Comics

Batman: The Adventures Continue #1 – Review

The DCAU lives on! We return to the world of Batman: The Animated Series and The New Batman Adventures in a new comic series – Batman: The Adventures Continue. With writers, Paul Dini and Alan Burnett returning, does the series add any value to the legacy of Batman: The Animated Series? Let’s find out!

The timeline of this first issue is a little confusing. Lex Luthor is the main antagonist of this story arc, but the Justice League doesn’t seem to have been formed. It’s likely in-between TNBA and JL, but some inconsistencies also make that confusing. Anyways, we see Batman patrolling Gotham City, and all seems fine. However, we’re talking about Gotham; it’s going to get nuts. Batman has to take down a giant robot, and it’s pretty neat!

We learn that Lex Luthor owns the robot, and he’s trying to steal leftover Brainiac parts from WayneTech. Bruce and Alfred figure out that Lex’s giant robot is using a solar battery as its power source. Bruce breaks out his suit from The Dark Knight Returns and goes to work. They fight for a bit, and Bruce breaks open the chest of the robot, revealing Superman as the power source! The World’s Finest makes quick work of Luthor and Mercy, and the day is saved.

So, these two chapters were relatively short but still entertaining. The problem is that the physical copies will have both sections bundled as one issue, but digitally, they’re cut in half. So the first chapter was all set up and fun writing and the second was mostly action panels. It made the second chapter less compelling because we had to wait two weeks for it, and it didn’t give us much.

We also get the seeds of Red Hood throughout the story. He’s at Crime Alley at the end of chapter two, but his motives are unknown. It’ll be interesting to see what they do with Jason Todd considering Tim Drake was basically a hybrid of the two. I’m interested in seeing where they take the story. They teased Deathstroke at the end of this latest one, so that’s sure to be entertaining.

Overall, these first two chapters of Batman: The Adventures Continue are decent. There’s nothing to get excited about, and it doesn’t add anything new or exciting to the DCAU lore. However, Paul Dini and Alan Burnett writing Batman will always be a treat. We’ll be following this series as it goes along. For more on Batman and the rest of the Justice League, stay tuned.

Kevin Conroy (Batman himself) read the first chapter. Check it out here!

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