“But y’all can see me now ’cause you don’t see with your eye. You perceive with your mind,” Batman #15 introduces all that is madness! Click the jump to see more.
PLOT: “DEATH OF THE FAMILY” continues here! The Joker’s attacks have taken their toll on Batman and his allies, and now they have to face the impossible. The final madness of The Joker’s plan revealed here! Why is he more dangerous now than ever before? Plus: In the backup feature, witness The Joker’s confrontation with the Riddler as the horror of The Joker’s plan is revealed.
RATING: Enjoyable Read, set-up issue but it’s still good!
REACTION: Batman #15 is good issue, and it introduces the crossover that will happen to the other Batman comic books. But…it’s still a good issue because the beginning holds a lot of suspense and tension with the GCPD there. In this issue, Scott Snyder shows a different kind of relationship between Joker and Batman that can considered more of a bromance than anything else.
PRAISES: Congratulations to Scott Snyder (writer of Batman) who continues to keep us all on our toes in this issue, the beginning was super impressive. The first page you see is one of the best because it features the Joker’s face in shadows. You get to see Greg Capullo’s (artist of Batman) artwork on his version of the Joker, which is the original version, up close and freakin’ personal! Above all, this is the best page from the entire issue! If you want, which I think many will do is blow up this image and make a poster out of it. I mean seriously, it’s poster worthy at this point!
Once, you pass this first page you get back onto the continuation from Issue #14. Capullo keeps the tension high as he shows Batman who is still constricted by Joker’s trap. Snyder shows a lot of twists and turns between Batman and Joker as to who as the upper hand, but of course Joker does which was awesome to see. Snyder has been saying this for the longest, but it shows more in Issue #15, which is the relationship between Batman and Joker. I would like to think its literal, by which Batman is king of Joker’s world. However, it seems that Joker has a little more of a psychotic bromance with Batman that seems truly one-sided at this point. Why would I say this because of this subtle “As I just kissed yours, my Lord” comments. Yeah, it references to how servants treat his King but it was a little awkward for my taste. I won’t lie; Snyder shows a different side to the relationship that has really never been shown. It’s cool to see this kind of relationship in a Batman comic book.
Greg Capullo is a natural at showing off his cinematic art direction with tons of explosions and cool camera shots from different angles. The best from Capullo in this issue besides his first page of the Joker in shadows is Joker pretending to be Alfred. It was creepy and very Texas Chainsaw 
Massacre! This imagery is a literal reference to Joker saying that he is Batman’s intimate servant. For the rest of this issue, it’s all a set up for the other Bat-family members to get ready for Joker’s attack in the crossover. If I had to say anything about how Capullo drew the other members. I can say that I enjoyed his version of Red Hood, even though Red Hood is in the background most of the time. Capullo drew him quite nicely giving his character ample time like the rest of the members. I wouldn’t mind seeing Capullo draw Red Hood or Damian in a solo Batman comic book; I think he would do well with those two bad ass characters.
The back-up story with The Riddler was nice. Jock (artist of Batman back-up stories) continues to stand close to Capullo’s version of the Joker if not much darker in comparison with Capullo’s. Jock has great moments where Joker shoots a horse and then a guard. It was definitely an “OH” moment! The way Scott Snyder and James Tynion IV (co-writer and writer of Talon) presented this back-up is to gather and hype up Riddler’s return to Batman comics. Basically, Riddler’s been away in the Arkham and he’s been wasting time in his cell. Joker tests Riddler to escape his cell by planting a death trap from him to push Riddler’s use of intelligence, which is the best way to intrigue Riddler out of his cell. It was great to see the two characters interacting with each other and Joker really knows how push Riddler’s buttons.
DISAPPOINTMENTS: As far as I can say about this issue that I didn’t like was the fact that this issue is more of a set-up for the crossover for the other Batman books. There is a lot of dialogue among the Bat-family members and it just solidifies the tension among them. As for Capullo, I think he dropped the ball when it came to Joker’s interaction with Harvey Bullock. There was supposed to be tension between them and well it didn’t translate very well. I think Capullo might have rushed this issue due to New York Comic Con 2012 when he visited to talk to Batman fans, which was around the time he had to draw Issue #15. However, he makes up for it by giving us explosions and high suspense scenes. I do think that Snyder might have put too much into this issue since he has to continue his story and tie in the other characters into this issue. It’s a lot to manage for the two, but they do the issue quite well if you don’t think about the nitpicks.
Batman #15 does not hold a huge candle to the previous issues, which were scarier! Issue #15 is more of a set-up issue than anything else. But, I still can’t get over that first page though…it’s freakin’ amazing! It’s also scary as hell if you were to place a black light on it. Arghh! BEAUTIFUL!
Check out some of the panels that I thought were cool.
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