Comic Review: That Time Batman Got Abducted by Aliens

Batman: The Abduction - A Comic Review

That time Batman got abducted by aliens

And I don't mean Kal-El and J'Onn threw him in a van

Batman: The Abduction (by Alan Grant, Norm Breyfogle, James A. Hodgkins) is a one-shot story with the dark knight dealing with UFOs and aliens in Gotham.

The Set-Up

One normal night in Gotham while chasing after some bad guys, Batman is abducted by Grays.

The Context

The comic came out in 1998. X-Files was on the air. This was two years after the original Independence Day and one year after Batman & Robin (I have a complicated relationship with Batman & Robin that I will not go into here. This book bears no resemblance to it).

The comic cast of familiar characters is limited to Batman and Alfred. Commissioner Gordon makes an appearance but that's about it. Batman is on his own. The usual Rogue's Gallery doesn't even make an appearance. It's a night in the life of Batman.

Reaction/Review

Plot good, writing good, art good. Good, not great. A fun bit of nostalgia. It doesn't send the reader into another world because the whole story is formulaic. Batman's abducted by aliens and looks for answers. There's even a tropetastic UFO convention.

The quality of the art in Batman: The Abduction is great but a little uneven. A few moments with weird facial expressions are jarring to look at. There's a fun fight scene between Batman and a phantom Bruce Lee, a few surreal touches and a few sci-fi movie creatures. It could have taken it much further and I wish it had. I wish the script had taken it further too.

The comic doesn't aspire to break new ground. I enjoyed it. It was a quick read. It's exactly what you expect when you pick up a comic book promising Batman will get abducted by aliens. There are a few surprises but nothing too surprising. Not exciting. Underwhelming.

I would have loved it if I'd read it in 1998 because it would have been feeding into my existing obsession with UFOs and aliens. I would have read it over and over again. I would have written fan fiction. But I'm not so it didn't do much as much for me now as it would have done for 1998 me.

I wouldn't dissuade anyone from reading it but it's nothing earth shattering. It's previously covered ground just Batman's covering it this time. There's no big twist or little twist or microtwist.