Comics / Comic Reviews / DC Comics

Batman #54

By Hervé St-Louis
September 11, 2018 - 22:22

Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson explore their relationship thanks to the intervention on the Condiment King and some soft cucumber sandwich created by Alfred.

Tom King likes to use themes related to food and relationships when establishing interactions between characters. He did so magnificently in Batman #29 with a nine-course dinner and now with high brow and low brow food as symbols of the friendship between Dick Grayson and Bruce Wayne. As a young and recent orphan, Dick Grayson liked chips and hated the soft cucumber sandwiches made by Alfred like every fine British butler would. That Grayson grew to love them means he grew to love to be part of the world of Bruce Wayne and by extension that of Batman.

Football, another thuggish and lowbrow sport liked by Grayson is replaced by acrobatics and gymnastics which the young ward already had a strong disposition for. Ergo, he really could be the son of Batman as they shared a love for this gentleman sport. Yet, even as an adult, Grayson still tries to bring Wayne over to his world and attempt to humanize him when he is feeling the most remote from the rest of the world. This, of course, has always been the call for Robin. This is what King pays deference to in this story.

Matt Wagner’s art has not aged as well but his function in this story was to refer back to an older mythical time in the past. That he does well even if the art looks a bit gauche in 2018. This is what he was supposed to do. He was not expected to draw like the current crop of artists.

Rating: 8 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12