Batman: Year One

by Frank Miller & David Mazzuccelli
DC Comics, 1997

There are few really, really good Batman stories. This is one of those. This is basically an origin story as told by Frank Miller (Sin City, 300), and beautifully illustrated by David Mazuchelli.

The story was first published as a serialized comic in 1987, but the last time I read it as a collection a few years back, it was still as captivating as ever. The collection remains in print today, 20 years after the story was first published.

Although this is a super-hero book, perhaps a more apt description would be that this is a crime noir tale. This is also a tamer Miller, without the sex & violence found in Sin City, but that does not mean the story is an all ages tale. Rather, the tone seems aimed at a more mature reader.

Along with Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns; Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale's trilogy : The Long Halloween, Dark Victory and Haunted Knight and Grant Morrison & Dave McKean's Arkham Asylum, this is one of those most critically acclaimed Batman tales ever published (IMHO). This was also the story that partly influenced the latest Batman movie, Batman Begins.