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| All-Star Batman & Robin, The Boy Wonder, Vol. 1 | 
 enlarge | Author: Frank Miller
Creator: Jim Lee
Publisher: DC Comics
Category: Book
List Price: $24.99
Buy New: $13.11
You Save: $11.88 (48%)
New (45) Used (17) from $13.00
Avg. Customer Rating:  46 reviews
Sales Rank: 61695
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 240
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 10.5 x 6.9 x 0.6
ISBN: 1401216811
Dewey Decimal Number: 741.5973
EAN: 9781401216818
ASIN: 1401216811
Publication Date: July 8, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 One of the Best I Ever Read September 7, 2008
0 out of 4 found this review helpful
Not sure why there are bad reviews, but then, there are bad reviews for The Dark Knight Returns! What the heck is that about? Well, I guess some people just cannot see Batman as something else and have the old Batman in their minds as the definitive Batman. This book is consistent with TDKR and Batman is still an outcast (The Dark Knight) hated by cops, public, and JLA. This story continues where Year One left off and tells the story of Robin and his origin - possibly one of the best Robin origins ever told down to why he calls himself Robin. Gordon makes a brief cameo but some other great cameos include Vicky Vale, Wonder Woman, Superman, Green Lantern, Plastic Man, and Black Canary. If you enjoy Miller's Year One and TDKR, you will love this book. His writing is at its grittiest and action-packed and really goes with Lee's illustrations which are just absolutely amazing. His pictures really help set the dark tone and mood of Miller's story-telling and I was just totally in a trance reading this book. Possibly the best drawing of Wonder Woman I ever saw, she's totally hot here. Highly recommended for Miller Dark Knight fans.
... September 27, 2008
0 out of 5 found this review helpful
imagine batman the way it's supposed to be written
and the drawings are amazing.
jim lee and frank miller ... perfecto!
 Disappointing November 9, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book just makes Batman seem like a jerk, not hardcore. It also contradicts many other parts of the Batman continuity. Dare I say that both Miller and Lee were arrogant with their approach. They thought that we would buy and like this storyline just because of the names on the cover. When one sees Miller or Lee we have come to expect great storys and artwork. The artwork was good, but since these books are usually collaborative efforts, they are both to blame for this utterly disappointing effort. I hope we see some new material from both of them so they can redeem themselves.
Insane and Wildly Entertaining November 13, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book is absolutely insane, and I loved it!
What we have here is a Batman story free of any previous or current continuity. Writer Frank Miller is taking Batman and starting his story from scratch. (Or is he? More on that later.)
The Batman in this storyline is testosterone fueled, immature, and more than a little nutty. Miller takes him so over the top that I really and truly hope the writer is poking fun at his previous incarnations of the characters and his previous, ultraviolent works such as Sin City and 300. The fact that both Batman and most other characters in the book refer to him as "the g--d--n Batman" can only lead me to believe Miller didn't want us taking this too seriously.
However, Miller is also proving a point. We'd always heard that Batman needed a Robin to take the edge off the man--to bring him back to humanity. However, as a Batman fan of over twenty-five years, I'd never really seen an incarnation of the character that had him in DIRE need of a humanizing sidekick. That is, until now. Miller's All-Star Batman is a whack-job, and it's only through his dealings with Dick Grayson that he slowly begins to realize he's turned into a monster. Despite all the sex and violence in the book, Miller actually does a wonderful job evolving Batman's character--there is real character development taking place that is rarely seen in the comic book medium.
And because this is an all-star title, the artist must be as equally as big a star--enter Jim Lee. Jim Lee has always been a mesmerizing artist, but he truly outdoes himself with All-Star Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder. His figures look amazing--as always--but the settings are what really blew me away. His attention to detail is nearly genius-level, and I found myself studying every building in the skyline, every poster on the wall, every tread on a tire. He is absolutely astonishing.
So while I'm glad this book isn't the definitive and mainstream interpretation of the character, I am so glad we have this Batman as well. I couldn't put the book down. It was ludicrously fun and breathtaking to look at and had me addicted within the first few minutes of reading it.
Now, if you'll allow me a slight digression: Does anyone else think this is a prequel of sorts to The Dark Knight Returns? As I started reading it, I noticed some thematic links between All-Star Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder and The Dark Knight Returns, as well as The Dark Knight Strikes Again. This is nothing unusual with writers, many of them tend to have certain passions that they return to (consciously or not) in their work.
However, as I continued reading, things began to seem like more than just coincidence. For example, in the huge spread from Episode 4, doesn't that look like the Dark Knight Returns Batmobile being built? Also, we clearly see the cover to The Dark Knight Returns collected edition as a poster on Barbara Gordon's wall in Episode 6. The Wonder Woman design in Episode 5 is very similar to the Wonder Woman in The Dark Knight Strikes Again, as his her basic personality and attraction to Superman. I would also argue that Superman, Plastic Man, Green Lantern, and Jim Gordon all seem tonally the same as they are in The Dark Knight Returns and The Dark Knight Strikes Again.
But, the real cinchers for me occurred first in Episode 8 where the Joker's henchwoman was the same lady with the swastikas covering her nipples (wow, there's a sentence I never thought I'd construct) as from The Dark Knight Returns: Book Three.
And then, the big one--the HUGE one--happened in Episode 9 where Batman tells Green Lantern, "Of course we're criminals. We've always been criminals. We have to be criminals." Now compare that to Superman's internal dialogue from The Dark Knight Returns: Book Three, which was written roughly twenty years earlier: "When the noise started from the parents' groups and the subcommittee called us in for questioning - - you were the one who laughed ... that scary laugh of yours ... `Sure we're criminals,' you said. `We've always been criminals. We have to be criminals.'"
In my estimation, it seems Frank Miller is using All-Star Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder to build upon his mythos originated in The Dark Knight Returns, and I think that's both incredibly entertaining.
Of course, if I'm right, knowing what we know about the end of The Dark Knight Strikes Again certainly makes his developing relationship with Dick Grayson seem bittersweet.
~Scott William Foley, author of Souls Triumphant
 Great series, but with a few drawbacks. November 27, 2008
Sure, Batman acts like a complete jerk in this, and it does feel a little more like Sin City than Batman. Granted. But if you can set aside your bias against a slightly crazy Batman, this series has a TON to offer. Jim Lee's art alone makes it worth staring at for hours (best art of his career, I think... BETTER than Hush). On top of that, issue 9 is one of the best Batman/Robin stories EVER (up there with Death in the Family). His interactions with Green Lantern are classic, and that Sin City edge actually fits very nicely in the Gotham Universe when it isn't overdone.
I think there are only two things that I can legitimately complain about in this series: (1)Overuse of repetition... it can really get annoying when every other word in the sentence is "goddamn", and (2)yeah, Batman is an a-hole, which is only slightly redeemed by the fact that he has very well written personal struggles and issues throughout.
Overall, a great series with a few drawbacks, highly recommended.
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