Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Reality Check, 16 Sep 2006
I feel there's a need to respond to the review that calls Arkham Asylum "UTTER RUBBISH". Frankly, that statement is ridiculous. Books like Arkham need to be taken in context. They exist to show something different. For the publishers to show off a little, to display a bit of extravagance. To showcase talent they may have in the stables and give a character the treatment they deserve. Personally I think the script for Arkham gives it a greater dignity than many of the so called "landmark" titles achieve (Digital Justice anyone?).
I first bought Arkham on its release when I was an impressionable teenager but have returned to it on numerous occasions as an adult and even bought it again when my original copy went awol. Whilst I would concede that it might not be the strongest plotline in a Batman story, in my opinion that's just missing the point.
Arkham is a prime example of the type of literary indulgence that has been used to flesh out the world of Batman or explore a different vein on numerous occasions. That is, there's no new characters, no major turn of events that will register on the Batman richter-scale (eg Death in the Family, Killing Joke) but it does go someway into presenting aspects of the character that help some readers see him in a different light. In Arkham's case that is to really emphasise the dark, psychological element of Batman and the space he occupies. The fact that, like his nemesis, he exists in a form of complete psychosis so utterly defined by the death of his parents, the resulting feelings of solitude and his almost scizophrenic dual identity ("Mommy's Dead. Daddy's Dead. Brucie's Dead"). Though all of this may have been explored in other stories, Morrison and McKean have, like several others before them, been given the oppurtunity to attempt to do something different.
The artwork plays a key role in this. The whole book is a thing of real beauty. Alex Ross may rule for out and out brilliance of illustration but in my experience, only Bill Sienkiewicz in Elektra:Assasin has done anything so astounding as Dave McKean's work here using varying media. Yes, some frames may not drive the story forward much but hell, just take them in and enjoy them. Those drops of blood in the glass shard scene are just exquisite. The character profiles at the end of the book that serve no real purpose but as an excercise in superb graphic design.
Arkham Asylum should be in anyone's collection whether a Batman fan or not.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Art-ham asylum, 14 Jan 2009
I absolutely love this book. I know that makes me bias, and some might say hypocritical at the average rating i have given it.
Ill start with why i love this book. The first thing you notice when you open the book is the high quality feel of the glossy paper, with a few splash pages of, well, clearly insanity inspired modern art. Once the story begins the art styles chop and change throughout, and it just suits my personal vision of what i love about graphic novels compared to prose. For the price of this book you couldnt buy a book on modern art that was as good.
The story, although not the most conventional, is fairly straight forward. In truth it follows two stories, batmans, and amadeus arkhams. I would say the latter is the more interesting of the two.
The downside is because it swaps every few pages the story loses its pace a little. The other thing is that because it is fairly short it will be over in about an hour.
For graphic novel fans, the second half of the book has the full annotated script, original storyboards layouts, and some more art pages. While this is appreciated, as somewhat custom in graphic novels nowadays to put some scripts in the back, i cant help feeling that 90% of the people who buy the books will not make more than a cursory glance at these pages.
My other complaint is that the joker, being the main arch-nemesis, has his captions done so it is a struggle to make out some of the words in one go. I feel that although it adds to the arty thing by giving all the major players special captions, it slows down the action when you have to re-read things.
Overall i think this is a good book. I enjoyed the subject matter, although i can see why it would not be to some peoples tastes. I would say, if you liked the killing joke, there is a good chance you will like this too.
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18 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
very 1980s... and not necessarily in a good way, 5 Oct 2006
At the risk of being mauled by several hundred angry Arkham Asylum fans, I have to say that this isn't a terrible graphic novel, but it is an incredibly over-rated one.
The main problem is Dave McKean's art. While he's a fantastic cover artist (just check out the gorgeous work he did on the complete run of Sandman and its associated collections), his ultra-impressionistic style just isn't suited to the demands of a linear comic book narrative. The inclusion of Grant Morrison's obsessively-detailed script only highlights this deficiency; so much of a reasonably interesting story has been sacrificed on the alter of admitedly awe-inspiring visuals. The nadir has to be when McKean translates a one-line description of Batman pricking his hand with a shard of glass into a double page orgy of gore as he rams the shard all the way through his palm. Why the hell would Batman do this? Your guess is as good as mine. The only answer I can come up with is 'because the artist thought it would look cool'. That sums up this book for me.
Grant Morrison's script isn't perfect either, although it would certainly have been better served by a Brian Bolland or a Dave Gibbons. The basic 'Batman is as crazy as his enemies' premise is almost as hackneyed as the 'Batman and Robin are gay lovers' one - a shallow take on the character that isn't even investigated very well here .
In his highly readable notes on the script, Morrison claims the story was a comment on the dark as hell, style over substance caricature that the Dark Knight had turned into in the post-Miller 80s. If that really was his intent, he was unsuccessful in bringing it across. Instead, the book seems to display all of the flaws of that period with few of the strengths. Morrison is very capable of writing classic Batman stories, but his 'Gothic' arc in Legends of the Dark Knight with artist Klaus Janson is superior on every level to his debut effort here.
Writer, artist and character have all produced excellent work in the field of comic books, but this just isn't a great example of it. The inclusion of the script makes this a value-for-money packaging of a curio of a bygone age, but the graphic novel itself leaves a lot to be desired.
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