Detective Comics by Ram V vol. 1: Gotham Nocturne — Overture

Some thugs are making trouble down at the Gotham docks and Batman is on hand to take them down.  It sounds like just another night in the city, but something feels off for the title character.  No, it’s not how one of the thugs mutates into a horrific monster before his  eyes.  Or the sudden appearance of Talia amidst all this.  No, Batman is feeling slower, less resilient, and generally not up to the expected standards of the World’s Greatest Detective.  The medical tests he’s run on himself say that he’s fine, so could the cause be something… supernatural?  Maybe it’s also related to the impending arrival of emissaries from the Orgham family who have come to reassert their longstanding claim on the city?  Or has he fallen under the long shadow of Barbatos once again?

Whatever the cause is, I can’t say that it presents a compelling mystery that demands I stick around to see how it’s going to be resolved.  While it’s admirable that writer Ram V is trying to add more onto Gotham’s already ornate history, and delivering a Batman whose capabilities are diminished, neither of them work all that well here.  In fact, the latter comes off as a device to make the former seem like a threat and something that we’ll have to take seriously for this storyline.  V does try to give the proceedings a horror-infused tone to them, but the results aren’t scary and will likely only interest readers who prize vibes over story.

It’s not helped by the art from Rafael Albuquerque who has toned down his impressionistic tendencies to deliver some rather conventional superhero work here.  Surprisingly, the best art in the volume comes from the final back-up story illustrated by Hayden Sherman, who delivers some wonderfully surreal work that delves into the mind of Two-Face in a Simon Spurrier-written short.  Spurrier also writes the three-part backup tale “The Coda,” about Jim Gordon with art from Dani, but I wouldn’t say it’s worth picking up unless you’re the most die-hard of completionists for the writer.  Which leaves this first part of “Gotham Nocturne” with precious little to recommend itself, aside from the fact that I’m glad I didn’t pick this up in its hardcover incarnation.