Gotham Central
As anyone who knows me will attest, I'm a big Batman fan. Going into my local comic book shop, Page 45 in Nottingham, I was often enticed by the likes of Gotham Central. This was a book set in the Batman universe that dealt, almost exclusively, with the men and women of the Gotham City Police Department. The artwork was quite stylised, not as pretty as some, but worthy - all the same, it put me off a little as I tend to go for shiny over dour (a mistake I'm often regretting).
One afternoon, though, I bit the bullet and ponied up the cash for Book One: In the Line of Duty, a rather fetching hard cover graphic novel. Within the first few pages, I was hooked. Gotham PD were called out to a kidnapping case that had gone cold, and two of the detectives working the case were working after hours on a tip that could break it. The denouement of a scene in which the cops are hammering on the door of a crummy apartment in a rough end (rougher end? - It's all pretty bleak) of Gotham is none other than Mr Freeze appearing in said apartment and turning one of the detectives into a copcicle.
The guy is dead, no question - especially when Freeze callously shatters him all over the floor (imagine the CSI's rolling up to that when the parts had thawed out...), and makes his getaway with the cop in shock. What impressed me most about this opening was that it then when on to deal with his partners grief about the death of the detective. It showed a very convincing, working police department in a city populated by freaks in mask (including the vigilante who helped the cops put said freaks behind bars) and the realities of being a police (to use a GCPD term) in such a city.
It's Gotham Centrals police procedural side, amalgamated with the Batman mythos that makes it so appealing. I love the the US drama series Crime Scene Investigation, and read Crime novels voraciously, so with my love of the Bat, this was a perfect choice for me.
The stories are taught, edge of the seat stuff. There's depth - it feels like you're reading about real people. Batman surfaces now and again, but it's often just a shadow or a brief glimpse before he's gone, flying across the rooftops on his Bat-line. Essentially, Gotham Central deals with all the stuff that happens when Batman isn't around.
Regular cameos are made by Gotham's villains, aka the 'Rogues Gallery', and this is where the GCPD faces its biggest challenge. I've already mentioned Mr Freeze, but expect to see the Joker, Two-Face, Mad Hatter, Penguin and others involved in the complex and compelling story lines.
There is a lot of heart in these stories, often driven by emotion and the desire of a police force to protect a city under their own steam, without the assistance of a man in a mask. Corruption, of course, is one of the major themes and forms the basis for one of the most shocking and genuinely moving stories within the Gotham Central Pantheon.
In terms of the timeline, it takes place after Commissioner
Gordon has retired and Maggie Sawyer (from Metropolis) is heading up the MCU (Major Crimes Unit). Harvey Bullock is no longer on the force, having been kicked off for a fairly serious indiscretion that is dealt with wonderfully in one of the later volumes (Unresolved Targets). Renee Montoya is still on the GCPD, along with Crispus Allen. There are a host of other GCPD characters, too, broken up into a First and Second Shift. Each book opens, effectively, with a squad roll call so readers can see at a glance who is in what shift and who partners who.
The book is written by Ed Brubaker and Greg Rucka, who was also on the writing team for DCs seminal series 52 (another of my great favourites, that deals with a 'lost year' in the DC universe, post Final Crisis), and features the artistic and pencilling talents of Michael Lark, Stefano Gaudiano and Kano (apologies if I've missed anyone out).
Rucka is a real favourite of mine - he also wrote and adapted the novelisation of No Man's Land - so much so that I named a minor character after him in my Salamander short story Fires of War (see if you can seek him out...).
The series, though a critical success (winning the Eisner and Harvey Award), failed commercially, and so only ran for 40 issues or so. This is the greatest crime associated with the pages of Gotham Central, and this is a wonderful book that was even talked about as a potential TV series I have later learned (let's hope Warners sees sense and gives Rucka and co the greenlight to do it - personally, I'd love to have a crack at writing a few episodes...).
Most the of the issues were compiled within graphic novels, stretching to five books in total. I'd recommend, if you're thinking about taking a look, that you seek them out in this format rather than individual issues as they tend to read better that way (low grade paper stock that comics are often printed from doesn't lend itself too favourably to the muddy art style of the series).
As far as I know, there's only one hard back volume in print as of me writing this entry and that's In the Line of Duty. Check this out first, as it's a great introduction to the series. Be warned, though, that this book actually (and a little confusingly) combines books 1 & 2 of the soft back graphic novels (In the Line of Duty and Half a Life).
For the sake of clarity, here's the running order:
Book 1 - In the Line of Duty (hard back)
Book 2 - Half a Life (find this in the book one hard back)
Book 3 - Unresolved Targets
Book 4 - The Quick and the Dead
Book 5 - Dead Robin
Each book contains three to four separate cases, or stories, that are all linked by the Gotham Central meta-arc. There are about another six or so volumes that have yet to be compiled into a graphic novel, but are stand alone and don't interfere with the plot overarch. For the sake of completeness, these are issues #11, #16-18, #26-27 and #32. They are tricky to get hold off so I'd suggest trying to find them on an auction site.
I really can't sing the praises of Gotham Central enough. This is such a good series and one, if you're a fan of Batman or any police procedural dramas, that you should definitely check out.
One afternoon, though, I bit the bullet and ponied up the cash for Book One: In the Line of Duty, a rather fetching hard cover graphic novel. Within the first few pages, I was hooked. Gotham PD were called out to a kidnapping case that had gone cold, and two of the detectives working the case were working after hours on a tip that could break it. The denouement of a scene in which the cops are hammering on the door of a crummy apartment in a rough end (rougher end? - It's all pretty bleak) of Gotham is none other than Mr Freeze appearing in said apartment and turning one of the detectives into a copcicle.
The guy is dead, no question - especially when Freeze callously shatters him all over the floor (imagine the CSI's rolling up to that when the parts had thawed out...), and makes his getaway with the cop in shock. What impressed me most about this opening was that it then when on to deal with his partners grief about the death of the detective. It showed a very convincing, working police department in a city populated by freaks in mask (including the vigilante who helped the cops put said freaks behind bars) and the realities of being a police (to use a GCPD term) in such a city.It's Gotham Centrals police procedural side, amalgamated with the Batman mythos that makes it so appealing. I love the the US drama series Crime Scene Investigation, and read Crime novels voraciously, so with my love of the Bat, this was a perfect choice for me.
The stories are taught, edge of the seat stuff. There's depth - it feels like you're reading about real people. Batman surfaces now and again, but it's often just a shadow or a brief glimpse before he's gone, flying across the rooftops on his Bat-line. Essentially, Gotham Central deals with all the stuff that happens when Batman isn't around.
Regular cameos are made by Gotham's villains, aka the 'Rogues Gallery', and this is where the GCPD faces its biggest challenge. I've already mentioned Mr Freeze, but expect to see the Joker, Two-Face, Mad Hatter, Penguin and others involved in the complex and compelling story lines.
There is a lot of heart in these stories, often driven by emotion and the desire of a police force to protect a city under their own steam, without the assistance of a man in a mask. Corruption, of course, is one of the major themes and forms the basis for one of the most shocking and genuinely moving stories within the Gotham Central Pantheon.
In terms of the timeline, it takes place after Commissioner
Gordon has retired and Maggie Sawyer (from Metropolis) is heading up the MCU (Major Crimes Unit). Harvey Bullock is no longer on the force, having been kicked off for a fairly serious indiscretion that is dealt with wonderfully in one of the later volumes (Unresolved Targets). Renee Montoya is still on the GCPD, along with Crispus Allen. There are a host of other GCPD characters, too, broken up into a First and Second Shift. Each book opens, effectively, with a squad roll call so readers can see at a glance who is in what shift and who partners who.The book is written by Ed Brubaker and Greg Rucka, who was also on the writing team for DCs seminal series 52 (another of my great favourites, that deals with a 'lost year' in the DC universe, post Final Crisis), and features the artistic and pencilling talents of Michael Lark, Stefano Gaudiano and Kano (apologies if I've missed anyone out).
Rucka is a real favourite of mine - he also wrote and adapted the novelisation of No Man's Land - so much so that I named a minor character after him in my Salamander short story Fires of War (see if you can seek him out...).
The series, though a critical success (winning the Eisner and Harvey Award), failed commercially, and so only ran for 40 issues or so. This is the greatest crime associated with the pages of Gotham Central, and this is a wonderful book that was even talked about as a potential TV series I have later learned (let's hope Warners sees sense and gives Rucka and co the greenlight to do it - personally, I'd love to have a crack at writing a few episodes...).
Most the of the issues were compiled within graphic novels, stretching to five books in total. I'd recommend, if you're thinking about taking a look, that you seek them out in this format rather than individual issues as they tend to read better that way (low grade paper stock that comics are often printed from doesn't lend itself too favourably to the muddy art style of the series).
As far as I know, there's only one hard back volume in print as of me writing this entry and that's In the Line of Duty. Check this out first, as it's a great introduction to the series. Be warned, though, that this book actually (and a little confusingly) combines books 1 & 2 of the soft back graphic novels (In the Line of Duty and Half a Life).
For the sake of clarity, here's the running order:
Book 1 - In the Line of Duty (hard back)
Book 2 - Half a Life (find this in the book one hard back)
Book 3 - Unresolved Targets
Book 4 - The Quick and the Dead
Book 5 - Dead Robin
Each book contains three to four separate cases, or stories, that are all linked by the Gotham Central meta-arc. There are about another six or so volumes that have yet to be compiled into a graphic novel, but are stand alone and don't interfere with the plot overarch. For the sake of completeness, these are issues #11, #16-18, #26-27 and #32. They are tricky to get hold off so I'd suggest trying to find them on an auction site.
I really can't sing the praises of Gotham Central enough. This is such a good series and one, if you're a fan of Batman or any police procedural dramas, that you should definitely check out.
posted by Nick Kyme at
09:18
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home