Writer Matt Fraction, artist Jorge Jiménez, colorist Tomeu Morey, and letterer Clayton Cowles take a step back from smaller, emotional stories in this week’s Batman #4 to introduce us to a larger criminal syndicate taking over Gotham’s underworld. We’re introduced to the Minotaur: a new villain who seems to have taken complete control of Gotham’s criminals. He’s sure to play a large part in the next few issues, and this team provides a very strong story to set him up.
This issue starts with the Minotaur watching a crime go south at Gotham’s docks. He calls for a meeting of Gotham’s crime bosses, planning to punish them. We cut to Bruce Wayne at the Wayne Experimental Sciences building where he surprises Dr. Zeller while she’s on the treadmill, working. He tells her to meet him for dinner, and she’s confused by the whole interaction but agrees in the end. We then see the reporter and child from the last issue going to the Gotham Eve, a newspaper building. The reporter takes him there so he can report what he saw the night Batman was framed.
WRITING
Fraction gives us a slower issue this time around, but a necessary one. He takes a break from the craziness of the last few issues to give us a pretty refreshing change of pace with a business casual Bruce Wayne rather than a costumed one. While Fraction has so far explored Batman’s relationships with the members of his family, we’ve yet to really see Fraction’s Bruce Wayne in the real world. This issue changes that, and Fraction really nails it. His Bruce is charming and clever, but constantly working to push forward his work as Batman. When he meets with Zeller, he acts as though he’s into her, when in reality he likely just wants to get to the bottom of last issue’s revelation. It’s a clever use of the dual identity.
Fraction sets up his big bad in this issue: the Minotaur. Right off the bat, he puts the character in a position of immense power. He sort of carefully weaves this character into the story. He’s introduced in a way where you’d probably believe that this wasn’t his first appearance just based on how deep his claws already are into Gotham. Fraction instantly makes him compelling, and he shows us later in the issue that the character means business by immediately having him intimidate all of Gotham’s most powerful. It’s a really smart issue on both sides of the coin.
ART
Jiménez gives every character a lot of personality through body language in this issue. When Bruce confronts Zeller, every panel displays a different emotion with her. Through the art, you can clock almost immediately that she is a very vocal and easily flustered individual who doesn’t really have the time to mess around. Before Bruce sees her, she’s in full work mode. She’s multitasking, and you can tell from her demeanor how she does each task carefully. The second Bruce is known to her though, she’s much more animated and jumpy. It’s a tough switch, but one that Jiménez makes almost seamlessly.
Jiménez has also completely mastered his paneling in this issue. There’s this one scene near the end where the Minotaur has all the mob bosses terrified, and he clenches his fist high above his head. Surrounding the panel of him doing this are six rectangular, smaller panels that give us a small look at each of the bosses faces. It’s such a fun way to show how deeply this new character has shaken each of them, wincing at even the slightest movement of his fist. Jiménez really gives you plenty to admire here.
COLORS
This issue has got some really vibrant colors, once again giving this team’s Gotham more room to shine. The city itself isn’t colorful, but the lighting and the people constantly are. It’s rare that you see Gotham in the daytime, and so when you do, you have to sort of make it stand out with other things. Morey does that pretty successfully. Dr. Zeller’s holographic work is a bright pink color that reflects onto her, giving her a pink glow when Bruce walks into the room. What’s smart about this is how, in this scene, she’s also wearing a pink shirt and headband. She’s illuminated by the same color she’s wearing, and so it’s muted when she speaks to Bruce, but still pink and harmless.
The issue takes a pretty big shift in color when we move to see what the Minotaur has going on. The room he gathers everyone in is covered in a lot of yellow and orange lights. It’s a smart choice from Morey. Not only does it place some pressure on everyone in that room, but it also makes it seem like the room is on fire, engulfing all of them, while the Minotaur is completely safe from it. It’s a very powerful way of cementing this new character as a large threat.
LETTERS
This issue has some pretty fun lettering choices from Cowles. He really shines with his little time and location boxes that occasionally appear in the corners of certain panels. The best example of one of these is when the reporter takes the child from the last issue to the Gotham Eve building. Once inside, the reporter talks to who we can assume is the editor in chief of the paper. Six minutes pass while the kid sits in the chair, and there’s this really nice and stylish box telling us that right in the corner of the page. It gives Gotham a sort of New York feel, and boxes mirroring subway signs. Cowles really does his best to further display the city and setting’s personality, and he succeeds.
CONCLUSION
Batman #4 sort of tones down the action, but it’s a much needed one that really shows us what goes on in Gotham when we’re not just following around Batman. Fraction, Jiménez, Morey, and Cowles all do their best in giving Gotham and its people a strong personality, and they really do a good job in familiarizing you with a city that’s been around for decades. They make you feel like you’re here, you’re comfortable, and you’re in this fight with Batman until the very end.
