The Dark Knight Returns: A Referential Compendium

ENGL 4204: Shay Paris, Spring 2016

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Jason Todd

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LYNN VARLEY

Frank Miller's ex-wife, Lynn Varley was a pivotal component in the creation of Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. First and foremost, she was the colorist for the graphic novel (as well as many of Miller's other works, e.g. Ronin and 300). Using watercolors to produce the rich hues evident in The Dark Knight Returns, she adds quite a lot of visual depth to the piece as a whole. As Scott McCloud says in Chapter 8 of Understanding Comics, “Color can be a formidable ally in any visual medium” (185). It’s also fascinating to see how well Varley’s work holds up over twenty years later, even despite the limitations of commerce and technology that all comic book artists face. It should come as no surprise, then, that she was a 1999 Eisner Award winner.

Varley is notoriously reclusive and it’s difficult to find out much about her. Here’s an interview with the LA Times circa 1990 where she briefly discusses her own process.

This interview with Dave Stewart is also worth a read for anyone interested in the techniques/process of other colorists.

In addition to being a brilliant and underrated artist, she was fundamental to the development of the slang used throughout The Dark Knight Returns.

“In the other books, it's just stuff I overheard or made up. But in Dark Knight, it all has to do with the town where [wife and colorist Lynn Varley] grew up. Her brothers—Don and Rob, by the way—were part of a bunch of kids who talked in this very peculiar manner. Whenever I heard it, I'd just go nuts, because I loved it. It was this very sarcastic mode of speech. One time I was in Michigan visiting the family, and I sat the two of them down and had them do it into a tape recorder, and I went back and studied it. Then I wrote my stories, and I would always show those parts to Lynn before I got it lettered, and she'd tell me where I got it wrong.”

 --Frank Miller

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Holy Terror, Batman!

The link between Batman: The Dark Knight Returns and Frank Miller's later ideas regarding terrorism and vigilante justice -- as well as his overt racism and Islamophobia -- raises a lot of uncomfortable questions. 

Consider Miller's graphic novel Holy Terror: published in 2011, it was initially conceived as a Batman story, a kind of propaganda piece. It gradually evolved out of the world of Batman and centered on a new character called 'The Fixer': 

"With Holy Terror, I seek to return to the traditions of the 1940s, back when Nazism was identified as an existential enemy, just as the Islamo-fascists have shown themselves to be in my time. Superheroes fight bad guys. These are very bad guys." --Frank Miller

This blog post appeared on Miller’s (now defunct) website during the height of Occupy Wall Street. further exposing Miller’s prejudiced views:

Additional Reading Material:

“Holy Terror Comic Is Islamophobic, Say Critics”, The National

“Are Frank Miller’s Politics Visible In His Comics?”, The Guardian

“Frank Miller’s Holy Terror Is Fodder for Anti-Islam Set”, Wired

See: The Joker

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“It was 1985 when I started working on this, and I thought, "What kind of world would be scary enough for Batman?” And I looked out my window.“ –Frank Miller 

What was happening in 1985?

60 people were killed (and countless more injured) by a massive car bomb in Beirut.

Ted Kaczynki, also known as the Unabomber, was still active. 

Philadelphia policemen dropped a bomb on Osage Avenue, attacking their own citizens

“Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.”

The Iran-Contra Affair

David Lewis Rice murdered a family of 4 because he thought they were Communist Jews

Mike Tyson burst onto the scene

Paul Castellano was murdered, thus effectively transferring control of the Gambino crime family to John Gotti

The first Nintendo Entertainment System made its debut in the U. S.

The Cold War was ongoing

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“A few years went by. Now it was the very angry late ‘70s, early '80s, the time of "Dirty Harry” and “Death Wish.” I started speculating how Batman would act, the kind of person he’d be in this world. Then I got the big light bulb: what if he was older or retired? What if he were the age of the legend?“ –Frank Miller

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The Joker operates within the narrative of Batman: The Dark Knight Returns purely as an agent of chaos. It’s important to note that he isn’t affiliated with any one religion, country, or political group. He doesn’t appear to be driven by anything except the joy of causing mayhem, the thrill of destruction, and, arguably, Bruce Wayne’s own existence. 

The Joker has no real cause, so to speak, yet he functions as a fairly blatant allegory for terrorism. This is largely what makes him so relevant and effective as a villain: he’s the Everyman of evil, willing to do anything for any cause if it will achieve the terror that he obviously desires.

Particularly interesting, then, is the juxtaposition between Miller’s current view of the state of world affairs (i. e. all Muslims are bad because they were behind 9/11, there is no distinction between Arabs, Muslims, or terrorists, AMERICA!) and the events that transpire in The Dark Knight Returns.

The Mutants, after all, place a bomb inside a woman’s bag on the subway. They murder innocent people and generally cause mass hysteria. They are terrorists. And yet, Miller allows them to find redemption: they become the Sons of Batman.

What, then, makes them so different from the terrorists that Miller eviscerates in works like Holy Terror and Anarchy?

Is it purely old-fashioned bigotry?

See: Holy Terror, Batman!

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Created by Italian artist Hugo Pratt in 1967, Corto Maltese centers around a swashbuckling rake who sails around the world in search of adventure. 

The contrast between the fictional character Corto Maltese -- a man who typically stood against colonialism, who always fought for the underdog and for the oppressed -- and the fictional South American island in Batman: The Dark Knight Returns upon which President Reagan exerts his own Imperialist tendencies makes for interesting satire.

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THE CREATION OF COMIC SANS

The much-maligned font Comic Sans, created by designer Vincent Connare in 1994, was originally intended to provide a cheery and more upbeat typeface for an early Microsoft children’s game.

This is especially interesting in light of the fact that Connare claims to have based it off Frank Miller’s Batman: The Dark Knight Returns and Alan Moore’s Watchmen, two graphic novels that, though acclaimed, are particularly dark and probably not appropriate for children.

It’s also indicative of the far-reaching effects that pivotal works like these have despite the cultural stigma surrounding comics as a medium. As Scott McCloud says in his conclusion to Understanding Comics (215):

“However you experience comics -- as reader, creator or businessperson -- there are a million and one ways you can help comics to grow into the next century.”