World Famous Comics: Batman: Arkham Asylum Anniversary Edition
Batman: Arkham Asylum Anniversary Edition
By: Grant Morrison, Dave McKean Publisher: DC Comics Average Rating: Binding: Hardcover Label: DC Comics Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 216 Publication Date: November 01, 2004 Release Date: November 01, 2004
Product Description: In this groundbreaking painted graphic novel, the inmates of Arkham Asylum have taken over Gotham's detention center for the criminally insane on April Fool's Day and demand Batman in exchange for their prisoners. Accepting their demented challenge, Batman is forced to live and endure the personal hells of the Joker, Scarecrow, Poison Ivy, Two-Face and many other of his sworn enemies in order to save the innocents and retake the prison. During his run through this absurd gauntlet, the Darknight Detective's own sanity is in jeopardy. This special anniversary edition hardcover also reproduces the original script with annotations by Morrison and editor Karen Berger.
Eh what now? Incredibly dense in symbolism and "art", this novel presents an else-worlds scenario outside of established canon. In it, Batman is forced to confront his own demons and his own monstrous nature. Basically, he kills some guys who are bad but by killing them or treating them poorly, he is also bad. Or something. The artwork itself is beautiful stuff with very expressive use of colors and geometry, as well as using the layout itself for impact. Each character had his or her own unique lettering which was interesting in and of itself, but made reading some dialog difficult (perhaps that was the point!). I suppose if you are willing to dig through the layers and layers of meaning and try to understand some of the psychology of the hero-who-is-no-better-than-a-villain cliche, it has... no actually, that's all it has. It is as if at the end of the story, you expect to see Batman wake up in a sweat with the whole thing having been a bad dream.
I had to read it three times and read the notes of the creators before it made much sense at all.
Good Book I liked this dark look into the minds of the inmates arkham asylum. Each with their own visual style and twisted quarters. all in all a good read.
Pretentious, difficult to follow, pointless. Very pretentious and artsy book, most of the events feel pointless and loosely connected at best. The artwork is interesting until you try to figure out what's going on at any given point. Personally I'd take Frank Miller or Jeph Loeb over Grant Morrison any day of the week - I like stories that are intriguing and unpredictable, but actually have a point. The one thing I did like was the portrayal of Two-Face, but I will never forgive Morrison for his unmotivated, unnecessary, gratuitous and disgustingly pretentious bloodletting scene. In my opinion, the most impressive thing an artist or writer can do is make something intriguing, original and deep while maintaining a clear and purposeful expression of thought or emotion.
Doing dark or graphic things for no reason doesn't make you an artistic genius, it makes you annoying.
Didn't stand up to my expectations I was expecting something pretty good with this gr. novel - after all, it's about a very interesting subject in the Batman world. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. The artwork isn't really my style (it's a more abstract paint style), and it often made the story difficult to understand - environments, characters, and objects were not always clear. The depiction of Batman also wasn't what I'm used to - he was made out to be more violent than usual (which according to the notes at the end is how Morrisson wanted it). Finally, the storyline had a pretty anti-climactic ending. It just seems like Morrisson was trying to be too profound and ended up with a story that's more esoteric and scattered. Ironically, the notes at the end helped me to better understand his intentions - if the book had been written and drawn the way it was intended in his original script/notes, I probably would have followed it better and maybe enjoyed it more.
I still gave it 3 stars though because it IS Batman, and the general focus of the story (Arkham) is a good one.
Visually interesting but not for a comic Very interesting artwork and cool story but it is hard to follow. The artwork in here doesn't work for me as a reader. To see them as individual frames they are quite amazing but they are simply to busy and blurred for me to look at and absorb as a story.
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