"Our run has been, on the one hand, on the surface, really bombastic and over the top, which is the type of Batman I always loved as a kid," said writer Scott Snyder, who has worked on Batman with artist Greg Capullo since September 2011. The team's first major story arc was The Court of Owls, followed by Death of the Family and then the ongoing Zero Year, a re-imagining of the caped crusader's origin. "But at its core," Snyder continued, "it's about anxieties, about mortality, about how we come to terms with our personal demons and our fears."
Snyder grew up reading and loving Batman. He learned to read, in fact, through reading comic books with his father, and as a young reader, Frank Miller's work on Batman--particularly the mini-series the Dark Knight Returns and the story arc Batman: Year One--reshaped his conception of not only Batman as a character but also of the potential of comic books as a storytelling medium. In Miller's Batman comics and in other, contemporary books like Alan Moore's Watchmen, stories were layered, sophisticated, psychologically nuanced and provocative.
"Batman is really a character who grew up alongside me," Snyder explained. As a result, writing Batman is for Snyder both a dream come true and an immense responsibility. "It's terrifying," he admitted. "He's my favorite character, and he means so much to so many people. But that's the challenge that makes it so inspiring."
From the beginning of working on Batman, Snyder's understanding of the character has continued to evolve. He was "just so terrified" at first, Snyder recalled, that it took some time to delve fully into the character and create his own, singular vision of Batman. A conversation with writer Grant Morrison, who'd had a seven-year run of his own on Batman across several titles, came as a "seminal moment": Morrison implied that every writer who has worked on Batman has his own version of the way the character is born and the way the character dies. From that point forward, Snyder felt it "really freeing" to re-imagine Batman.
With Zero Year, Snyder and Capullo are giving readers an unprecedented take on Bruce Wayne becoming Batman. Now with the main "Bat-book" firmly rooted in the past, DC Entertainment has just launched Batman Eternal, a year-long, weekly series that takes place in Gotham's present. Its story sets the groundwork for the next major Batman story arc to follow Zero Year, and Snyder is one of a group of writers working on the weekly series, including James Tynion IV, Ray Fawkes, Tim Seeley, John Layman and Kyle Higgins.
The writing of Batman Eternal is a kind of a round robin structure, with each writer creating a mini-arc of three to four issues before passing the baton to the next writer. As long as each writer keeps "clicking the big wheels" of the overall story arc forward, he can go wherever he likes, Snyder explained.
"Everybody brings something different to the series," Snyder said. "It's exciting to see each one of them do their thing in Gotham. James [Tynion] really loves the world building. Tim [Seeley] loves the really big, over-the-top Batman stuff. I'm really impressed with all of them."
Crafting a story spanning more than 50 issues has given the writers a lot of room to work with. They can explore in depth any character, however minor--from a janitor at Arkham Asylum to a rookie cop in the Gotham Police Department to an associate of Oswald Cobblepot. "It allows us to make the series experiential," said Snyder. "It feels like you're living and breathing and working in Gotham."
The third issue of Batman Eternal hit stores on April 23, and so far the series has been very well received. "I was really nervous that [writing Eternal] was going to be incredibly difficult. But so far it's been really effortless," Snyder mused. "People seem very supportive of it. We're really, really grateful for all the support that the readership has given us." --Alex Mutter
