Whilst DCs New 52 continuity reset a few years back wasnt a complete disaster, it did appear to be a nail in the coffin when it came to certain interesting things the company had been trying over the decades. Pretty much all art had to conform to a restrictive and boring house style, the storylines were all suspiciously nineties and uninspired, and everything seemed to revolve around (yet again) big universe-altering crossover events. The one exception to all of this the whole time appeared to be Batman. Grant Morrison had been allowed to continue his pre-New 52 epic past the reboot, and thus most of the characters remained untouched by the reboot. Then Scott Snyder and Greg Capullos run on the main Batman title continued in a similar vein, and it was good. The Bat side of things is where you get the best stuff from DC these days. Things have only gotten better under Mark Doyle, the new editor for the Bat-Books who has presided over the launch of young adult series Gotham Academy, the new Batgirl reinvention and Arkham Manor, a series where Bruce Waynes home gets turned into a mental asylum. After such daring, fresh and new takes on the world of Gotham in 2014, expect even more in the new year, especially as the creative teams plan to tie their books together more closely...
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
