“Batman and Robin, Volume 1: Born to Kill”

“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 ends up with the son and FOR SOME REASON decides to make him Robin.

FOR SOME REASON, though this is cute and all, the father/son thing isn’t all that great. And to call it a reboot is kind of unfair to readers.

Even if I could get past all that, I couldn’t get past the dialogue. Every character sounds like an Englishman narrating a travelogue through the Wonder of the World.

Examples:

Robin: “You can’t just build a boat and hope darkness magically sails away in it.” Yeah, nothing I love more than a smartass punk. It’s too bad that Fred Savage is too old to play this Robin in the movie version. Or maybe Kirk Cameron, who is also too old. And bizarre.

Batman: “We’ll go topside when I say we go topside, not a second before.” Roight! You’ll get the porridge you get, not a mouthful more!

Thugs:
Thug 1: “Then tell our dimwitted brother to get it together!”
Thug 2: “Robbie, tell Reggie to stop yelling at me!”
Thug 3: “Remind me next time to simply shoot you both.”
The good news is that these chaps should get along just fine in prison.

I know that comic books don’t always traffic in reality. And that the dialogue isn’t always well-represented by reading it out loud. But when you have Batman, his pre-adolescent son, and three punks all talking the same way, the reading gets tough. “