They Revised Art for 'Absolute Batman Inc.'

I’m sure quite a lot of people didn’t like it, and I’m sure even more didn’t quite get it, but Grant Morrison’s Batman Incorporated is an epic book. It’s a tribute and look back at Batman’s most iconic – if not forgotten – tales from the past. It updates, explains and ties together some of the Caped Crusader’s craziest adventures, spanning time and the universe.

Though DC was pleased enough with it to make an Absolute Edition of the series, they apparently thought the art needed some work. Recently colorist Nathan Fairbairn revealed some revised work for the new collection.

"When I started work on Batman Incorporated with Grant Morrison and Yanick Paquette, it seemed to me that the concept driving it (and, by extension, all of Grant’s Batman work) was that all of Batman’s long, byzantine history was in continuity, and that if you just gave Grant a chance he’d show you how all of those pieces fit together.Unfortunately, halfway through this series that was based on the idea that everything is in continuity, word came down that The New 52 would be happening, and that none of it would be in continuity anymore. Batman had never duelled Ra’s al Ghul in the desert. He’d never had his back broken by Bane. He’d never been a prisoner of three worlds with Kathy Kane’s Batwoman. Heck, there was no Kathy Kane anymore. No Stephanie Brown. None of that happened."

"On Batman Incorporated, it became necessary towards the end for series artist Chris Burnham to regularly turn on the bat signal and call for help getting the thing out the door on time. Several artists, but primarily Jason Masters — a great artist and friend of Burnham’s — were enlisted to help out with anywhere from 3-6 pages of interior art per issue."

"And so it was with a good deal of excitement that the creative teamed learned that the series would be getting the Absolute treatment, and that there would be time and a budget to revisit the series, and for Burnham to redraw every single page that he’d needed help on."

You can see more of the work and Fairbairn’s behind the scenes explanation of the Absolute edition right here.

They Revised Art for ‘Absolute Batman Inc.’

By Skip Harvey | Jan 9, 2015