Batman Knightfall 1

As the new Batman movie rises to fame in the theaters, fans from all over, new and old, are interested in reading, or re-reading, the story that inspired the movie itself. Spanning Batman 491-500 and Detective Comics 659-666, Knightfall follows Batman in his quest to stop Bane, and Batman's subsequent defeat and approval of his replacement. This new version of the Knightfall TPB starts off with the Vengeance of Bane Special #1 in which you learn of Bane's past at the Santa Prisca prison and his hatred for a caped crusader he's never met and the desire to rule a town he's never been to. Fast-forward to Batman #491 and Detective Comics #659 and we bounce around between those two series as Batman and Robin are forced to deal with Bane's prison escape, and Bane's hand at letting everyone in Arkham Asylum out loose in Gotham. As chaos ensues, Batman (already in bad shape , is forced to mop up and take everyone he can in as quickly as possible before the kill count rises any more. However, it all leads to Batman #497 where Bane's evil plan to break the bat comes to its peak. The evil mastermind of crime takes advantage of Batman's sheer lack of strength and energy and uses it to break him and show the people of Gotham that Batman is no more. As Bane finally gets a hold on Batman, Gotham goes into a frenzy as crime shoots through the roof and the police are unable to handle it.We learn in Showcase '93 #7-8 of Batman's attempt at bringing Harvey Dent back into the Asylum prior to his encounter with Bane, and in Batman: Shadow of the Bat #16-18, we learns of Scarecrow's origins and his grand scheme that puts the new Batman, formerly Azrael, in charge of cleaning up the mess that Bane has created. However, Jean-Paul's Batman doesn't have time for sidekicks and he surely doesn't have time to hold back on the murderers and thugs of Gotham.One of Batman's greatest stories ever told is reprinted here in a more complete volume that spans over 600 pages! Although you get a whole mess of content to read through, you're still left wondering who in the world this Azrael guy is and why Bruce is messed up already as you're barely into the first issue. Also, you get no introduction to Azrael's partners nor an origin to Bane's venom toxin. However, you do get a lot of content that makes the story fairly easy to follow despite the few missing links. The art's consistently nice aside from perhaps the Two-Face and Scarecrow story arcs. The writing is superb with every page making you want to keep it turning and the eventual breaking of the Batman as powerful an image as ever. This is definitely a story to read even if you just jumped into the New 52 era of Batman. Seeing Jean-Paul become Batman makes you start to hate him as he turns more and more into a villain instead of a Batman-clone. His desire to take over what Bruce has becomes a scary reality to what Tim Drake has to face while Bruce is confined to a wheelchair. However, the entire book really makes you think about what Gotham would be if Batman were to suddenly cease to exist and how easily a maniac like Bane could take over.The book comes with all the comic covers as well as the Batman #500 variant and the Knightfall TPB covers as well. So, there isn't a whole lot of extras but they're there. Overall, definitely a book to get for a classic story!

Talking about the product, it was such a fantastic purchase, it came in magnificent condition, the printing is good, and of course, the comic itself is a masterpiece from the Batman lore.Despite being a printed version with newspaper material, it is a good product and highly recommended.

Batman: knightfall is the first story that the villain Bane ever appeared in, and boy did he make an impression! he was so good in this story that he is a villain in 2 live action batman movies, there are a WHOLE lot of villains that batman fights in this story but none are ever as intimidating or as powerful as Bane. so in this book a drug junkie named Bane and his gang of crackheads break the most insane villains out of arkham asylum, and Batman spends half the book chasing them down, but we find out that batman is sick during this time and is pushing himself beyond his own limits. as the story progresses you see batman get more, and more, sluggish, he isn't sleeping, he's sick and not taking medicine, and he's getting beaten to a pulp every night. each battle (and there's like 20) you see batman just BARELY come out on top, and once Batman was the weakest he's ever been, bane shows up in his house and he BREAKS THE BAT. after that this book gets depressing, Batman is totally broken and done, robin is treated like crap by everyone, and jean Paul valley becomes the new Batman and while he DOES beat Bane he's not a good Batman and robin can tell, i'm guessing in vol 2 bruce takes the mantle of the bat back. anyways that was the story 4/5 its good anyways now lets talk about BANE. bane is the polar opposite of bruce wayne, but yet so similar, bruce grew up alone in a mansion, bane grew up alone in prison for the sins of his father. Bane was locked in the deepest hole in a prison that was basically hell where he spent ten years, in that time he became extremely spiritual and he trained every day and became huge. after the ten years he emerged from his hole and gained the respect of his prisonmates. but while he was down there he dreampt only of killing a Bat that haunts his dreams, and once he heard about batman he immediately broke out and headed towards gotham. the man was MADE to break the bat. and then he took a drug called venom that gave him superhuman strength."You Will Know My Name One Day. And On That Day, You Will Beg For Mercy." -Bane 1993