10 Overhyped Comic Books That Were Incredibly Mediocre
4. A Death In The Family
It is not everyday that readers actively choose the fate of a character via a phone call, but this was the case with A Death in the Family, one of a handful of Batman stories that ushered in the Dark Age of comics.
Centering the story on the unlikable Robin (Jason Todd) was ingratiating for readers back in 1988, but having the readers kill him off was essentially an admission by the staff at DC that they were incapable of redeeming Todd or making him more palatable for readers.
Up until the titular death, the story's tone is all over the place and ranges from silly and Silver-Age esque, to disturbing and grim (see Joker's torture of Jason Todd). Speaking of the Clown Prince of Crime, his tenure as...Iran's ambassador to the UN is a poor attempt at humour and arguably Islamophobic.
Equating Iranians (and the Arab world in general) to the Joker was incredibly misguided and served no purpose in the narrative. All in all, one of Batman's most iconic stories is a messy attempt at adding stakes in the Batman mythos and elevating Joker's threat level.