Product Description

Featuring characters from the blockbuster movie "Batman Begins", "Batman Year One: Ra's al Ghul" takes us from the crime-ridden streets of Gotham to the chilly mountains of Tibet, as Batman hunts down a dangerous and immortal enemy! A suspicious letter lands on the doorstep of Wayne Manor addressed to the Batman, just as a string of unusual occurrences are reported across Gotham City. In a race against time, Batman must find Ra's al Ghul before the world of the living becomes the world of the undead! Written by the talented Devin Grayson ("Nightwing") and illustrated by Paul Gulacy ("Eerie"), this tale takes us into the realm of horror where the movie would never dare!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #140385 in Books
• Published on: 2006-02-24
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 104 pages

About the Author
Devin Grayson is the regular writer of Nightwing, featuring Dick Grayson, the original Robin, and new series Matador which pits a jaded cop against a viscious serial-killer. Paul Gulacy has over twenty years experience drawing comics, with work appearing in Eerie, Superman: Action Comics and Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight.

Customer Reviews

Not worthy of the "Year One" title.
The "Year One" title puts one in mind of the works of Frank Miller and Chuck Dixon, with their superlative "Batman", "Robin" and "Batgirl" contributions. This edition however fails to deliver, on many levels, and is a showcase in lazy storytelling.

In its defence, we get two brief flashbacks to the early days of Ra's and his researches into immortality, and one to an early(ish) encounter between Ra's and Batman. It therefore receives one star. The rest of the book is spent on a bland excuse for zombies to rise in Gotham, and an ensuing paper chase for Batman that has no real sense of challenge. The final solution is made preposterous by the fact that Ra's never capitalised on it himself, having already provided it to Batman in the course of the story.

I would not recommend this purchase. Ra's al Ghul is a terrific character, but this book does nothing to enhance that character, and is proof that you should not judge a book by its cover.

Batman? Kinda. Ra's? A bit. Year One? Nope Pointless zombies? Oh yeah.
Well, it isn't year one, but somewhere between 2001 and present-day, Ra's only shows up in flashbacks, bland action sequences ripped from James Bond pad everything, Batman has no sense of power at all, there seems to be no challenge to him throughout, and in the end (spoiler here-watch out!) is that oh, we were wrong, we dont have to go on a mystic quest, we can diy our way to victory. (Spoiler over) The first time I've ever had to write an online review for anything, and damnit, this book just hurt me.

Worth a look, definitely.
I picked this up kind of expecting more Ra's than i eventually got, but i like the ideas in it so much that i don't mind that, really.

Rather than a straightforward retelling of Ra's early origins, we have Batman taking on a case that leads him back to certain key moments in the life of possibly his most brilliant and deadly foe. I actually kind of like that idea; it's more ingenuitive and interesting than just copying and pasting other "year one" formats.

However, though the narrative voice (a letter written by Ra's before he died) does guide us through his philosophy and world-view very well, and is wonderfully and evocatively written, by the end of the book i felt a little short-changed on the Ra's front. We basically get two flashbacks (good ones, important ones) to Ra's past life and then the rest of the story is Bats doing what he does best. Now, that's fine, but not what i was expecting when i picked the book up, and in terms of seeing behind the scenes of Ra's personality, well, that doesn't really happen on a grand scale. We get told he's brilliant, ancient, ruthless and get a few momentary insights of this. That's fine as far as it goes, but i already knew that. I never doubted it. I would rather have found out why it was the case than just have it reiterated again.

I liked it. It's good stuff, and any batman fan will enjoy the story, i think. I did. It just might not be quite the story they were expecting, is all.