Writer: Paul Dini

Artist: Eduardo Risso

DC Comics/Vertigo

$22.99

Dark Night: A True Batman Story is probably the most important Batman comic you’ll read this year, even compared to anything being written by Scott Snyder, Tom King, or Frank Miller. No offense to those guys–they’re all important contributors to Batman as a comics character. But Dark Night is critical reading because it’s an autobiographical work about one of the key players who introduced Batman to so many of us in the 1990s. It’s a story that gets inside the head of Paul Dini, co-creator of Harley Quinn and one of the lead creators on Batman: The Animated Series. Don’t worry: Batman is in this comic too, sort of.

Although the “Dark Night” title is an obvious play on one of Batman’s many monikers, it also sets the tone for one of the darker chapters of Dini’s life as it coincided with his work on the Batman cartoon. In the midst of producing the show and preparing the Mask of the Phantasm film, Dini was brutally mugged and barely escaped with his life. Although Dini struggled through his introverted childhood by turning to his imaginary conception of Batman and other characters, it was on the night of the attack that Dini was really struck with the fact that no heroes were coming to save him. In many ways, Dini was living the pop-culture geek’s dream: an apartment full of toys, a job producing a famous cartoon. Brushing with death and coming home to an empty house forced him to confront all the ugly aspects of himself and realize two things: his life was empty, and no Batman was ever coming to save him.

Dini’s choice of title for this story quite possibly invokes his Catholic upbringing and the concept of a “Dark Night of the Soul.” For the religious believer, a “dark night” is a period of intense feeling of abandonment and near-despair even as they move closer to God. Dini doesn’t experience a catharsis so religious in nature, but he does undergo a deep crisis of faith and painful introspection as he emotionally works himself over as good as his muggers beat him physically. He questions the meaningless of his life, his treatment of others (including his quest to find a good woman, a place many male nerds have been), and whether a figure like Batman can ever have any meaning again. His journey really illustrates why, conceptually, the lost soul’s journey is called a “dark night.”

Masterfully, Dini works in Batman and his rogues’ gallery as representations of different aspects of his own consciousness. Batman becomes his ego, pressuring him with guilt for how he could have saved himself from the attack and determination to pick himself up again. The Joker is his cynicism and darkest thoughts, taunting him for where he’s failed. The Scarecrow reminds him of his fear of surgery. Poison Ivy guilts him for his treatment of women. And so forth. Dini very capably reminds us that as intense as Batman’s cast is, they’re also a representation of the worst thoughts in our heads…and later, our best.

Dark Night is an extremely introspective work, for both Dini and for all of us nerds who’ve dreamed of being Dini. Flashbacks to Dini’s childhood will probably be very familiar to readers, as we witness his loneliness at being “different” and the comfort that fantasy worlds bring to the downcast. It’s also a colossal punch to the gut when Dini’s story shows us that our fantasy characters really are just escapism, and that we need to look elsewhere when life is at its worst. We love Batman, but there is no Batman coming to save us.

The story wouldn’t be half of what it is without Eduardo Risso’s art, however. The man truly is a chameleon artist, changing his style to reflect both the time period and the mood of various portions of the story. Risso invokes the best parts of Will Eisner, Tim Sale, and Fritz Freling as he walks us though Dini’s childhood, adulthood, and the zany animated characters who run through his consciousness. The art vacillates between realism and cartoonishness, and between storyboard sketches and photorealism as the story demands, and yet somehow it’s never inconsistent.

Dark Night: A True Batman Story is very much a Batman story even as the story acknowledges that Batman is a work of fiction. It’s essential reading for fans of the Animated Series even as it only scratches the history of that beloved show. Really, Dark Night is a story about Dini’s inner demons, the same ones that come for all of us in our darkest hours, and what Batman represents in our struggle to fight back against those moments.

Rating: Five batarangs out of five (and I’d rate this higher if I could).