Batman, Vol. 1: I Am Gotham by Tom King, David Finch, Scott Snyder, Mikel Janin, Matt Banning, Danny Miki, June Chung, Jordi Bellaire, Deron Bennett, John Workman  | Rating: ★★★☆☆

A copy of this novel was provided through NetGalley by the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not effect my opinions in any way.

I'm going to be upfront about it all: I enjoy a lot of works from DC. Batman is not, typically, one of them. So my review may be--a bit--biased on the matter of whether or not this release is good or bad. I thought the summary of it all seemed promising; a good mismatch of various runs for Batman and had hoped it would be something bigger, better than it was. The truth is that despite the artwork and solid dialogue, the tone was vastly underwhelming for me and I just felt it could have done so much more than what it did.

This isn't to say it lacked action or that gritty tone that it promises. It was neither here nor there in my opinion and by the end I felt rather indifferent toward the volume. For the most part, it had that familiar DC/Batman vibe to it but then there were moments where it took a turn into something that just didn't feel quite right. Again, this could perhaps be due to my relative indifference towards Batman. But the indifference felt even stronger than usual--very nearly at dislike--as I couldn't help but to feel this wasn't, well, right. 


That's not especially helpful, I know. A lot of the qualities you'd expect were there but or the most part I wasn't feeling it. It felt familiar in a way that was repetitive and dull but it also had a hint of general WTF-ness going on that I couldn't get past. There were some solid moments though and those of us who fawn over good artwork will definitely appreciate the way it's drawn/coloured. I found there were a few laughs and a lot of action but it didn't save the rest of the lackluster vibe the story had and I just couldn't shake it.

Not an ideal release for me personally and one of my least favourites in the rebirths. But it's definitely not the worst DC comic I've ever come across. Overall, I neither hated nor loved it and would recommend just picking up the volume for yourself so you can decide. I do think it has that spark that the hardcore Batman fans will either love or hate. I am not sure there's going to be much of an even ground on this.