[World of Bats] Batman: Son of the Demon

Hello Gothamites and welcome to the World of Bats, the Batman Book Club!

This week, we’ll be looking at the one shot prestige graphic novel Batman: Son of the Demon, written by Mike W Barr and drawn by Jerry Bingham!

Batman must team-up with his arch nemesis Ra’s Al Ghul to stop a madman from destroying the world. A romance between the Dark Knight and Ra’s daughter, Talia, ignites and will change Batman’s life forever!

LINK: Batman: Son of the Demon #1

Reading will last from 2022-02-12T06:00:00Z2022-02-18T06:00:00Z, though if you find yourself dealing with a bout of Lazarus Pit madness, you can always come back later.

Looking forward to discussing this story with you all. :slight_smile:

Click here to learn more about World of Bats.

Click here to join and get cool flair!

4 Likes

Knowing me, how would you assume I’d fill in this blank?

Batman: Son of the Demon is the _____ Batman graphic novel.

So anyway, we start off with a hostage situation that quickly goes into “threaten and assault the pregnant lady” territory, reminding us that we’re firmly in the bleak, misogyny-filled world of early post-Crisis Batman. Speaking of the Caped Crusader, he gets a splendid introduction here, first appearing as an off-panel fist and then proceeding to stay in the shadows for the next few pages until he is forced to come out by a terrorist who really should pay better attention to where he’s shooting. Face melting ensues.

One helicopter explosion later, Batman uses Dirty Harry logic to bully a medic into helping the pregnant woman rather than an injured terrorist. Perhaps it’s because ol’ Bruce can’t help but see his parents in every single heterosexual married couple he sees. Then he swings off and reflects on the inevitable infections he can expect from the wounds he took before succumbing to said wounds (which might have been avoided if he would’ve taken up Jim Gordon’s offer to have his injuries checked). Naturally, this leads to more dead parent flashbacks and other such origin story motifs as he loses consciousness, this time with a full-on Man-Bat coming through the window to inspire him to don the cowl. Beat that, Frank!

Luckily, he was saved by his wife Talia. (“Wife?!” you say? Clearly, you need to check out a certain Denny O’Neil story from DC Special Series #15. I’d give you a link, but guess which website doesn’t have it?) She proceeds to stick her tongue down his throat, while Alfred moves in to get some chicken consommé down that same throat. But Batman has no time for Alfred’s French soups, even ones that are served hot (contra Vichyssoise). And thus the adventure begins…but I’ll refrain from covering the rest for now.

4 Likes

I thought you might be into this one, knowing your love for other Mike Barr stories. :smiley:

3 Likes

I have never read this before. Interesting to see Batman happy, although I prefer him with Selina. Of course, he doesn’t remain happy. Hard to believe he would remain absent from Gotham for so long.

4 Likes

This was also my first time reading this; I liked it in a similar way to how I like the classic James Bond movies: don’t worry too much about the plot details but enjoy the hero saving the world. Honestly, this story almost feels like Batman was dropped into a Bond movie.

Ra’s is a good villain and I found it interesting that Batman teamed up with him to take on a worse villain. Initially I was perplexed as to why Talia lied about the baby, but I think it was because Batman became so protective of her and she felt stifled. The fact that Batman thinks she miscarried is sad; he certainly doesn’t need anymore trauma. I kinda like the pairing of Talia and Batman, but ultimately I think he’s better without romantic entanglements. He’s just not a character that is meant to get a happy ending.

Those are my thoughts upon finishing the book. I feel like I rambled a bit.

3 Likes

I’m also with you on the Selina thing, but I can appreciate him with other people in different stories. I get what you mean with the Gotham thing – I guess Bruce would maintain that in trying to stop Qayin, he’s also protecting Gotham, but I think in reality it had more to do with Talia.

I think it makes sense because when Denny O’Neil and Neil Adams created Ra’s, it was to give Batman a different story to tell, inspired by Bond movies that were popular at the time.

I can see some of that. I could also see her worrying that Bruce would lose a part of who he is if he tried to raise their son right. But I think with how she gave the child to a seemingly normal family, I wonder if she did it because she was lucid enough to realize that crimefighters, supervillains, and ninja assassins aren’t really the best people to raise a child.

I do believe that is addressed in a later story. Because while this story doesn’t really get put into continuity until the 00s when Morrison kinda-sorta put it back in, this is actually the first part in what is called the “Demon Trilogy.” There’s “Bride of the Demon” and “Birth of the Demon”, and I believe in one of them, Batman does confront her about what happened at the end of this story, but I don’t think he finds out what happened.

Sadly, the other two stories aren’t on DCUI. All three books were recently collected in a nice, oversized hardcover, but unfortunately, it looks like it’s out of print. Maybe they’ll add the other parts on here someday. Hopefully. :slight_smile:

Thank you guys for sharing your thoughts on this book!

3 Likes

I didn’t realize that, but it certainly fits. It’s also not the only connection between Bond and Batman. You may already know that Nolan borrowed the airplane sequence from the Dark Knight Rises from License to Kill.

2 Likes