Detective Comics #1049

Purely subjective but I hate the covers for this run. Looks like a DC cosplay calendar.

I don't like them either.

Then buy the variant covers, Lee Bermejo's variants have been the best covers on any bar book for 30 issues now. Screw the main covers bermejos card stocks are legit 🔥🔥🔥

Bermejo and Fabok are my favorite Batman artists active right now.

Fabok is my favorite artist, period. I'd like to see every DC or Marvel character drawn by him, he is so, so gifted. Unfortunately, the dude is lazy af and he won't involve himself in anything other than covers.

Fabok art is amazing, I've been wanting to read read his new 52 books lately. Emperor penguin is an underrated Batman story, it's only really problem is when you try and trade read it. You literally have to buy the next vol to get the ending lol, and it's only 1 issues I'm pretty sure. But ya Fabok I think also didn't like what dc was doing it seemed, if he can't draw Batman I would absolutely love him to see him get a arc or two on Spider-Man or daredevil or spawn too.

I agree the backup got interesting. The kid is like a bastard-Robin. Kinda hard to believe it is written by Rosenberg.

I just read that Tec is going back to a monthly in April and Batman will take on the riddler (of course hes the main villain in the new movie). Tamaki is staying on as writer.

@Ming — Did you read the solicitation? Riddler comes back as a “media personality.” Why do I think we are about to get some thinly veiled social commentary pointed in the same frigging direction it always is? :( April’s solicitations in general looked abysmal. Thank God I have an archive of library editions to keep me going for a long time.

Oh boy, Riddler as a media personality? I mean, he's done it in the past but I don't know if I'd trust Tamaki to deal with that sort of stuff in a satisfactory way.

Lol Yep. I have a feeling Tamaki’s Riddler is going to be like a Fox News pundit. But who knows… Maybe DC will try to keep Riddler on brand since he’s a major character in the upcoming film.

Riddler is my favorite Batman villain but it's been pretty long since I've read a good story with him as a main villain. King's War of Jokes and Riddles and Snyder's Zero Year gave him a major role but I'm not sure I liked him in either of those roles.

King made him kill a kid, which I don't know, I'm not saying that was necessarily above him but I always saw Riddler as a more fun type of villain whose main focus is to prove Batman he's smarter than him rather than just engaging in casual violence for the sake of it. He's not the Joker and in that story he was actually far worse than Joker.

I agree with you 100% that they made him even darker than Joker in that storyline. I love the Riddler, too. I always thought the casting of John Glover to voice Riddler in BTAS was so spot-on (as were nearly all the voices). Last time I thought he had a good storyline was during Dini’s run where Riddler was almost a supporting character because he was semi-reformed.

I never read that whole run, just some issues here and there, I kept postponing it and surmised that it was similar with Riddler's Reform episode from BTAS since it was also written by Dini. I might proceed to read it soon, though. Could you tell me what issues I should read from that run, regarding Riddler's "reform"?

Yeah when I saw Tamaki was staying on as writer I didnt gave great expectations for the new status quo but the fact that Batman is back in Gotham is in the right direction. But now you international Batman with Williamson-whos run I'm enjoying- and Batman back in Gotham in Tec. DC editorial ate all over the place right now.

And yeah Hydro I'm expecting media personality Riddler to be used as a caricature too. But I knew the release of the movie would pressure DC into getting Batman back in Gotham. I don't mind cinematic elements coming into the comic books of the character so long as it's not diluting the stories. For instance Emperor Penguin brought the nolan verse tumbler into the comics. And the joker was drawn to resemble gwinplaine from the man who laughs film.

As 7ve said Tamaki has yet to settle into writing Tec. Some of it is based editorial decisions so of it us Tamakis inabilty to voice the characters well and to tell a story that keeps the reader engaged. She seems to lose steam quickly.

Mora carried her last run.

My favorite Riddler story us dark knight dark city which funnily enough is out if character fir how hes normally written

Ok when you guys bring up the war of jokes and riddles. I gotta say the dinner scene with Bruce having the joker and the riddler over for dinner was one of the most ridiculous things I have ever read, but it was alot of fun. I did not like alot of kings run but it did have some good moments like that one to me.

I liked The War of Jokes and Riddles, I've rated it with a 9 here, though I still think it had much more potential than what King went for. I liked Janin's art, I liked what he did with Kite-Man and the way Batman acted but I wasn't a huge fan of how he wrote Riddler or Joker.

@Merlyn — Dini’s Tec run was a thing of beauty. He managed a series a great one-and-dones at a time when everything was written for the trade. Despite that, there was still a semblance of an overarching story but the key Riddler issues were #822, #828 and #837. @Ming — Hell yes, Dark Knight, Dark City was awesome. A huge influence on Morrison’s run and also Snyder’s run.

Thanks! Yeah, I think I read those issues a pretty long time ago. What I wanted to read but never got to were those issues where he had a daughter and he ends up killing her or something of the sort.

Oy. Back when they were letting Tony Daniel write. One of the very few times I dropped the book.

Love Daniel's art hes up there with Fabok but his writing wasnt nearly of the same standard.

On the April solicitation, I have an unpopular opinion. I think if Miko Tamaki is going to stay Tec main writer, then leave Batman out of it. Tec was not always a Batman book, so there is precedent. She has publicly stated has she doesn't like Batman. OK, then don't write him, when he is the MAIN character. Everyone needs a job-totally respect that. Maybe write a Batgirls mini-series or something. But if Tec focuses on Batman, main writer should not publicly state they enjoy torturing him. My 2c

That's been a lot of fans grip with DC Bats...how about a writer on batman that likes the character? One can tell from Tamakis handling of the book she prefers other characters she kept Batman on the sidelines. And yeah Tec has been without Batman in the past.

The only torturing Tamaki has done is on the readers.

Shes never been able to voice Batman in a way that grabs the fans. Obviously because she dislikes the character and cant resonate with him.

@Bats20832: Has she really publicly stated she doesn't like Batman? Could you give me some proof on that? Not that I don't trust you, it doesn't surprise me someone like Tamaki hates Batman. The fact that DC has let these last years writers like Tynion or Tamaki on these books, both showing strong disdain towards Batman, is disgraceful.

So if you go to Mariko Tamaki's Twitter page, you will see that someone told her to delete all of her Tweets before end of November 2021. Could it be the big $$ movie people don't want bad publicity in March? Anyways, it was September 8, 2021. I posted on this before. Didn't make a screenshot apparently - shame; actually thought everyone knew. https://twitter.com/marikotamaki

On 9/8/2021, Mariko Tamaki wrote on her Twitter page, while she enjoyed being 2 weeks off, she missed torturing Batman. "After two weeks off, it's back to Batman and mayhem. Admittedly, I missed torturing these guys." So if it was anyone else, "maybe funny?" But I thought she was serious. Tweet and anything she posted before 11/4/2021 is GONE. I mentioned it here on 9/16 in review of Detective Comics #1042. https://comicbookroundup.com/comic-books/reviews/dc-comics/detective-comics-(2016)/1042

To clarify, Tamaki had one retweet at beginning of 11/2021, and didn't post anything herself until end of 11/2021. I imagine the DCEU media PR team thought maybe they should decide what she says - which I THINK IS WRONG. I believe in Free Speech. And if she really hates the Batman character, that is HER RIGHT. It's not right to have writing that character, that's all.