Batman: Vampire

First of all, the three graphic novels from the Nineties reprinted in this very nice trade paperback collection – BATMAN & DRACULA: RED RAIN, BATMAN: BLOODSTORM, and BATMAN: CRIMSON MIST – don’t take place in the regular Batman continuity. They’re alternate versions of Batman – “Tales of the Multiverse”, according to the cover. I believe at one time DC also referred to this sort of thing as “Elseworlds” stories. When I was a kid, anything outside the established continuity was called an “Imaginary Story”. I always loved the concept that some superhero stories could be more “imaginary” than others.

I missed these particular stories when they were first published, so they were new to me. Author Doug Moench spins a yarn that could only be told in an alternate DC Universe. Simply put, Batman becomes a vampire, just as the collection’s title says. This takes place in the first of the stories during an epic war against Dracula, who has come to Gotham City to expand his legion of undead followers. Batman’s allies in this struggle are vampires who have overcome their thirst for blood and dedicated themselves to wiping out Dracula. Even though the Lord of the Undead is defeated, things don’t turn out too well, and Batman is left a vampire himself, although a “good” one, much like the TV character Angel would be a few years later. The Joker enters the plot in the second story and makes things even worse, and they continue to spiral downward for Batman in the third story, which involves many of the villains from his rogues’ gallery, such as the Penguin, the Riddler, Poison Ivy, Two-Face, and Killer Croc. And if Batman has always been the most noirish DC hero, that’s really true here, as he struggles against evil both without and within.

This is classic Batman with a horror spin. Doug Moench was one of my favorite comics writers during the Seventies, based mostly on his great run on MASTER OF KUNG FU with artist Paul Gulacy. (And, boy, I’d love to read all those issues again and see how they hold up.) His scripts on these three Batman stories are excellent, with plenty of action and angst. Speaking of Paul Gulacy, the artwork in this collection by Kelley Jones reminds me a little of Gulacy’s work, as well as Berni Wrightson’s. I’m not always a big fan of Jones’s art – his human figures get a little elongated and bizarre-looking for my taste – but it’s really good in these stories, especially the first one, RED RAIN. I’m glad I was able to catch up to these three stories all in one book, and if you’re a Batman and/or horror fan, I think you’ll enjoy them, too.