Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Book 1

In this RETRO SEASON of Special Topics in Media, host Garret Castleberry winds back the podcasting clock to the quarantine months of the 2020 global pandemic. The Comics Studies mini-series focuses on what many consider the great stand-alone superhero story ever told, Frank Miller's future shock crime thriller, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. Released in four parts near the end of the real-world Cold War in 1986, Miller posits an iconoclast depiction of a city in turmoil, a country at the crossroads, and an isolationist antihero in retirement. Miller's punk rock penciling ignites the interior panels like a flame lit buzzsaw. The artist-author's boxy illustrations are further upstaged by Miller's sharper than glass Neo-noir internal monologues and terse scripted prose. Equal parts revenge fantasy, superhero love letter, mythic deconstruction, and political satire, Miller's work remains a crowning achievement ahead of its time and serving as a paradigm shift to the way superhero comics are perceived and received by critics and audiences. Each episode will focus on a single entry in the four-part series, followed by a discussion on the topic of adaptation as well as a scholarly roundtable that examines the media artifact's continuing impact on American popular culture.   


Hosts: Garret Castleberry, Scott McMurry

Producers: Garret Castleberry, Will McMurry (Audio Engineer), Alli Garner (Cover Art), Austin Foster (Music)

Recommended readings paired with Season Two "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns":
Frank Miller (with Klaus Jansen). Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. DC Comics, 1986.

Chris Gavaler. Superhero Comics. Bloomsbury Academic Press, 2017.

Robert Jewett & John Shelton Lawrence. The Myth of the American Superhero. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2002.

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