"WHO DIES FOR THE MANIKIN?"
Writer Gerry Conway | Artists: Don Newton & Steve Mitchell
Letterer: Ben Oda | Colorist: Adrienne Roy | Editor: Dick Giordano
The Plot: Ten months ago, Batman arrives at the scene of an auto wreck. He pulls the car's lone occupant free, but she is horrifically burnt and rushed to the Gotham Burn Center. In the present day, Bruce Wayne watches the news and then prepares for a night out. He and his date, Crystal, arrive at the trendy Studio 52 nightclub, where a woman strides in and murders fashion designer Kevin Clane in front of the club patrons. Bruce follows her out the back door and changes into Batman, then confronts her in an alleyway. But the woman disrobes to reveal herself as a golden "Manikin" and easly subdues Batman with super-strength. A mystery accomplice then helps Manikin escape.
Batman takes Manikin's discarded dress to Selina Kyle for identification. Selina tells him that the dress is the handiwork of one of Gotham's greatest designers, Mister Hoston. Batman heads to Hoston's office and as they speak, the place is firebombed. Batman gets Hoston out into his showroom, where he is attacked again by Manikin. As flames spread out of the office and into the showroom, Manikin again subdues Batman and then goes after Hoston.
Continuity Notes: As Bruce watches the news, he tells Alfred that he wants to catch up on what's been going on in Gotham while he was in Alaska last issue. He sees a debate between mayoral candidates Arthur Reeves and Hamilton Hill, with the former accusing Batman of unchecked vigilantism and promising to bring him to justice, while Hill is more interested in a recent spike in police shootings, for which he plans to demand Commissioner Gordon's resignation if elected. (And again, in today's climate, it feels kind of weird that the story wants us to root
against Hill over this!)
Bruce mentions that he had thought when Rupert Thorne was committed to Arkham in DETECTIVE #477, politics in Gotham might have become "cleaner". Why is Gerry Conway referencing a random plotline from three years earlier which has never been mentioned since? Because Thorne is due for a big comeback as his run moves along!
Studio 52 is of course based on the legendary Studio 54 nightclub in New York. We also learn this issue that Gotham is a major player in the fashion world, with "Seventh Avenue" cited as the location of its big name designers (as opposed to Fifth Avenue in New York).
Selina, the once-and-future Catwoman, is irked that Batman has tracked her down after she told him she wanted some space following the events of BATMAN 335, but he assures her that he only did it because he needs her help. (And honestly, if she truly wanted to hide from him, why did she stay in Gotham?? Her final scene in that same BATMAN issue suggested she planned on taking a long trip or something.)
My Thoughts: I'd call this an all-around good issue. Conway is back in form with lots of sub-plot scenes and continuity notes, and it's all wrapped up in (so far) a pretty good mystery story. I mean, it's obvious that the woman from the car accident ten months ago must be Mannikin, or somehow related to her, or we would not have been provided with that scene to open the story. The question, however, is -- how? Next issue should answer that, and I assume there's a twist.
But more exciting is the fact that we can see more of the "Conway Run" taking shape here. Up to this point, the only sub-plot we've had has been the mayoral race between Reeves and Hill. And while that's still very much on the front-burner, we also have more. The return of the apparently reformed Selina Kyle is welcome, as she will go on to a prominent role as part of a love triangle in Conway's stories.
And the most thrilling element of the issue, to me, anyway, is the mention of Rupert Thorne. I love that guy. I fully admit that my affection for the character is informed massively by his appearances on BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES, where he was a gangster rather than a city councilman, and where he was voiced brilliantly by the late John Vernon. But I noted when I looked at the Steve Englehart/Marshall Rogers DETECTIVE COMICS run some years back that I felt Thorne's arc came to a perfunctory and somewhat unsatisfactory conclusion -- so I'm quite excited to see Conway revisit the character and do a lot more with him (as with Selina, Thorne will become a recurring character in the upcoming run).
All I hope now is that we have no more false starts, and that Conway's run will continue at this level, with no more sub-par one-offs, for the duration.
I assume that in Conway’s DCU, Willie Jowell’s popular song “Big-Timer” goes
ReplyDelete“They were all impressed with your Hoston dress /
And the people that you knew at Eileen’s” …
That seems totally appropriate to me! Conway subs in a lot of little things in that vein throughout this run, so I wouldn't be surprised.
DeleteIn all seriousness, and I think I discuss this more in an upcoming post, I don't think I've ever seen anyone lean so hard into the "Gotham is New York" conceit as Conway does in this run. His Gotham is quite clearly New York City with the serial numbers filed off, as they say. It's right next to the Hudson River across from New Jersey, locations in upstate New York are referenced somewhat regularly... I think in Conway's DCU, Gotham simply exists where New York would be normally.
It's actually kind of odd to me that DC has Gotham, Metropolis, and the actual New York City all existing together. I'm sure there must some kind of official DC Atlas or something that shows where they all are in relation to each other. I should try to find it, because I'm curious.
I'm a strong believer that when DC has the likes of Gotham and Metropolis, they don't need New York also. The fake cities are a huge part of DC's charm, and something is lost when real cities are thrown into the mix.
One thing that I never liked in NEW TEEN TITANS was the inclusion of New York City there. Wolfman and Perez should've come up with a new city, or even just placed Titans' Tower in Metropolis or something.
I liked when John Byrne had Superman meet the Titans in ACTION COMICS #584 and didn't name the city they were in. He calls it "the biggest city in the nation" and things like that, but never outright names it. At the time I wrote about that issue, I noted that I was confused by the obfuscation, but now I've come to realize that Byrne probably didn't like the idea of New York existing in the DCU either, and so kept the location vague. Readers of NEW TEEN TITANS could assume it to be New York, while anyone else could imagine it's Metropolis if they wanted.
DeleteDC’s in-house fanzine in the ’70s rather startlingly gave states for most of the fictional cities and in the ’80s, post-Crisis, there was indeed an official Atlas of the DC Universe handbook tied to the DC Heroes role-playing game. I can’t get to my copies of those right now but I believe that both had Metropolis in Delaware and Gotham City in southern New Jersey mapped over the area where I spent my childhood; Smallville was in Maryland according to that fanzine, by the way, ere John Byrne took his cue from the 1978 film and moved it out to Kansas. My personal headcanon adheres to those publications, with the DC Universe’s greatest city situated appropriately in the First State, but later post-Crisis stories definitely at minimum suggested that Metropolis is in New York.
Fascinating -- Metropolis in Delaware and Smallville in Maryland puts them really close together! I remember watching Smallville back in the day, and finding it odd that the show presented the two as being seemingly only a few hours' drive apart. Perhaps the creators were going off of Bronze Age mapping -- though I'm pretty certain Smallville was established as being in Kansas in the show, so that would've put Metropolis someplace in the middle of the country, too!
Delete
DeleteAs the Superboy feature progressed, Smallville went from being decidedly rural to rather suburban and it was clearly positioned near Metropolis — I recall that in the Legion of Super-Heroes’ future, pre-Crisis, Metropolis was said to have swallowed up Smallville within its expanded city limits. Superman: The Movie placing Smallville in the Midwest while Metropolis remained a clear stand-in for New York City, and Smallville’s relocation to Kansas post-Crisis while Metropolis remained on the East Coast, did in fact oddly result in Metropolis being moved in Kansas on Smallville when the show decided to put Smallville back in the city’s orbit.
I’ve confirmed the placement of Metropolis in Delaware and Gotham City in New Jersey per both The Amazing World of DC Comics and Mayfair’s The Atlas of the DC unvierse, by the way.