Where I realize the Long Halloween is a foundational story

Rereading Batman: The Long Halloween, I realize I had forgotten both how good it is and how long ago it was written. Almost thirty years ago but it doesn’t feel that way.

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Of course, part of why The Long Halloween feels timeless is because it is so firmly entrenched in film noire. Which I suppose means it is kind of timely but that time is the 1940s lol

It is also set in that mythic early period of Batman’s history before Robin. Which, in real life was eleven months of comic books but apparently lasted at least ten years of Bruce Wayne’s life in some continuities.

The Long Halloween is a murder mystery, one that never entirely gets resolved (at least to some readers’ satisfaction. And that’s just fine because that’s part of film noire) It also explores the fall of Gotham’s conventional organized crime with the rise of costumed lunatics taking over the criminal world.

The Long Halloween is not the only story that explores Gotham becoming a superhero setting with the likes of the Joker pushing out mobsters who haven’t escaped from Dick Tracy but it does a very good job of it. (It might be one of the earliest stories about that but Batman is too vast a subject for me to the sure)

The Long Halloween also gives us another origin story for Two Face. I’m honestly not sure how many of those we’ve gotten over the years. Two Face is such a hot mess that he can’t help but be fascinating. Again, it does a very good job of it. Having thirteen issues, eleven of them before the disfigurement, helps. It gives us time to get to know Harvey Dent before everything comes crashing down.

Researching the story for this blog, I found that it influenced the Nolan movies and 2022 movie. Which I hadn’t realized but I can see. The fact that I hadn’t realized it speaks to how well The Long Halloween has sunk into the DNA of Batman.

Because while it is a solid mystery with a fascinating serial killer and an engaging origin story for both Two Face and Gotham’s identity as a fever dream, it is, above all else, a cracking good story.