Batman's A Scientist

    This is a short one, well, more of a long recommendation. As you know, I love comic books and superheroes, and all of that stuff. I love Batman, and there have been some great comic book one-off series about Batman. What I mean about that, is there are short, 10 to 12 issues that tell a story, and then it's done. It's like a season of a TV show where there are 22 to 24 episodes telling one story, and then the next season, they have a different story. 

    There is one new Batman series that it interesting to me, but I wanted to start off with a Simpsons quote, because you know me, I love The Simpsons, and this is a quote from my favorite episode, Marge vs. the Monorail, (It's in season four and available on Disney+. 

(Homer is on a speeding monorail that he is the conductor of, and the brakes have gone out.)

Marge:  Homer, I have someone here to help you.

Homer: Is it Batman?

Marge: No, it's a scientist.

Homer: Batman's a scientist.

Marge: (Angrily) IT'S NOT BATMAN!

    So, when Batman was created by Bob Crane back in the 1930s, Batman was more of a scientist/investigator, as well as a hero trying to save his city. Over the years, most Batman stories had Batman going out, and fighting bad guys, and the scientist stories were kind of weeded out. What is interesting, is that in the 1966 Adam West Batman series, which I love so much, has Batman in the Batcave in almost every episode doing science stuff, or solving crimes using detective work, and then to the fighting. 

    There is a newer Batman series out now called Batman: The Detective. It starts out in the future, and Bruce Wayne is getting older, and he feels that the only people he really saved in Gotham City directly were safe, but thousands of people have died, due to criminals. So, he decides to go to London, with a new, younger partner, and he becomes a crime scene investigator, and does detective work. He still fights, in fact, in the first issue, spoiler warning, he fights a ghost using a pair of gloves John Constantine had, but gave to Batman. If you don't know who John Constantine is, he's a hero that protects the world from demons, or other monsters from Hell or other dimensions. NBC had a 13 episode series for Constantine, That was fantastic, but ultimately canceled, unfortunately, because it had great stories and special effects were awesome.

    Anywho, back to Batman, The series starts out with an airplane crash in England, and it turns out that every passenger on the plane was personally saved by Batman, and a new criminal gang is trying to make sure those, and others directly saved by Batman die, defeating all of Batman's work. Bruce then leaves Gotham City for England, where the plane crash was, and starts to investigate and do scientific research to find the people responsible for it, and bring them to justice. The story started out strong, and it's interesting. Don't get me wrong, Batman still fights a little, but it has more to do with his scientist and detective side. 

    Then, there's one that is based in Gotham City, but 97% about Batman called Gotham By Midnight. This is one I don't recommend for kids. It's more of a horror comic book story. It's about Gotham's Precinct 13, where the detectives deal with evil entities. Battles Batman couldn't win. Batman does show up in the first issue with some pictures that help the precinct, but then his is gone. Some of the crew have supernatural abilities, some are psychics, and some are just normal police officers. However the story centers around a normal detective who has been assigned to Precinct 13 by the main precinct building, basically to pull their funding, and shut the precinct down. However, when a new, scary supernatural things start happening, the precinct makes sure to send their new "Captain" what they do, which of course scares the living heck out of him, and the precinct is saved. 

    I know there were a couple of spoilers in that synopsis, but if like scary stories, and ones that happen in a familiar place, Gotham By Midnight be right up your alley, but I like I say, this one isn't really for kids. You know, the whole comic book scene isn't what it was when they started in the early 1900s, and tons of comics from all sorts of places and genres usually have some kind of comic book. I bought my dad an awesome Baseball comic book from two years before he was born, and it's so cool. I guess what I am trying to say is that the comic book scene has changed. They aren't all about superheroes, and written for kids. There is a huge selection of different story genres out there. I have talked about Usagi Yojimbo, probably my all-time favorite comic book series, and it's about a Rabbit Samurai that is incredible. There is just a lot of stuff out there. The internet is so great when it comes to comics. There are tons of sites that are like Wiki websites that you can read the histories of comic books and their characters, and then some sites will say, well, Moon Knight has been around for almost 40 years, but if you want to learn and catch up, they post reading lists to get you all caught up, without having to read a boat load full of comic book issues to learn everything about them. 

    Anywho, I guess this post was longer than I thought it would be. You know what I always say, be safe, be smart, be healthy, and with what is going on with Russia and Ukraine is at war, and I would suggest saying prayers for all of the innocent people to be safe. War sucks, and the war between the two is awful, and we need a lot of good things in the world to turn tides and make the world safe and happy.  

    With that said, I will end this blog post right about...................................................................................................................................................................................................................Now!