The Dark Knight Returns

The Dark Knight Returns is another of Frank Miller's Batman mini-arcs. This one is four issues long and takes place a decade after Batman has retired. But he decides to jump back into the action because, well...

Look, reading comics is a skill. One I don't entirely have. You don't just read them. You look at the art. You take it all in. You think about it. And I probably read this one too fast. I might read it again some day and then I'll have a better understanding of what happened.

But here's what I think happened.

Harvey Dent has been rehabilitated, according to his psychiatrist. And his plastic surgeon has managed to fix his face. So they're releasing him from Arkham Asylum. Even though Bruce Wayne publicly supports this, it seems to trigger Batman into making a reappearance.

In the meantime Police Commissioner Gordon is nearing retirement and a gang of mutants are trying to kill him. Oh, and the Cold War with Russia is still going on.

So everyone thinks Dent is leading the mutants. Only he's not? I think? Either way, The Joker wakes up and Dent just sort of disappears from the story. Then Batman fights the leader of the mutants and all the underlings start worshiping him instead. Which only causes more problems for Batman.

Then the Joker escapes. The president sends Superman after Batman to make him stop. The mutants are terrorizing Gotham. And we get a new Robin - a thirteen year old girl whose parents don't notice she's gone because they smoke too much pot.

Batman kills the Joker and half the police force in the process. Like, I don't really understand why he's so blase about beating up cops. But he is.

Then Russia drops a nuclear weapon on us and everything goes to hell. And Batman fakes his own death during a fight with Superman.

I'm still really confused. I'm also not sure how I'm supposed to read this story. I recently learned about Frank Miller's far far right political leanings, which make a certain amount of sense. But now I don't really know who I'm supposed to sympathize with in the context of this story or what's being said.

I just don't know. Maybe I need to think about it some more. Or have someone explain to me why this is considered such an excellent comic.

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