The Dark Knight Strikes Again

DC Comics

Writer, Penciler: Frank Miller

Colorist: Lynn Varley

The career of graphic-novel god Frank Miller bears an eerie resemblance to the history of Classical music. In writing and penciling monthly stories for Daredevil, he stayed within the bounds of form and necessity, much like a Baroque court composer. Frank Miller as J.S. Bach. In Dark Knight Returns, he spawned a cosmos that revolutionized the genre—and the medium—and worked magic few thought possible. Frank Miller as Ludwig Van Beethoven. Now, with The Dark Knight Strikes Again, he’s adapted style and story to reflect and mock the soundbitten chaos of contemporary life. He has abandoned sense and form in the name of the bizarre subconscious, and a new, political focus. DKR assaults the senses while convincing the reader things will never be the same. In other words, Frank Miller has finally become Schoenberg. Sequential art, meet Serialism.  

Dark Knight Strikes Again picks up three years after the end of Dark Knight Returns. Out of the chaos of nuclear war has risen a new world order run by Brainiac and Lex Luthor. Superheroes are imprisoned, threatened into submission, or even used as power sources. Amidst all this is Miller’s perennial preoccupation with how common men forsake heroes for expediency: think The Incredibles at an adult tempo.

Love him or hate him, you can’t deny Frank Miller’s an ambitious writer. Notice that I say writer, and not storyteller or “fan-favorite scribe,” because there is some linguistic density to Miller’s work. Language is not just a tool for Miller—it’s an organic part of the story. He’s not Somerset Maugham, but he knows how to combine the rhythms of noir and comic book language into a gripping, sometimes revelatory, synthesis.

here's what I mean by frenetic...and this isn't even the worst of it.

To return to my long-winded music metaphor, DKSA is a lot like a Serialist compostion. There are moments of stunning beauty hidden within a tremendous amount of annoying, affected chaos. With the use of radioactive, offensively colored backgrounds, one feels colorist Lynn Varley is either copying Ralph Bakshi’s lamentable film Wizards, or trying to replicate the famous Pokemon seizures of the late 90s. The penciling, too, is inaccessible. Miller has sacrificed clarity for style. He wants the visuals to have a chaotic, frenzied look, and, unfortunately, he succeeds so well that the book requires a prescription of Dramamine and a lot of patience to sift through. As with any Miller penciling, there are stunning images, but this time, they’re overpowered by the hyperactivity that characterizes the majority of the book. Miller’s madcap approach is well suited to a few scenes, however, such as when he lampoons television, especially political talking heads. This is probably the first comic book in history to feature Bob Novak and Margaret Carlson.

Bruce Wayne's new Hellboy smack 'n sound (TM) gloves came.

If the original Dark Knight Returns was a love song to the Batman mythos, then DKSA is a book of sonnets with the entire DC canon filling in for the “dark lady.” (It’s a Shakespeare reference, people Google it. You won’t be disappointed.) Miller plays favorites, no doubt: how else can you explain the Green Arrow having a starring role? (the Green Arrow is a superhero the same way a half-eaten baloney sandwich is a meal) Captain Marvel and Martian Manhunter partisans be warned: you’ll be annoyed. I was, and I’m not that big a fan of either. A purist fanboy might go so far as to say Miller’s depictions of Wonder Woman, Superman, Flash, et al, should be labeled interpretations. That same purist fanboy would probably be right. Superman’s an accomplice to fascism, Wonder Woman’s kind of a cipher, and Robin…well…just read and find out.

Despite his fast and loose treatment of the DC universe, Miller still understands the soul of Bruce Wayne as well as any writer in comics today. Hal Jordan gets the best line of the entire book, and perhaps the best line Miller’s ever penned: “How strange that it would be you. The mean one, the cruel one, the one with the darkest soul. How strange that you, of all of us, would prove to be the most hopeful.” Write a line like that, and you have me half-convinced you understand Batman even better than Bob Kane and Bill Fingers.

Worth the money? No, because it might be in your local library. I’d give the original Dark Knight Returns a yes in this category, but DKSA is a little too all-over-the-road. Still, if you get the chance to read it, do.