What I’m reading: Batman Snow

August 20th, 2008

I would like you to put that horrible disaster of a film Batman and Robin out of your mind, there now doesn’t that feel better?

You have to put it out of your mind otherwise you won’t for a second consider what I’m saying to be reasonable.   Mister Freeze could be a great villain for the next Batman film.

Eh! Remember we’ve put Batman and Robin out of our minds for the time being, yes I know some things just can’t be unseen but you said you’d try.

You see today I randomly picked up a copy of Batman: Snow in my local library.   Only really because I hadn’t seen the cover before and was in the mood for a bit of a Batman read.   I currently prefer reading his stories in trade paperback simply because I’ve got no idea what is going on with Batman RIP.

So I read Snow which features the origin of Mr. Freeze and to a lessor degree paves the way for Robin, this story is set the first year or so of Batman’s career.   The story and the depiction of Freeze in this has me convinced that he would be an ideal candidate for a Nolan villain on the big screen.

The character is really well portrayed in this book, he is a tragic figure who simply snaps after the death of his wife at the hands of stupid office politics (it makes sense if you read the book but I assure you it’s not a simple case of setting someone’s stapler in jelly).   His decent into paranoid madness is completely believable.

The thing about Freeze though is that he can bridge the gap between organised crime and super villain as the story involves organised crime families trying to get their hands on weaponized versions of his research.   And of course he is a much larger than your normal villain in terms of visual power.

No bloody ‘everybody chill out’ lines.

Sorry, we’re not talking about that film are we.

So if you get a chance to read Snow (frankly I think it’s a little obscure anyway, I’d never heard of it and this is the first I’ve seen it - published in 2007 I believe) give it look and let me know what you think.   The artwork I can take or leave, it’s fine I just don’t find this version of Batman very menacing.   There is a great secondary story about how the Batman enlists civilians to help him in his fight against crime which is very compelling and as I mentioned above lends itself to paving the way for Robin.

Now you can go back to thinking about Batman and Robin…

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