80 Years of Batman-C2E2 and More
The Dark Knight is turning the big 8-0 this year, and the celebrations have already kicked off, with panels at Wondercon, and at Chicago’s C2E2. What does DC have planned for the Bat, as he turns octogenarian?
Starting with the C2E2 panel, DC marched out some of it’s biggest guns to celebrate and talk all things Batman related. Peter J. Tomasi (Batman and Robin, Detective Comics), Jason Fabok (Detective Comics, Batman: Three Jokers), Marc Silvestri (Batman/Joker: Deadly Duo), Tom Richmond (Mad Magazine), and Chrissie Zullo (DC Collectibles and statues) discussed topics as diverse as Gotham’s role in Batman’s popularity to Batman’s greatest villains.
Over at Wondercon next weekend, DC plans to unveil the full slate of Batman-related celebrations. Onee panel at Wondercon will include David Mazouz, star of the hit TV series Gotham; Kevin Conroy, the legendary voice of Batman in Batman: The Animated Series; Lee Meriwether, Catwoman from Batman (1966); DC Publisher and Batman: Hush artist Jim Lee; and Batman pop-culture specialist Grace Randolph.
All this is buoyed by the release next Wednesday of Detective Comics #1000, a huge milestone in comics publishing.
Additional celebratory events are planned, including a return of Christopher Nolan’s wildly popular Dark Knight trilogy to select theaters. A retrospective hardcover Detective Comics: 80 Years of Batman will also be released next week, along with dozens of variants of the aforementioned Detective Comics #1000, drawn by some of the most influential artists in Batman’s history.
From midnight on Saturday, March 30th, through 11:59 pm that day, DC’s streaming service will also be free–for Batman-related content. In a move that will almost certainly wreck the internet in a way not seen by comics fans since Marvel made all it’s #1 issues free on Comixology a few years back, for one 24 hour period, you will be able to watch every Batman movie on the service, and read every Batman comic on the service.
There will be, inevitably, more celebrations as the Dark Knight heads into his 81st year, and this is just a sampling of what you can expect, and what has come so far.
Rich Davenport graduated from Concordia University in St. Paul Minnesota with a B.A. in Mass Communication. He is a lifelong comicbook reader, a film fan and a hardcore video gamer. He also makes a lot of funny faces in pictures, much to his wife’s chagrin.
