Back when DC announced its reprints of the Michael Fleisher Encyclopedia of Comic Book Heroes books, I wondered whether updated volumes were in the works. I wasn’t too optimistic, but I still wondered.
Well, I need wonder no longer, at least with regards to Batman: Bob Greenberger is writing a follow-up, The Essential Batman Encyclopedia. Greenberger explained:
Unlike Michael’s book, which covers Batman, Detective Comics and World’s Finest Comics from 1939 to more or less 1966, this book would cover every Batman comic book appearance in the DC Universe from 1939 through 2007. The entries would differentiate between the various parallel worlds in addition to changes resulting from Crisis on Infinite Earths and Infinite Crisis.
[...]
I plundered my collection, I plundered illegally scanned comics I did not own, I scanned websites to check facts and interpretations. Most of all, I relied on the master of the facts, John Wells. With his meticulous character lists, I was able to check where people appeared in addition to their varying interpretations. On some of the most difficult to reconcile entries, I showed him drafts and he turned them around with lightning speed. The final week, he helped me make Bruce Wayne and Batman coherent and allowed me to deliver on deadline.
The Batman entry, whose counterpart covered some 100 pages of the Fleisher book, checks in at 316,933 words. Therefore, it sounds pretty prose-intensive, as opposed to the more art-oriented DC Comics Encyclopedia. One would hope (even if, say, one is already looking forward to this book more than one expected to) that Greenberger’s updates include such bits of lore as the Super-Sons, the original Joker’s Daughter, and Dick Grayson’s college sweetheart (she was blonde; that’s all I remember).
The book will be published next June 10, timed naturally to coincide with the next Batman movie, The Dark Knight.
[Via Lying in the Gutters.]
October 22nd, 2007 at 8:43 pm
Lori Elton, dang it! I wish they’d toss out some Batman Family Showcase Presents: I’d really love to reread those Dick Grayson at Hudson U stories.
October 24th, 2007 at 7:55 pm
I just wish they’d call it “Encyclopedia Batmanica”. I’m going to call it that anyway, and I encourage others to do so also.