10 Best Moments From Batman: Zero Year – Dark City

1. Batman Fails

All through Zero Year, but especially in Dark City, Snyder's been working in flashbacks from when Bruce was a kid and his parents Thomas and Martha were alive, juxtaposing these with the "present" (which is actually 6 years ago from the current New 52 timeline) showing the increasingly tough task it is for Bruce to be Batman. This isn't just done because it's an origin story and as such we need to be reminded (for what seems like the billionth time) why Bruce chose to become Batman. The point of Dark City is Batman learning to trust others after realising that he can't do this alone. What the flashbacks show is a helpless Bruce Wayne looking over his dead parents and the current Bruce Wayne who stubbornly refuses to ask for help and tries to do everything himself. This is why Batman fails at the end of the story arc. He tries to take on Doctor Death and Riddler by himself and only just manages to beat Death but fails to stop the bigger problem of Riddler and his unrelenting attack on Gotham. By the end of Dark City, Batman and Gordon have failed in saving the city €“ blimps are on fire and crashing into buildings, a storm is raging, and the sea walls break, flooding the city. If we take the analogy of Star Wars, Dark City is The Empire Strikes Back, where things look their bleakest and our heroes are losing. Snyder builds up the scenes of Bruce's past and present side by side perfectly so that by the end, when things have completely fallen apart, the very last page is the young Bruce looking up in tears and screaming "HELP!". Batman/Bruce has come full circle and his past and present have synched up in a very relevant way. It's good to see Batman fail, not just because we rarely see this, but because this is an origin story of Batman's first few months "on the job". He should fail, he's still learning how to cope with super villains and he's inexperienced. Seeing him vulnerable is completely appropriate to the story from a time before Batman learned how to perfectly be Batman and is a vital building block of the character. This is truly an origin story that enriches Batman's character enormously. * Those were the best parts of Dark City - what've you enjoyed about Zero Year so far? Let us know in the comments below!