Intro
There is no denying that Frank Miller redefined Batman with The Dark Knight Returns, and then recreated his origin in Batman Year One. Both of these series were used as inspiration for Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy. What many don't realize is that Miller wrote other Batman series as well. Such as The Dark Knight Strikes Back, All-Star Batman And Robin The Boy Wonder, and Batman/Spawn. Another little known fact is that this was all a series, meaning it is in fact all the same Batman. Here I will post my reviews of the other series, factor them in with Miller's masterpieces and rate them as a whole, this review is different then what I intend to regularly post, but this will be a good practice run for future series reviews.
The Dark Knight Strikes Again
Miller later wrote a sequel to The Dark Knight Returns titles The Dark Knight Strikes Back. A series so incoherent in its plot and characters that resembled nothing of their former selves. For example Big Barda, a warrior from the planet Apokalips who escaped slavery and turned her life around to become a member of the Justice League. In The Dark Knight Returns she is a porn star named Hot Gates who decided to become the dictator of Columbus Ohio. Another casualty was Elongated Man who was, to be honest was a less popular, more adult version of Plastic Man, Miller made him a spokesman for erectile dysfunction pills.
Normally I don't believe in judging anything based on art/special effects, but this series was so oddly drawn, the backgrounds were not finished, the characters seemed to all be in different art styles, and the fact that the original series was far more appealing on the eyes, I would post an image, but I don't know how the copyright laws on this issue work, if you want examples simply google The Dark Knight Strikes Again. All in all this series fails on all levels, thus I give it an F.
Batman/Spawn
The Batman/Spawn series was actually three different stories, but because they were crossovers with the same guy I decided to tie them together. As far as crossovers go this one is actually not half bad. The only real issue with this is that Spawn deals with supernatural problems whereas Batman is more grounded in reality. As far as superhero team ups go, this one seems natural, 2 dark and broody lone wolf type men trying so solve murders, when they realize they are after the same killer they decide to pool their resources and work together. This happens three different times. And to really nitpick another problem issue is no matter how many times they work together, they always start off by duking it out over a misunderstanding. Not a bad series, but not as amazing as Miller's other work. Honestly it is barely above average, I give it a C+.
All-Star Batman And Robin The Boy Wonder
Personally I feel this series gets more crap than it deserves. True they destroy Batman's character turning him into an angry psycho who kidnaps kids, insults them, sleeps around, and blackmails Superman. But other characters that are introduced have far better origins than those introduced in other series of Miller's. For example Batgirl is a girl who worships Batman and decides to follow in his footsteps, their is no affiliation between the two, and in fact they never meet. Robin's origin is relatively the same. His parents are murdered so Batman decides to take him in and train him, however because Batman takes a young boy from a circus, it looks like a kidnapping. This leads to a subplot. Black Canary is a bartender who works at The Black Canary and fights crime in her uniform, earning her the name. The Justice League in this series seems to be just starting out. The roster includes Green Lantern, Plastic Man, Superman, and his girlfriend Wonder Woman. The biggest problem with this series is that there is just too much going on. That and the fact that it doesn't really have an ending. Along with the aforementioned Batman character raping earn this series a B-.
The Verdict
The results are in and go as followed.
The Dark Knight Returns A
Batman Year One A
The Dark Knight Strikes Back F
Batman/Spawn C+
All-Star Batman And Robin B-
Average B-
If you look at the series individually some of them are colossal failures. But as a whole they are not all that bad. Because of that you can forgive a majority of the flaws, and if you stop after The Dark Knight Returns the series becomes instantly better. Though one thing that always bugged me about Miller's Batman is that he is constantly referencing things that happened, that we the readers never saw. A huge example being the death of Robin, which is the reason for Batman's retirement, I feel this would have made a great series, but all we get is a single line of dialogue. Anyway that is my opinion on Miller's Batman, if you have your own thought feel free to let them be known.
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