield), Ray Burzon, Joe Rosen, John Morelli, Janice Chiang, and Shelly Leferman

This volume collects issues #4-18 of Marvel's Star Trek ongoing (#1-3 were collected in the Movie Classics Omnibus), which ran from 1980 to 1982. Following on from the events of The Motion Picture, these comics have two reputations that aren't entirely earned.

from Star Trek #6 (script by Mike W. Barr, art by Dave Cockrum & Klaus Janson)

The first is that they're terrible. I don't think so. There are some not-great ones, sure, particularly the dumb opening two-parter where the Enterprise is haunted, and it turns out to be some guy's mental projections based on horror films he watched! There are also ones where the Enterprise battles the Loch Ness Monster and gnomes, and one where Kirk thinks he's a pharaoh. I'm not sure what's up with these old horror standbys; they sound like they might be campy fun, but are just boring. But there are some solid Star Trek stories here: a guy is seemingly killed beaming up to the Enterprise but Spock finds the trick; Spock and McCoy are forced to interfere in the development of a primitive society; Janice Rand moves on with her life but ends up in deep trouble beyond the galactic barrier; McCoy struggles to reconcile with his daughter... who's married a Vulcan! Nothing too flashy, and still sometimes goofy, but solid, interesting Star Trek work.

from Star Trek #7 (script by Tom DeFalco, art by Mike Nasser & Klaus Janson)

I was particularly struck by the thematic consistency with Motion Picture; there are lots of stories of ancient computers and/or would-be gods. Also I enjoyed the emphasis on elements that later Star Treks ignored; Chief DiFalco becomes a friend of Sulu and Chekov for example, and Janice Rand gets some moments as transporter chief, and the perscan belts are even employed on occasion. The comics do suffer, however, from a bevy of rotating writers and artists. Martin Pasko has a good run as writer, but writes just over half of the issues himself. Dave Cockrum and Klaus Janson do good work (Cockrum drew the Legion, so of course he can do Star Trek), but handle just a third of the issues.

from Star Trek #9 (script by Martin Pasko, art by Dave Cockrum & Frank Springer)

The other oft-claimed thing about this comic is that Marvel had only licensed Motion Picture itself, and this could only use elements of Star Trek that appeared in the film. Supposedly a couple references were snuck in. But once you get reading, I'd say more issues use ideas from the original series (and the cartoon) than don't. There's an Antosian from "Whom Gods Destroy," the disease choriocytosis from "The Pirates of Orion," the galactic barrier from "Where No Man Has Gone Before," Kirk's backstory from "Court Martial," the Klingon stasis weapon from "More Tribbles, More Troubles," recurring characters like Kyle and DeSalle, and so much more! Christopher Bennett has suggested that perhaps "the restriction on Marvel was that they couldn't use storylines from TOS, rather than a blanket ban on concepts from TOS." But in Back Issue! no. 5, writer Mike Barr claims they thought they couldn't even use the Vulcan mind meld until someone was told Spock did one in The Motion Picture (the relevant issue was written before the film was even released!). He doesn't really discuss where all the other references come from.

from Star Trek #11 (script by Martin Pasko, art by Joe Brozowski & Tom Palmer)

As per usual for IDW collections of archival material, the paratext leaves something to be desired. The back cover calls these comics "the first-ever original Trek stories for comics," completely missing the existence of a Star Trek comic book published by Gold Key from 1967 to 1979 that lasted for 61 issues!

Next Week: We find out what happened between Star Treks III and IV, in volume 6 of the Star Trek Archives... the Mirror Universe Saga!

Faster than a DC Bullet: Gotham Central, Part Ø: Batman: Gordon of Gotham

Before plunging into my next comics project, I want to cycle back to some old ones and read some books related to them that have come out since then. The first of these is Gotham Central, which I read over five years ago now.

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2014 (contents: 1996-98)
Borrowed from the library
Read March 2016

Batman: Gordon of Gotham

Writers: Chuck Dixon, Dennis O'Neil
Artists: Klaus Janson, Jim Aparo, Bill Sienkiewicz, Dick Giordano
Colorists: Kevin Somers, Ian Laughlin, Pam Rambo, Jamison

Letterers: John Costanza, Clem Robins

This book collects three four-issue miniseries that feature Commissioner Gordon and/or the Gotham City Police Department; it's a precursor of sorts to Gotham Central, though I am pretty sure that the only main character here who is also a main character there is the ubiquitous Renee Montoya. Each of the stories here has a slightly different focus.

"Gordon's Law" is pretty squarely focused on Commissioner Gordon himself, as he discovers that there's possibly some corruption in the GCPD, which means he can't trust anyone on the force-- and to make things worse, he only wants cops to go after cops, which means he rejects Batman's offer of assistance as well. The story is kinda complicated; there are a lot of characters, and most of them were new to me (if not new to everyone), and though I really like the gritty tone established by Klaus Janson's artwork, he didn't always make it easy to remember who was who. Its biggest weakness is probably that it's one of those stories where tons of "old friends" we've never seen before turn up, and the narrative expects us to be surprised when an "old friend" we've never seen before turns out to not be altogether trustworthy. And that's not the only obvious twist, but there were some good ones as well. Overall, it's an okay tale: some good crime fiction influences, but it doesn't really have anything to say about Gordon, about the GCPD, or about Batman.

I love how sleazy/creepy the face of this guy (he's an informant) looks.
from Batman: Gordon's Law #1 (script by Chuck Dixon, art by Klaus Janson)

"GCPD" is the most like Gotham Central of all the stories here; the commissioner is just a minor part of a sprawling, ensemble tale of various members of the GCPD pursuing various cases. Harvey Bullock struggled with anger management, a new partner, and a serial killer; Renee Montoya goes undercover as a diplomat's wife to help catch an assassin; two cops named Kitch (a trained lawyer) and Cav (a grizzled old vet) track down art thieves and an insurance same; an administrator named Hendricks tries to figure out who's stealing stationery. As you might imagine, some of these stories are better than others: I always enjoy a Montoya tale, but Chuck Dixon doesn't really her very unique, and the circumstance she ends up in seems incredibly contrived to say the least. (Do local cops really handle assassination plots against foreign officials? Would there really be no plan for cancelling the operation when it all goes wrong and the diplomat deliberately endangers Montoya's life?) On the other hand, I did enjoy the Harvey Bullock plot. This was my first real exposure to the character (he was retired during Gotham Central), and he gets to do some good old-fashioned investigating that shows off his intelligence as well as his human side, and I liked his contentious relationship with his new partner.

Jim Aparo just can't resist giving Gordon that dandyesque mustache curl, though.
from Batman: GCPD #3 (script by Chuck Dixon, art by Jim Aparo & Bill Sienkiewicz)

The Kitch/Cav plot had its moments, but some of its beats were very familiar. Is the lawyer-turned-cop who is mocked for his education by the cops and for his slumming it by the lawyers, and flirts with going back to law only to be reminded that lawyers are corrupt, a thing? I am pretty sure I read this exact story last year in Fort Freak. I liked Cav, though. The best character of all, however, was Hendricks: of course a desk officer grimly determined to catch an office supplies thief in the fact of mockery from his colleagues was my fave. The law begins and ends with him! I've previously struggled with Jim Aparo art on stories of the "gritty" type, but to my surprise, he paired really well with Bill Sienkiewicz on inks: Aparo does great figures and great storytelling, but Sienkiewicz's rough inks add the right tone for an urban cop story. Best art in the book.

CHILL OUT JIM!
from Batman: Gordon of Gotham #1 (script by Dennis O'Neil, art by Dick Giordano & Klaus Janson)

"Gordon of Gotham" is even less about the GCPD than "Gordon's Law," as it's mostly a present-day Gordon telling Batman about his last year as a Chicago cop, leading into the events of Batman: Year One. As anyone who read my review of that story would know, I love Jim Gordon, and Dennis O'Neil really captures what it is that I like about him. Gordon is just a man trying to do the right thing in a world that will never reward him for it, because it is a world that needs Batman. Gordon argues with his wife (there's a callback to his struggle with domestic violence from Night Cries, another quality Jim Gordon tale), but ends up stopping a diner holdup almost by accident, then decides to go after corruption, but the world itself is corrupt, and he quickly gets in deeply over his head and ends up making choices that violate his moral core... or so he had thought. O'Neil piles on the twists and the action in a compelling way, and I really liked how this set us up for the  Gordon on Year One, down to his decision to grow a mustache. The only real weakness is the frame; I wonder why they didn't just do this story in pure flashback.

I didn't quite buy that everyone would recognize a "hero cop" so readily, but I guess more people watched local tv news back in the 1980s.
from Batman: Gordon of Gotham #1 (script by Dennis O'Neil, art by Dick Giordano & Klaus Janson)

Next Week: And now I'll be catching up on the expanded universe of The Sandman, beginning with the long-delayed collected edition of The Children's Crusade, Free Country!