Monday, April 04, 2005

DETECTIVE COMICS #571 DC Comics 1987



He’s back! The pharaoh of phobias! The duke of dread! The Scarecrow.

An issue from writer Mike Barr and artist Alan Davis’ run on Detective Comics. The Barr/Davis issues were fun retro romps through Giant Typewriter Land instead of grim slogs through Crime Alley. These issues feature the almost universally hated Jason Todd version of Robin, but I like them anyway – they’re just old school Batman & Robin stories told with style. I’m a huge fan of Alan Davis, who worked on this run with inker Paul Neary. Davis is one of the best artists working in comics today – his work is so clean and confident – I just think he’s the shit. I mean that in a good way.

Much like the Silver Age comics they pay tribute to, this brief run of Detective Comics features stories that wrap up in one comic book and don't stretch out over multiple issues. This issue is a tightly plotted and drawn comic book that efficiently tell the story, then gets the hell out. Sure, it's a little cheesy, but intentionally so. I love it.

Extra points for multiple death traps and bullfighting with semi trucks.

2 comments:

Felicity Walker said...

I haven’t seen much Alan Davis art, but what little I have seen (like the covers to Genesis) wasn’t to my tastes. Alan Davis’s art does it fit in very well with what’s the current art style in comics, though.

Felicity Walker said...

Remove the “it” from the last sentence, please. :-)