From the coked-up brain and spastically trembling fingers of "creator" Frank Miller comes the third installment of his Dark Knight saga. It should come as no surprise to readers of the first and second installments that this third installment represents yet another huge decline in the quality of Miller's work. At this point he has lost even his knack for occasional interesting ideas and memorable dialogue.

And as for the art, don't even get me started. I'm pretty sure there are elephants and orangutans who can draw better than Miller, at this point.

The first Dark Knight book was brilliant. Batman: Year One was excellent. But Miller used up his talent long ago. He squeezed out a few memorable moments for The Dark Knight Strikes Again, but the decline in his abilities was already plain to see. Now? He's a joke.

He's used up all the great villains, so the primary villain in the book is effectively a nobody with no real history in the story of Batman that I'm aware of. In any case, he is an absolutely cardboard-flat character with no interesting qualities at all.

So why did I give this book two stars rather than one? There are two reasons: first, familiar actually did have one mildly memorable line from Batman. I suspect it's his last. Second, the two stars are a testament to the grotesque decline of writing in the mainstream comic book industry over the past couple of decades. Disappointing as The Master Race was, at least it wasn't as bad as Safespace or Snowflake or I Am Not Starfire. ( )

so he really just draws like that and we're all pretending to be okay with it, huh ( )

It doesn't amaze the reader by reinventing virtually everything on page after page like "Dark Knight Returns" once did, but unlike the confused and sadly uneven "Strikes Again" follow-up from 2001, this is a darned good story if given the (as is only fair) chance of being compared to your average super hero comic rather than the once-in-a-decade phenomenon that was the original. And Azzarello also pleasantly tones doen the chauvinistic testosterone nonsense that tends to litter Miller's solo outings, without in any way neutering the brutality and force that comes with it. A really good read, through and through. ( )

Blade Runner came back after 30-some years. Star Wars has a new lease of life. Couldn't The Dark Knight still work? Perhaps, but it doesn't. This has nothing of the original in it except an odd moment or two where Carrie shines. I've always been more about the writing than the art, but The Dark Knight Returns revolutionized the look of comics by taking a formal panel grid and then playing with page layouts. Most of the panels were tiny intricate works of art so that when there was a splash page, it sang. This is just a big dumb comic like a lot of other big dumb comics. The most damning thing i could say now about this project is that it's just nothing special.

That said, I love my out-sized hardback edition which is simply beautiful to look at and hold. ( )

What a stupid, poorly-written mess. It had a few scenes that worked quite well, but everything in between was just awful. I'd had better off using the time I spent with this dreck re-reading Miller's original masterpiece. ( )