This is a new twelve issue story and is written by Warren Ellis and drawn by Bryan Hitch. It was an ok read. It was a bit of an underwhelming read because it was more of a Bruce Wayne story than a Batman story. Kind of a boring story. I doubt I'll buy any further issues.

BATMAN'S GRAVE
https://www.mycomicshop.com/search?TID=49460933


Nice art. But pending any favorable reviews, I'm very Grant Morrison resistant.

Loved planetary, but didn’t care for any of Ellis’ other mainstream work. I’ll wait for the trade and good reviews

Am I hallucinating?
I could have sworn Grant Morrison's name was attached to this series. My error, Warren Ellis.


While I'm not a big Warren Ellis fan either, he does always seem to be paired with really good artists. The first thing I ever read by Eliis was a 4-issue STARJAMMERS miniseries, paired with Carlos Pacheco.

I read the first dozen issues of PLANETARY, then lost interest.

I think it was on the old DCMB where I saw good and bad reviews about Planetary. I just never bought any issues to see for myself.

You ought to pick up the first volume, for the art if nothing else.

It’s a little like Astro city or Top 10 in that it plays with archetypes that are common in DC and Marvel (including a really sinister take on the fantastic four) as well as pulp heroes and similar tropes. The interplay between the three lead characters is fun, and reminiscent of the X-Files by way of Buffy.

Now I kind of want to go and re-read it.

PLANETARY series, all 27 issues, online:
http://12comic.com/comic.jsp?id=190227014105fc0v

Planetary is surely one of the best comics ever written for people who like comics. Most of it is to do with the archeology of comic books. The team discover things that almost occurred or which occurred and ended. you've got nods to Godzilla, old 50s sci-fi (Attack of the 50 Foot Woman), Jules Verne, a Vertigo Comics homage, a Doc Savage story, a absolutely brutal "why the JLA never happened" story, a Star Trek Borg story, even a "why Batman is so different in each of his iterations" story with a cross-over of sorts to mainstream Batman. (The DKR batman is awesome, but we also see the Neal Adams Batman complete with purple shading, and the '66 Adam West Batman). The villains of the story are The Fantastic Four, kind of a "what if they were self-ish and evil fuckers?" And "what if Reed Richards's initial rocket trip was intentional?"

I didn't know Ellis was writing Batman. He must need the money. Ellis really turns up his nose at superhero comics and the two main publishers. He referred to his time with Marvel a few years ago as his "year of whoredom" - it happened to coincide with lukewarm receptions of his novels (Gun Machine was pretty shitty). Ellis has an enormous wit which is acerbic and unforgiving. It didn't translate well into prose and he mucked up his characterisation with it.

in comics, he has some clever ideas (look at Iron Man: Extremis, and Simon Spector). I didn't like Transmetropolitan, which I thought was a political wankfest. But he did a fine job on The Wildstorm for DC, which I think just finished up.

He did a Batman story a long time ago in “Legends of the Dark Knight.” I really didn’t care for it.

The Batman story for Planetary wasn't a straight Batman story obviously, and the Batman portrayed in JLA/Planetary was more like Sherlock Holmes than Batman. The character is subject to so many interpretations, some of which are great, and some lazy.

I was pretty impressed by a Scott Snyder Batman story recently in The Batman Who Laughs. I thought Snyder was a hack. But then we have this: https://www.worldcomicbookreview.com/2019/02/28/the-batman-who-laughs-1-of-6-review/



I've got to say, for a character who has been interpreted and reinterpreted in so many ways, this one really got me.

On the other hand, we have Snyder's The Grim Knight which is basically The Punisher in a Batman mask - https://www.worldcomicbookreview.com/2019/03/17/the-batman-who-laughs-the-grim-knight-1-review/