Bat Kicks and Monkey Fists

What makes Batman such an enduring character? Is it the power fantasy of a supremely capable billionaire boogeyman fighting the good fight and standing up for the little guy? Is it the toyetic nature of his gadgets and armaments? Is it his malleability and openness to interpretation? Since the days of Adam West and the original wave of Batmania, every generation has had their version of the Dark Knight, each reflecting the social mores of its time. Every time Batman falls out of the limelight, a new creative team comes along, be it in comics or on the screen, and shakes things up enough to herd readers and viewers back in droves.

This is kiddie stuff, remember?

What makes Batman such an enduring character? To kids?

He's a ninja, plain and simple. Kids love ninjas. If your kid didn't at least once run around the house and pretend to be a ninja, let's face it, there's something wrong with your kid.



Batman's ninja roots were emphasized in Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins to great effect. It provided an explanation for Batman's tactics and mindset. Portrayed as a deserter to Ra's Al Ghul's League of Shadows, our hero returned to Gotham with all of the ninja's methods, sans the killing. It was an interesting take, borrowing from comics like Shaman, The Man Who Falls, and Year One, but it wasn't the first time Batman's roots as a ninja and martial arts master were front and center in a storyline.

During the 90s epic that was Knightfall, Bruce Wayne suffered a broken back at the hands of his then-nemesis Bane and had to rebuild his body, as well as his spirit. Seeking out the assassin Lady Shiva, Bruce attempts to get his edge back by enduring her cruel tutelage. Shiva's solution was to murder an old master wearing a bat mask and essentially frame Bruce for the crime. The Old Master's students go on the hunt, looking for the killer in the Tengu (Bat) mask. What follows is Bruce regaining what he'd lost by fighting through a brutal gauntlet of martial arts wunderkind.

A few years later, the summer of '98 to be almost exact, Batman would again cross paths with a bevy of ninja assassins in a multi-part storyline entitled, "The Brotherhood of the Fist". This crossover spanned the pages of Detective Comics, Nightwing, Robin, and Green Arrow, and featured the heroes Gotham and Star City becoming embroiled in a war between ninja factions, centering around a new player calling him or herself "Paper Monkey". Nearly every ninja or martial arts-themed character from the DCU appeared in the story in one form or another, even old favorites like Bronze Tiger and Judomaster. It's a jet-setting, globetrotting affair, and Chuck Dixon's sparse scripts leave the exposition and meaningless rabble at the door to make room for plenty of punching and kicking.

Green Arrow, at the time, was not Oliver Queen. His son Conner Hawke had taken up the mantle in his absence. Conner was a visually dynamic Green Arrow who'd been raised to be a fighting machine by monks and never knew his father while he was alive. The mantle of Green Arrow was his only tie to his father and in places like Grant Morrison's JLA, we'd often see young Conner shaking his head in disbelief at the arsenal of trick gimmick arrows his father would use, preferring instead the simplicity and practicality of traditional weaponry.

I wasn't a regular Green Arrow reader at the time, but virtually everything I liked about Batman and Nightwing at the time could be found in that series as well. (Except for maybe the rogues gallery; Green Arrow never had a great cast of villains.) Anyhoo, the first part of Brotherhoof of the Fist passed me by when it hit stands, but when I saw the cover to Detective Comics #723, with Batman and Conner attempting to outrun an avalanche on a snowy mountain, I knew I'd have to backtrack and pick up the first part. A good cover can do that: it can present an entire scene in your mind and get you thinking off the page before you even read the damn thing.

Robin and Nightwing are also roped into the story, being a part of the "Bat-Family" and all. I would get Robin here and there, but Nightwing was always a must-buy for me, mostly because of Scott McDaniel's art. Like I said in my post about Brubaker's Batman run, McDaniel's art isn't for everybody, but in a story about ninjas kicking the shit out of each other, his twisted, acrobatic forms are a nice fit. If this story had come a few years later, I think we'd have seen Cassandra Cain in the Robin role, to be honest.

Oftentimes a crossover like this can fall apart because of dueling narrative voices. Brotherhood of the Fist has the distinct advantage of taking place in four titles that all have the same writer. Dixon's story gets to flow seamlessly from chapter to chapter, and there's none of that awkward overlap you find when Writer B has to pick up where Writer A left off. Dixon is also a writer who knows how to shut up and let an artist tell the story. Whether its Dougie Braithwaite on Green Arrow, Scott McDaniel on Nightwing, or Alex Maleev on Detective Comics, Dixon lets these guys set the pace and make room for as much fisticuffs as possible.

This little five-parter remains uncollected in trade paperback, but the issues shouldn't cost you more than a buck a piece if you can find them. It's worth seeking out if you're a fan of the League of Assassins aspect of Batman's world, or if you're a fan of the old Green Arrow/Batman team-ups from Brave & The Bold. Also, it's the only way to find out who Paper Monkey is, because I'm not gonna spoil it here!

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