Writer: Tom King / Penciller / Colour Artist: Mitch Gerads Letterer: Clayton Cowles / Editors: Jessica Berby, Dave Wielgosz, Ben Abernathy HC / DC Comics
Review by Paul Dunne
22nd June 2023 (Released 20th June 2023)
The Pitch: The Most Dangerous Game of Wits Batman and Riddler have ever played… The Riddler is one of Batman’s most intellectual villains and the one who lays out his clues the most deliberately. The Riddler is always playing a game, there are always rules. But what happens when The Riddler kills someone in broad daylight for seemingly no reason? No game to play. No cypher to break down. Batman will reach his wit’s end trying to figure out the Riddler’s true motivation in this incredible thriller!
Reinvention.
It's the name of the game. In comics. In characters. Especially in Gotham. Reinvention equals reinvigoration. We've seen Gotham reinvented as a corrupt Cirque du Freak that gives reason for someone like Batman to exist. The Joker gets reinvented often. Deranged maniac, agent of chaos. Macabre performance artiste in love with Batman. But what of Edward Nygma? Riddle me this: who stays the same but changes? A: No one. Truth is, The Riddler has undergone changes to suit the writers and the times before. Paul Dini made him a match for Batman, bringing his Detective prowess to the fore. Jeph Loeb had him figure out Batman's other identity and sell it to Hush. Tom King had him in the guise of a kind of Irish bowery boy, at war with the Joker. And now King and artist Mitch Gerads reinvent him again, only as something much more insidious.
The many faces of The Riddler?
There is only a certain amount of this darker reinterpretation you can cycle through before you arrive back at edgy 90s Liefeld look-at-me comics. Thankfully, King and Gerads skate over this phase gracefully landing at the door of Seven's John Doe, or the creeping dread of Mindhunter. They utilise the Riddler's currency - information - and weaponise it to re-establish him as a monster. But one that can make himself urbane if he wishes. There's a charmless, frustrating arrogance about him, the kind you might find in American West Coast intellectuals. But this is a mouth, hiding teeth, sharpened to points. He means to draw blood and blood he draws.
Disrupting the ‘no-kill’ policy for a pyrrhic victory?
I won't give away the twists and turns of this first in the series of Killing Joke-inspired one-shots. I think there's a real pleasure in not knowing going into this one. King creates a cloudy narrative dialogue, but one that rewards your concentration. There are overlapping voices and conversations going on throughout as the law tries to deal with The Riddler. But the Riddler will only deal with Batman... There's a sinister, capable psychopath standing in place of the crown prince of conundrums. One who genuinely disrupts and stifles the power of others and who challenges the concepts and ideas of Batman's 'no kill policy'. Not as much as the Joker's ever-rising body count does, but nonetheless, it does seem to fly in the face of any hope for rehabilitation. This is a Riddler that is too far gone. There are of course callbacks to Killing Joke, including one that pends Gordon’s view of what happened back then. But a lot of these have to do with a tone that’s more shocking and ‘adult’ rather than direct touches. You get the sense that even if there will be a victory for Batman, it will be a pyrrhic one.
Moral choices that make you uncomfortable…
King's writing is fascinating as always, posing moral choices that don't always sit comfortably for caped crusaders. He keeps the edge on throughout the book, which is pleasing. There's not an ounce of fat on the thing. Gerads art is lovely. A tad more painterly than say, Miracleman, but without blurring the image and making it unclear as to where - and when - you are. A must, especially since the story takes place in a couple of different time-frames, one telling the story of Edward's newfound power, the other filling you in on how he got that way. In this, we truly see him become the Moriarty to Batman's Holmes. Gerads' colours excel here, too. He creates Distinct palettes for the different time frames and dips the modern strand in The Riddler's shade of green, extending his reach even to the moments he doesn't feature in. Clayton Cowles completes the trio, lettering the book wonderfully, giving Nygma a precise, scalpel-like tone. A worthy successor to the Killing Joke? Maybe. Worth your time? Definitely. Although the decision to put all of the One Bad Day books out as Hardcovers is a bit baffling when it would have made more sense to perhaps do four books with two stories each, or reprint some complimentary Riddler one-shots and stories to make the package more financially sensible, this is a good book that deserves its place in the long-term bat-canon.
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