Batman: Gotham Adventures #31

Batman: Gotham Adventures

by Ty Templeton (Script/Cover), Terry Beatty (Pencils/Inks), Lee Loughridge (Colors)

There's a blackout in Gotham! Citizens everywhere are running scared--and who else could be behind such uncontrollable chaos but the Joker?

Genres: Comics, Comic Book, Batman

44 pages, Comic Book

First published December 1, 2000

About the author

Tyrone Templeton is a Canadian comic book artist and writer who has drawn a number of mainstream titles, TV-associated titles, and his own series.
He is the brother of internet pioneer and entrepreneur Brad Templeton, and son of Canadian celebrities Charles Templeton and Sylvia Murphy. He lives in Ontario, Canada.

Reviews

[cauldronofevil · Rating 2 out of 5]

“Issue #31” starts with Joker crowing over the phone with his henchmen and three tied-up scientists. He is about to cause a huge electromagnetic pulse that will cause a city-wide blackout and render all the technology inert. This is due to our reliance on cloud computing.

Who the heck was he on the phone to!!?

Batman, Robin and Batgirl are busting up a gang of fur coat thieves when the blackout occurs. The phones are dead and even the Batmobile won’t start

Joker meanwhile decides to randomly attack a crowd that has gathered outside with candles.

”Gee boss, that’s the second biggest mackerel you’ve ever had in your pants.”

Beating them with fish.

It was actually Commissioner Gordon he called to take credit for the chaos.

Gordon remembers that 25 years ago there was a big blackout and there was looting, and fires.

Joker joins some punks looting and asks them to thank him. They fight.

Batman takes the batplane up in the sky. It was in the batcave, protected from the pulse. He creates a bat signal out of smoke and asks the people to go back to their homes over the plane’s PA system.

Nightwing stops some looters.

Joker starts to realize that he can’t get credit if no one can watch the news.

That was fun. A little too ‘silly Joker, tricks are for kids’ for my tastes. I like my Joker’s maniacal, but fun enough. 2 stars

[Jimmy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story for this issue is given in the front cover: “Chaos at the hands of the Joker!” Here the Joker sets off electronic magnetic pulse which cuts the power and electricity of the city of Gotham. The Joker wants to sow chaos in the city with the darkness of the night and take credit for what he’s done but Batman and Robin is going to try to bring order and stop the Joker. There’s this funny undercurrent in the plot where different people come up with different conspiracy theories of why there’s no power but when the Joker comes out and tells the public he’s the one that caused the power outage no one in the public believes him. Of course that upsets the Joker. That point is important for the way that the story ends. Fun and clean story, I recommend it.

[Steven Shinder · Rating 3 out of 5]

Always hated this Joker design.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Citizens of Gotham, do your part to keep the city safe

I think this story might just be my favorite. It's fairly rare in batbooks to really see citizens of Gotham who aren't either criminals or victims, but we see them. That the Joker's bid for attention is foiled - we all knew it would happen; it's not a spoiler - is just a bonus.