DCU Comic Book Reviews

BATMAN: RETURN OF BRUCE WAYNE #1

Shadow On Stone

early July 2010

Written by Grant Morrison

Pencils by Chris Spouse

Inks by Karl Story

Cover by Andy Kubert and Chris Spouse

Synopsis

In prehistoric times, a tribe of cavemen stumble upon a rocket ship.  They also find boot prints leading to a cave, where they encounter Bruce Wayne.  He is confused and not speaking clearly.  He briefly joins the tribe.  That night, the tribe is attacked by the Blood Mob tribe.  Bruce manages to save one of the cavemen, but the rest perish while Wayne is captured.  The Blood Mob tribe, and Chief Savage, return to their camp.  That night, the boy Bruce saved returns to help him escape.  The next morning, Savage awakens to find Bruce gone.  He orders his tribe to find him, but suddenly Bruce (wearing the hide of a bat-beast) attacks Savage, with the young cavemen helping out.  Using items from Batman’s utility belt, Bruce defeats Savage.  Suddenly, there is a solar eclipse.  In the darkness, Bruce and the young man escape.  By the next morning, however, Bruce is gone.  Nearby, Booster Gold, Green Lantern, and Superman.  They are searching for Batman.  They need to find him before he returns to the 21st century or else everyone dies.  Elsewhen, Bruce is helped to his feet by a young woman, who points out a large creature is close and ready to attack. 

Review by Binkley (e-mail)

This is one of those times when my reaction during the first reading was different than my reaction during the second reading.  In this case, my appreciation for the issue grew as I was reading the second time.  The first time, I was put off by the caveman sequence, finding it difficult to follow with the strange dialogue and the echoes to the infamous issue of Powers in a similar setting and situation.  Yet, the second time around, perhaps because I was familiar with the story, it was making more sense and I started to get into a little bit more.  That is not to say I thought it was this great, awesome story, but I can see what Morrison was going for and I like what he was able to accomplish.  I like the introduction of Bruce and the fact that no one can understand what he is saying due to shifts in the English language over the years.  I also liked Anthro (I assume Young Man was supposed to be Anthro given the way the beginning of this story picks up with the ending to Final Crisis) and the way Bruce saved him and then Anthro in turn saved him.  I also liked the fact that Morrison included Savage, connecting this story to the larger DC universe in a logical manner.  So, overall there are a lot of good things about this story, much of which I started to notice more as I was reading the story a second time. 

Another reason why I was a little uncertain during the first read is that Morrison waited until almost the end of the issue before getting to the core of the mini-series:  if Bruce makes it on his own to the 21st century, it will have catastrophic effects.  As I was reading the first time, I was trying to make sense not only of the story within the issue, but also the story as it relates to the mini-series.  The second time, knowing what was going on; I can appreciate the smaller story as part of the larger story, which will center on Superman and others trying to find Bruce as he slowly progresses through time.  I think it really helps to put what happened in this story in context.  On the one hand, it is somewhat of a compete story, with the defeat of Savage, but on the other hand it is only part of the larger story. 

This may be a little nitpick, but it has been bothering me so I’ll pose the question.  At the end, Superman and the others discuss Bruce and his determination to accomplish whatever he wants.  To me, that fits the character, so it makes sense.  But in this issue they are specifically talking about Bruce finding a way back to the 21st Century.  Exactly how did Bruce manage to leave the caveman time to get to the next time period?  What did Bruce do to get there?  Because, as I read the scene, it seemed like it just happened, without anything that was done on Bruce’s part.  Where does determination fit into the scenario Bruce jumping around in time?  Is it simply his ability to survive and not connected to the time jumps, at all.  Or it might have something to do with his actions in each time period.  He needs the determination to fulfill some task (like defeating Savage’s tribe) and once that is done he will jump forward.  I guess we will see. 

 

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