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Comics and Magazines from Diamond Distributors for January 25 2012

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Leroy Douresseaux Reviews: TALES OF THE BATMAN: DON NEWTON

TALES OF THE BATMAN: DON NEWTON
DC COMICS

WRITERS: Dennis J. O’Neil, Bob Rozakis, Cary Burkett, Martin Pasko, Michael L. Fleisher, Marv Wolfman, Gerry Conway
PENCILS: Don Newton
INKS: Dan Adkins, Dave Hunt, Robert R. Smith, Kim DeMulder, Frank Chiaramonte
COLORS: Adrienne Roy, Jerry Serpe
LETTERS: Ben Oda, Todd Klein, Gaspar, John Workman, Milt Snapinn, John Costanza
COVER: Don Newton and Dick Giordano
ISBN: 978-1-4012-3294-8; hardcover
360pp, Color, $39.99 U.S., $46.99 CAN

[Tales of the Batman: Don Newton reprints stories from the following comic books: Batman #305-306, 328; Detective Comics #480, 483-497; The Brave and the Bold #156, 156, 165.]

Tales of the Batman: Don Newton is a recent DC Comics hardcover collection that gathers the work of the late comic book artist, Don Newton. Once an art teacher and fan and amateur artist, Newton had a brief, decade-long career as a professional comic book artist. Newton drew for Charlton Comics and Marvel Comics, but did most of his professional work for DC Comics. Newton died in 1984, at the age of 49, as he was set to become the series artist on Infinity, Inc., a spin-off of the 1980s DC Comics series, All-Star Squadron.

One of the characters with which Don Newton was most associated was Batman. Beginning with Batman #305 (cover date November 1978), Newton drew Batman and related characters in almost 80 stories that were published over a seven year period. DC Comics has gathered 22 Don Newton-drawn Batman stories in Tales of the Batman: Don Newton. These stories were published during a two-year period from late 1978 to late 1980 and were published in three Batman comic book titles, Batman, Detective Comics, and The Brave and the Bold (a Batman team-up book).

Don Newton’s compositional style reminds me of Jim Aparo, while his graphic design and page layout clearly show the influence of Neal Adams. Newton wasn’t a copycat, though; the way he composed the contents of his panels was and still is distinctive. Most of the stories here feature Dan Adkins inking Newton, but I prefer Dave Hunt, who inked the first three tales in this book. Hunt makes Newton’s figure drawing look gorgeous and smooth and made each element in a panel stand out, while Adkins’ inks allows Newton’s eccentricities free reign, which isn’t always a good thing.

The Batman of the late 1970s still retains some of the influence of Denny O’Neil (who wrote several of the stories in this book). O’Neil’s Batman is an ominous figure, more like the avenging wraith that appeared in the first Batman stories back in the late 1930s. However, I think the Batman in these Newton stories is most influenced by the work of writer Steve Englehart, who presented Batman as a “Darknight Detective.” In fact, this Batman is more detective than “Dark Knight.”

Newton is perfect for this kind of Batman, who creeps around inside, deftly crossing the threshold into buildings, hallways, rooms, laboratories, and other interior and living spaces. Of course, the Batman in these stories also swings over roofs, jumps on moving vehicles, and has no problem kicking as in his urban playground.

There is an awkward nature to the way Newton draws, but once again, that serves his stories well. Limbs flail and smash into things, which give a strong physical sense to Newton’s fight scenes. That’s why the fight in “The Perfect Fighting Machine” (Detective Comics #480) really looks like a fight to death – one that Batman might lose. Newton’s Bronze Tiger in “The Vengeance Vow” (Detective Comics #480) captures Bruce Lee’s movement in the static visual medium of comic books probably as best as anyone can. For an odd bit of physicality, Newton stages a fight between Batman and some thugs in the narrow rows between movie theatre seats (Detective Comics #487).

DC Comics sent me a copy of Tales of the Batman: Don Newton for review, and this is one of the instances when I feel a bit guilty about that. Why? It’s because after reading this book, I realized that I would have been happy to buy it. As with many DC hardcover reprint collections, the interior pages are made of coated or enamel paper stock. The reproduction of the comic book art is solid, and the restored color pops on the page. Only the reproductions of The Brave and the Bold stories can be described as poor.

With this book, DC Comics has made Newton, who is practically obscure now, seem like someone special. For awhile, Newton was special, because he got the plumb assignment of drawing Batman comic books on a regular basis. And you will also believe in Newton’s noteworthiness when you see Tales of the Batman: Don Newton.

A-

43rd NAACP Image Awards Nominations: Literature Categories

The NAACP Image Award an award bestowed by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). The award honors outstanding achievements by people of color in film, television, music, and literature. The awards are voted on by members of the NAACP.

The 43rd NAACP Image Awards winners will be announced in a ceremony, February 17, 2012 and broadcast live on NBC.

LITERATURE CATEGORIES

Outstanding Literary Work - Fiction
• "A Silken Thread" - Brenda Jackson (Harlequin Kimani Press)
• "Boundaries" - Elizabeth Nunez (Akashic Books)
• "Say Amen, Again" - Reshonda Tate Billingsley (Gallery Books)
• "Silver Sparrow" - Tayari Jones (Algonquin Books)
• "The Plot Against Hip Hop: A Novel" - Nelson George (Akashic Books)

Outstanding Literary Work - Non-Fiction
• "Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America" - Melissa Harris-Perry (Yale University Press)
• "Super Rich" - Russell Simmons (Gotham Books)
• "The Cosmopolitan Canopy" - Elijah Anderson (W. W. Norton & Company)
• "The Wealth Cure: Putting Money in Its Place" - Hill Harper (Gotham Books)
• "Who's Afraid of Post- Blackness?: What It Means to Be Black Now" - Toure (Free Press)

Outstanding Literary Work - Debut Author
• "2Grieve 2Gether: A Journal from the Heart Helping Survivors & Supporters Navigate the Healing Process" - Denise Hall Brown (2Lift 1Up Publishing)
• "A Defining Moment" - Patricia Duncan (IJABA Publishing Inc.)
• "The Loom" - Shella Gillus (Guideposts Books)
• "The Strawberry Letter" - Lyah Le Flore (Ballantine/Random House)
• "We the Animals" - Justin Torres (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

Outstanding Literary Work - Biography/Auto-Biography
• "A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mother" - Janny Scott (Riverhead Books)
• "Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention" - Manning Marable (Penguin Group (USA)-Viking)
• "My Song" - Harry Belafonte (Knopf)
• "No Higher Honor: A Memoir of My Years in Washington" - Condoleezza Rice (Crown Publishers)
• "The John Carlos Story" - John Carlos, Dave Zirin (Haymarket Books)

Outstanding Literary Work - Instructional
• "A Year to Wellness and Other Weight Loss Secrets" - Bertice Berry (Freeman House Publishing)
• "Living My Dream: An Artistic Approach to Marketing" - Synthia Saint James (Create Space)
• "Our Difficult Sunlight: A Guide to Poetry, Literacy, & Social Justice in Classroom & Community" - Quraysh Ali Lansana (Teachers & Writers Collaborative)
• "The T.D. Jakes Relationship Bible: Life Lessons on Relationships from the Inspired Word of God " - T.D. Jakes (Atria Books)
• "Too Important to Fail: Saving America's Boys" - Tavis Smiley (Author), Juan Roberts, (Illustrator) (SmileyBooks)

Outstanding Literary Work - Poetry
• "Afro Clouds & Nappy Rain: The Curtis Brown Poems" - James Golden (iUniverse)
• "Head Off & Split" - Nikky Finney (TriQuarterly Books / Northwestern University Press)
• "Honoring Genius: The Narrative of Craft, Art, Kindness and Justice" - Haki Madhubuti (Third World Press)
• "Intimate Thoughts" - Darrin Henson (Author), Anna Saunders (Illustrator) (Godzchild Publishing)
• "Last Seen" - Jacqueline Jones Lamon (University of Wisconsin Press)

Outstanding Literary Work - Children
• "Acoustic Rooster and His Barnyard Band" - Kwame Alexander (Author), Tim Bowers (Illustrator) (Sleeping Bear Press)
• "Before There Was Mozart" - Lesa Cline-Ransome (Author), James Ransome (Illustrator) (Schwartz & Wade Books / Random House Children's Books)
• "Heart and Soul" - Kadir Nelson (Author/Illustrator) (Balzer + Bray, an imprint of HarperCollins Children's Books)
• "White Water" - Michael S. Bandy (Author), Shadra Strickland (Illustrator) (Candlewick Press)
• "You Can Be A Friend" - Tony Dungy (Author), Ron Mazellan (Illustrator) (Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing - Little Simon)

Outstanding Literary Work - Youth/Teens
• "Camo Girl" - Kekla Magoon (Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing - Aladdin)
• "Eliza's Freedom Road: An Underground Railroad Diary" - Jerdine Nolan (Author), Sadra Strickland (Illustrator) (Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing - Paula Wiseman Books)
• "Jesse Owens: "I Always Loved Running"" - Jeff Burlingame (Enslow Publishers, Inc.)
• "Kick" - Walter Dean (HarperTeen, an imprint of HarperCollins Children's Books)
• "Planet Middle School" - Nikki Grimes (Bloomsbury Children's Books)