Batman: Turning Points has its problems. Greg Rucka trying to write in Frank Miller's Year One style is atrocious and both Ed Brubaker and Chuck Dixon get saddled with generally useless issues. Brubaker writes two issues and his first one is a fun tribute to 1960s Batman, but his second one is so forgettable--well, I had to think really hard about it. Dixon's is also blah and the problem is with the content--Brubaker's second issue deals with the dead Robin and the shot Batgirl and Dixon's deals with the Batman replacement guy who was running around in the mid-1990s, after DC realized what a cash cow (from killing Superman) messing up their characters could be. The last issue, also written by Rucka has no lame pseudo-Year One narration and it's actually pretty damn good. It's cheerful and lamely completes a narrative loop back to the first issue, which this type of series often does, but there was something pleasant about it. So pleasant, shockingly, I'm actually hunting down Greg Rucka comics, something I never thought I'd do again....
The nicest part about the comic--and probably why DC is finally collecting it in a trade--is the art. The first issue is Steve Lieber, who mimics David Mazzucchelli but somehow doesn't capture the iconic aspect from Year One, which is fine. The art is certainly not the problem with that first issue (the problem is Rucka's constant underlining for emphasis). The second issue and the third issue, though they have different styles, just kind of gel together. Not really--Joe Giella's art in the second issue is fun, but Dick Giordano's in the third is lazy and somewhat ugly, even if it is competent. The Chuck Dixon issue has Brent Anderson art and Anderson does a beautiful job, absolutely beautiful. But the last issue is the best, because it's Paul Pope, and Pope has a great time with it. He's got Batman swinging hands with a little kid, smiling and cheerful. Rucka's writing of the scene is, obviously, over-melodramatic, but there's just something about it... it engages with Batman as a character who's the reader's possession (the experience of reading Batman comic books making him so), not a corporate icon. Not a figure on notebooks or really dumb kids' Valentine's cards.
Because the story's set over ten years, haphazardly, the whole thing is certainly not essential reading. The first Brubaker and the last Rucka are both quite good, but then again, passing up Steve Lieber Batman art just seems wrong and the Anderson stuff is beautiful. I also like the concept behind the series--it's a Batman comic and it's supposed to make you happy at the end. Usually these things are supposed to make you... I don't know, I don't read Batman comics today, but they certainly aren't supposed to make you enjoy yourself.
