10 Reasons Why 'The New Frontier' Will Always Be DC's Greatest Graphic Novel

8. Cooke Meshed Light And Dark Together Wonderfully

DC: The New Frontier Batman Darwyn Cooke
DC Comics

Over the past decade or so, an apparent consensus appears to have been reached in superhero literature: lightness and darkness are mutually exclusive; plot, character and action cannot account for those two opposites concurrently.

First of all, this is a fairly ridiculous concept. Though the medium may have developed a reputation for all things dark and gritty, let us not forget that at the end of the day these are stories revolving around fantastical beings - characters who don bright and colourful costumes, explore the universe, and carry out death-defying feats on a regular basis. Of course this does not limit the potential for creators to explore dark or complex narratives, but there is always a danger of a tale becoming comically serious if it seems to shy away from the crazy and wonderful tenets that their creative properties were founded upon. If anything, The New Frontier proves that you really can have the best of both.

The text is light and funny, yet dark and mysterious. It's unrelentingly fierce in its social-commentary, yet joyful and mystical all in one. The thought of any creator dealing with the rampant racial violence of Jim Crow in a book that also features Dinosaur Island would seem overly ambitious and antithetical at first, but trust me, it's a testament to Cooke's story-telling talent that he could approach both with unreserved nuance and analogous creativity.

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WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.