Here Talia doses a number of her assassins with Kurt Langstrom's Manbat serum while Bruce is attending a pop art exhibition in the National Gallery and meets Jezebel Jet. The opening sequence set in London is a brilliant start. It really shows the extensive planning and effort Morrison puts into his work.

For example, I didn't notice the graffiti featured in the background of the first issue - Zur-En-Arrh - which is relevant because Batman becomes the Batman of Zur-En-Arrh in the Batman RIP arc, a couple of years after this issue came out. I forgot how much I enjoyed this book the first time around, but knowing all that happens down the line makes re-reading Batman and Son all the more fun and rewarding. Jezebel Jet is introduced as Bruce's love interest, Joker pops up for his usual Joker shenanigans, and the book ends with a grown-up Damian in the future, now the Batman of Gotham City. This volume collects Batman #655-658 and #663-666.Grant Morrison's epic 7-year run on Batman ended last month with the brilliant Batman Incorporated #13, so what better time to revisit the book that kicked it all off: Batman and Son?īatman discovers he has a son - Damian - following a druggy one-night stand years ago with Talia Al-Ghul who stole his DNA and combined it with hers to grow Damian in a lab. Is Damian really just a misguided boy trying to prove himself to his father or have long years of Talia's indoctrination left him an operative solely designed to destroy Batman? Under the masterly skills of Morrison and Kubert, BATMAN AND SON is one of the most intriguing Batman tales ever told. Soon, both Tim Drake, Bruce Wayne's newly adopted heir and Alfred, Wayne's faithful butler, find themselves targets of this genetically perfect and very angry child. Stunned, the Dark Knight takes the child in, but the boy, raised among the brutal dictates of the League of Assassins, has his own agenda. The mysterious Talia, daughter of arch villain Ra's al Ghul and Batman's one-time love, returns with a boy named Damian and claims the child is Batman's. From the endlessly creative minds of comics legends Grant Morrison and Andy Kubert comes a startling chapter in the life of Gotham's Dark Knight. Named by James Gunn as an influence for Gods and Monsters, the first chapter of the new DC Universe film and television slate! This story inspires the upcoming film THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD.

Batman and Son by Grant Morrison