On my second read, I think what people overlook about this book and this series is the fact that Bruce and Damian's relationship is the main plot, as Peter J. Tomasi himself tells us in the afterword. Nobody, a brilliant new villain from Bruce's training days, is the subplot which serves as a background upon which the two Waynes (and Alfred) play out their complex emotions. And their emotions, their fears and dreams, are as dark as the night in which they fight and bloody themselves.Patrick Glea...

Whoa, I REALLY enjoyed this. So Damien is a interesting character (he's tied for my number 2 Robin with Tim.) but but thing I really liked here was just the breakdown of his relationship with Bruce. I enjoyed Damien's time with Dick but he was different with dick. He viewed him as a brother, or partner, not a father or leader. So seeing Damien readjust to it all, to follow his father's lead, is both interesting and actually really funny at times cause Damien the king of burns. I love watching th...

(B+) 78% | GoodNotes: It retells Eden: where Robin defies the father, falls to temptation, wakes to mortality, and in sin knows good and evil.

Duuuuude. One of the best gn’s I’ve read in a while. Tomasi is quickly becoming one of my favorite creators.

This week with the Shallow Comic Readers Buddy read: Batman!It's been a couple years since I read this first volume of the New 52 Batman & Robin series. I remember really liking this book, especially as I didn't have a lot of exposure to Damian Wayne outside of a few issues of Batman, Inc. Years ago I had the OGN where Batman and Talia meet and have their child, but for many years it wasn't considered canon, and I had forgotten about it.My initial take on this still stands. It's rather refreshin...

Uh oh, Peter J. Tomasi and Patrick Gleason went and wrote my second-favorite New 52 series so far! Between this and Scott Snyder's Batman, there's a lot of killer Bat stories in this "new universe" or whatever they're calling it.The thing that makes this one work, and that is lacking from pretty much every other New 52 series I've read so far, is its devotion to character relationships. Yes, there's a supervillain coming after Batman, but that feels very much like a subplot here. Instead, we're

It's a good story, but Damien takes about 20 steps backward in the personal growth department. He had matured so much while working with Grayson, that it was a bit of a let down. Instead of having his trademark cool-under-pressure (read: scariest ten year old alive) persona, he's back to stomping his foot like a bratty little boy when he doesn't get his way. *sigh*Oh well.So right off the bat this Nobody character targets Batman through his Russian counterpart (or at least I assumed he was from

Well, it was okay, I guess. There is a consistency to the book that I appreciated: no fill-in artwork, no crossovers, no overambitious storytelling techniques. Patrick Gleason’s clean, heavily inked high-contrast artwork looked pretty solid to me—a bit like Mike Mignola’s, even. I also appreciated the attempt to tell a superhero story that does not just move from one action scene to the next, though I can’t say I found the story’s reflections on fatherhood and crime-fighting methods all that fas...

This is interesting as we get to see Batman as a real father. Damian is his DNA child and Damian get up under one of Batman's enemies. Damian is much like his father. He is angry and restless for a fight and he is only 10 years old. He doesn't have the impulse control that his dad does. Damian does kill someone. The whole book is this debate about the use of killing someone to stop them verses not crossing that line. It works pretty well that way. This is the Damian who goes on to lead Teen Tita...

I spent the last two weeks reading and individually reviewing the eight issues that composed this magnificent first volume. It had been an amazing journey for me to examine and discuss the character arc progress between Bruce Wayne (Batman) and his son Damian (Robin) which is the most important thing that writer Peter J. Tomasi himself emphasized throughout the issues. As for the villain NoBody, he explained in an afterword (his very own story proposal that he submitted to the company) that it w...

In this book Bruce Wayne is the Batman of Gotham with his son Damien as Robin; Dick Grayson has gone back to being Nightwing, and there’s no mention of Batman Inc. The book explores Bruce and Damien’s complex relationship as Bruce struggles to be a father to a son who’s had a very unusual upbringing, and Damien fights conflicting ideologies: the conditioning of the Al’Ghul’s bloodiness or the Dark Knight’s code of honour.Though there is the obligatory villain to defeat (a guy with a robot spider...

I feel like I'll never like a Batman comic again. After the shitshow that was Batman v Superman, I could never look at the character the same way. Now, instead of a cool hero, I only see an ugly, Ben Affleck-shaped grown up idiot in a stupid suit whose whole personality is based around the fact that his parents are dead. After that damn movie I slowly started to lose interest in DC in general, and Batman in particular. I sold all of my Batman comics and never really had the urge to pick up anoth...

I hovered between a 3 and a 4. There's nothing wrong with this book, exactly. I've just read better books about Bruce and Damian's relationship. I really like the chemistry Damian has with the Batfam. He's a little brother to Tim, Cass and Dick. (And probably Jay as well but I haven't really read them interacting). He's a son/grandson to Alfred who seems to have the least expectations for Damian and just accepts him as he is. I think their relationship is really great because it highlights the p...

Issue #1 -- Batman and Robin begins, and we get our first New 52 taste of the latest (fifth) Robin -- Damian Wayne (this time the son of Bruce Wayne and Talia al Ghul) -- in action with his father. It's the first issue of the title in the New 52 relaunch, so there is some vague subplot leading to something big for the title's future, but this is mostly a character piece wherein Bruce tries to exorcise the demons of his parents' murder in a moment of potential bonding with his cold, calculating,

Once I picked this up, I realized that I had read it already. Not sure when, not sure where. And no clue whether I had finished it or not.But just in case, I read it through again. This is still a really good story. I'm not certain of the entire chronology and back story, but it goes something like: at least twelve years ago, Batman discovers a new supervillain - Ras al Ghul, the "Demon's Head". Ras respects the Batman's strength, intelligence and prowess. Ras has a daughter and (in the chronolo...

THIS WAS SO GOOD!Damian and Bruce team up like always and you can see the discord growing between them as one doesn't trust the other but when Morgan Ducard aka Nobody comes in and starts attacking them and his life unravels and Damian seems to give in to his dark nature, will Bruce be able to save his son? What is his history with Nobody? And also whose side will Damian turn? Can nurture overtake nature? Its an intriguing book and shows Bruce as a dad and that for sure was a great status quo ch...

A book about fathers and sons, specifically Bruce Wayne and his son Damian, who has just entered his life at age 10, and the disreputable Henri and Morgan Ducard, who have their own issues Morgan killed his own Mom as a kid. Not the kind of guy I'd take advice from, Damian..Damian Wayne, the titular Robin, is not a very likeable character, so I felt myself rooting for Bruce to find a way to deal with this unmanageable little psycho as opposed to getting behind Damian and his own journey.Morgan D...

3.5 starsDamian Wayne, our new Robin, is in the middle of a high-stakes tug-of-war contest between his Batdad and a vengeful (is there any other kind?) former colleague from Bruce Wayne's salad days known as 'NoBody.' Taut and efficient suspense story, with loyal Alfred - dependable as always - being the only other major character. A bone-cracking, muscle-aching , explosion-filled little saga.

Eh...Okay, first problem with a "DC reboot" is that they don't really reboot some things.If we're talking reboot, I think we'd be talking about a Batman with a Robin. Perhaps, PERHAPS a Batman, a Robin, and a Dick Grayson Nightwing. That's about as far as I'm willing to go.I'm not really willing to go so far as to entertain the idea of Batman having a son with the daughter of one of his worst enemies FOR SOME REASON, a son who was raised to be a killer FOR SOME REASON, and FOR SOME REASON Batman...

I was very pleased with this. I knew ahead of time what was involved, based on other readers' reviews, and what drove me to it was the story had an emotional core to it. This takes place during the time when Bruce is Batman again and his son Damian has taken over the Robin mantle. What sets this apart from most other stories during that time period is that it takes a hard look at their relationship. In real life, it's already a big adjustment to try and start raising a 10-year old soon you never...