Review: All-Star Batman, Volume 1: My Own Worst Enemy

A weekend light reading review.

Scott Synder.  All-Star Batman, Volume 1: My Own Worst Enemy. Burbank, CA: DC Comics, April 25^th, 2017. 192 pp.

4 out of 5

Purchase: Amazon

This is a volume that is a part of DC Comics’ recent “rebirth” reboot.  This particular work is on Batman.  I wanted to read this graphic novel largely due to the fact that Scott Synder wrote the story.  Synder’s previous stories has been good and I’m especially impressed with his Court of Owls.  While this particular work wasn’t as good as some of his previous works nevertheless you see the author’s creativity with how this story was told.

This work tells the story of Batman trying to help Two-Face.  Apparently Two-Face has for lack of better terms a multiple personality disorder in that there is the evil side named “Two-Face” while there is on the other side the original man, Harvey Dent.  Batman is taking him cross country to get the cure for him that would help him change.  But this trip suddenly gets more longer as Two-Face announced to everyone that there is great incentive to try to free Two-Face by getting rid of Batman: there’s a financial reward and also if Batman is not stopped then all the deepest secrets of everyone would be released as a leak.  While the story doesn’t get into specifics somehow one gets the sense that it has to do with all our information being found online.  So Two-Face’s announcement thus brings all sorts of villains out of the woodwork to try to stop Batman.  Some of these characters I have not heard or seen before and I thought it was neat that as each supervillain is introduced the comic does give quick information about the person and also his name.  It felt that each new villain is progressively worst and tougher to handle than the earlier ones.  Perhaps most shocking is the fact that regular people and ordinary citizens now also want to stop Batman as driven by the fear of Two-Face releasing their secrets.  It’s an incredible twists to the story in that Batman is trying to save the very people who are now going against him.  What a way to build thrill!

I thought it was interesting to see Synder goes back and forth in time as you read through the comics.  At one moment is the present then the next scene would be in the past.  Especially in the beginning this method of storytelling leaves us with intentional “gaps” in which we are drawn into the story wanting to find out more of what’s going on.

Overall a fun read.

Reflections according to the Christian worldview: I do think there is more to this than just a telling of a story for the sake of the bottom line of making money.  It seems this volume was an exploration of human nature.  Two-Face represents the capability that humans have of doing good while also having the capability of doing much heinous evil.  I also thought it was interesting that the mood of this story was dark; it was made more darker when ordinary people turned out to have great hidden secrets that they didn’t wanted to have revealed.  This in turn drove average citizens out to stop Batman in order to protect their private information from being leaked.  You also see in this story that everyone could be corrupted; even characters that we traditionally have taken for granted in Batman’s stories can and will end up double-crossing Batman.  I think Synder is hitting something spiritual here in that it is true all human beings are sinners and have dark secrets in their hearts.  Upon finishing the book I thought another useful lesson from this work is how great evil by the mass can be committed by what originally at first might seem like a good intention.  What a story.

NOTE: This book was provided to me free by DC Comics and Net Galley without any obligation for a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.

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