Batman: Blink

Batman Post-Crisis #16

by Dwayne McDuffie, Val Semeiks (Illustrations)

A serial killer is loose in Gotham. He has no pattern, and he leaves no clues for the police or Batman to follow. The only certainty is that he will strike again.

Acclaimed writer Dwayne McDuffie (STATIC SHOCK, TV’s Justice League Unlimited) and artists Val Semeiks (DC ONE MILLION, LOBO) and Dan Green (JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA, Wolverine) present a team-up like no other with BATMAN: BLINK, collecting BATMAN: LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT #156-158 and #164-167!

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Batman, Dc Comics, Superheroes, Comic Book, Graphic Novels Comics

168 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2011

About the author

Dwayne McDuffie was an American writer of comic books and television. His notable works included creating the animated series Static Shock, writing and producing the animated series Justice League Unlimited, and co-founding the comic book company Milestone Media.

He co-hosted a radio comedy program, and also wrote under a pseudonym for stand-up comedians and late-night television comedy programs. While working as a copy-editor for a financial magazine, a friend got him an interview for an assistant editor position at Marvel Comics.
While on staff at Marvel as Bob Budiansky's assistant on special projects, McDuffie also scripted stories for the company. His first major work was Damage Control, a series about the company that shows up between issues and tidies up the mess left by the latest round of superhero/supervillain battles. While an editor at Marvel, he submitted a spoof proposal for a comic entitled Teenage Negro Ninja Thrasher in response to Marvel's treatment of its black characters. Becoming a freelancer in early 1990, McDuffie followed that with dozens of various comics titles for Marvel comics, DC Comics, and Archie Comics.

In 1992, wanting to express a multi-cultural sensibility that he felt was missing in comic books, McDuffie co-founded Milestone Media, a comic book company owned by African-Americans.

After Milestone had ceased publishing new comics, Static was developed into an animated series Static Shock. McDuffie was hired to write and story-edit on the series, writing 11 episodes.

McDuffie was hired as a staff writer for the animated series Justice League and was promoted to story editor and producer as the series became Justice League Unlimited. During the entire run of the animated series, McDuffie wrote, produced, or story-edited 69 out of the 91 episodes. McDuffie also wrote the story for the video game Justice League Heroes.

McDuffie was hired to help revamp and story-edit Cartoon Network's popular animated Ben 10 franchise with Ben 10: Alien Force, continuing the adventures of the ten-year-old title character into his mid and late teenage years. During the run of the series, McDuffie wrote episode 1-3, 14, 25-28, 45 and 46 and/or story-edited all forty-six episodes.

On February 22, 2011, McDuffie died from complications due to a surgical procedure performed the previous evening.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwayne_M...

Reviews

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I almost returned this to the library without reading it, because the cover looked sort of cheesy, and instead of being new (like I originally thought), this is a reprint from a few years ago. That's the one bad thing about putting books on hold online. I search using publication date to find the new stuff, and occasionally the publication date is a big fat liar.
Ok, not so much liar as tricker.
Tricker is a word...I don't care what spellcheck is telling me right now!
Anyway. What was I saying?
Oh. Yes, I almost didn't read Blink, but I'm glad I did.



It's not like this is a must-read Batman story, but it is a good Batman story. It reminded me of the older Batman stuff. You know, where he was a detective with gadgets.
The criminals feared him, and the police loved him!
At one point, Gordon even has him in the interrogation room.
You don't see that shit much anymore, you know?


Another thing that was different, was that Batman was considered an urban legend. Like, he's not a fact of Gotham.
Myth...*wiggles fingers* Ooga Booga Boo!



Alright, Blink refers to a guy named Hyland. He's blind, but because of {no explanation necessary} can see through the eyes of anyone he touches.
Sounds hokey, but it works!
When the story starts, he's using his power to rob people. Using his dog's eyes, he'll accidentally bump into his mark, then look through their eyes for the next few weeks or so, until he spies them paying bills. Armed with their account numbers, he transfers all of their funds into his offshore account.
Nice setup, right?
Yes, yes it was.



Until he bumps into a serial killer.
Ok, now he might be a thief, but he's not evil. So, when he witnesses this man killing a woman, he rushes to her rescue. The killer escapes, the woman dies anyway, and Hyland is left covered in her blood at the scene of the crime. However, since he's blind, there's no way he could have done it.
It's a mystery...



Like I said, Hyland isn't evil, so he tells Gordon & Batman what he can do. Batman believes him, and decides to use Hyland's gift to track down the killer.


There are two parts to this story. The first half is spent figuring out who's killing these women & why, and the second half is another Batman/Hyland team-up...of sorts.



Anyway, I enjoyed it. It had this old school feeling to it, without all of the crunchy old school dialogue.

[Sam Quixote · Rating 1 out of 5]

Lee Hyland is a blind grifter with a superpower: when he touches you, he can see through your eyes for a time. He uses this ability to spy on his marks until they take a look at a bank statement and then he uses that info to clean them out. That is until one day his latest mark kidnaps and murders a woman, inadvertently getting Lee involved with the mob - Batman to the rescue!

Blink was a stinker. This was, at best, a weak Batman subplot that got streeetched into six long issues (that felt way longer) by Dwayne McDuffie. It’s actually two different story arcs and both are pretty bad. The first one is a really sketchily-written story about how Batman uses Lee to catch some nameless gangsters - or something to that effect because it’s that poorly written. The bad guy is some balding guy in glasses - totally forgettable.

The second is about Batman saving Lee from the government after he volunteers to spy on international villains for them using some Cerebro-type machine - more vague plotting. I guess Lee’s just born with these powers but it’s never clear exactly how they work, like how long can he see through the person’s eyes and if he touches someone else, does that mean he loses the other person’s vision or can he switch between them? Can he see through anything with a set of eyes? He can see through his dog’s eyes as well as human eyes.

It doesn’t really matter though as in the second story any conceit about touching people to see through their eyes is thrown out the window because McDuffie didn’t know how to conclude this arc without some hack nonsense. Also, good thing when he was looking through Batman’s eyes that, in the Batcave, Alfred never called him “Master Bruce” like he always does! And why is it the murderer in the first story kills his victims in an empty lot, completely out in the open, in broad daylight, making it easier to stop him? Lots of convenience in this script…

It’s a Legends of the Dark Knight story meaning it’s from early in Batman’s career which is why he finds these nothing goons a challenge supposedly because he’s not as capable yet. McDuffie’s inconsistent though as Batman can take out a room of armed soldiers single-handedly in one scene and then struggle with one armed thug in another! It also means that awful unreadable cursive script throughout because Batman’s apparently writing this down as a casefile for later review.

Blink’s stories bored me throughout; the plotting was rote and sloppy as well as everyone besides Lee being written as a one-dimensional “character”. Val Semeiks’ art never really felt distinctive or interesting either – it’s standard, competent, dull superhero art. Definitely not a must-read for Batman fans - I didn’t get anything positive out of this one at all.

[Lost Planet Airman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Entertaining collection of seven or eight issues of Batman in two related stories, narrated by the Batman's early journal entries. A con man with the power to see through others' eyes is witness to crimes and gains the Batman's attention.

[Molly™☺ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Containing both 'Blink' and 'Don't Blink', the former is a much stronger entry than the latter. Tonally different, 'Blink' acts like a more traditional detective mystery that nicely wraps up, whilst 'Don't Blink' is a more grand scale, action piece with a less satisfying conclusion. An overall entertaining collection, Lee's character allows for some interesting ideas and gimmicks, but the execution falls just short of being fantastic.

[Matthew Ward · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow! I loved this story! Dwayne McDuffie did an incredible job creating a new Batman villain/character in this one. While the power felt a bit ridiculous, this story still read as mostly believable within the parameters of a Batman story. The art and coloring on this one shined, as well! I loved the two different sides we say of this new character and seeing how Batman dealt with each of them. Very well done! Looking forward to more stories from LOTDK.

[B. P. Rinehart · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a solid graphic novel by the legendary comic book writer Dwayne McDuffie (the creator of Static Shock among other things). McDuffie was not the first black comic book writer to work at the big two of Marvel and DC Comics (that honor goes to Christopher J. Priest of Black Panther fame), but he may be the most celebrated. He wrote prolificly for Marvel Comics and DC Comics and later became the show runner for cartoon Justice League Unlimited and Static Shock as a part of the DC Animated Universe. In this story, we have him giving of an interesting take on Batman.

This book looks at Batman after the events of Batman: Year One, but in the then-current time of post-9/11 (the weirdness of comic book time). So we have police lieutenant James Gordon instead of police commissioner. This is Batman towards the end of his time simply going against regular villains, but before he is taking on super-villains--basically crime noir Batman like his early comic book appearances. The Dark Knight is much more of a detective than a typical superhero and he is still in the last "learning-stages" of his early years as his 1st person narration indicates (calling back to Batman: Year One). Joining him in this graphic novel as the co-protagonist is a blind meta-human named Lee Hyland who works as a scam artist until he gets mixed into a serial murder conspiracy and teams-up with the Dark Knight (who at this time is known to the police under Jim Gordon's command, but still regarded as more of an urban legend by the wider society of Gotham.

I really enjoyed this early-Batman-take of McDuffie's--he's still young, but has the swagger that characterized the prime-Batman who would take on The Joker and Two-Face, etc. I wished Dwayne McDuffie would have been given a shot at writing him in his ongoing comic books, but given the adversity he faced when he finally got a chance to write the Justice League of America, it probably was not meant to be. I should be happy we get this over nothing. Like with the other books I have read by Dwayne McDuffie, I like the humanist-feel that is in this story.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

There is absolutely nothing remarkable about this story, good or bad. The Blink character himself is kinda odd and not that interesting. Bruce's internal dialogue in the form of diary entries is also mostly uninspired.

I'd say the best part of this book is the juxtaposition of the cartoonish appearance of the art (not in a bad way, I liked it) against the intensely dark subject matter. We see an underground snuff film business, and also an infant trafficking ring.

Batman still batters some goons and showcases his iron will, and Jim Gordon helps him save the day.

Will any of this blow you away? No. But if you like Batman, you'll enjoy this book.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

So this story is about a man called Lee Hyland who is blind but has the ability to see what other people see when he touches them and happens to stumble across a murder.

I liked this story, it was actually two separate stories but both about Lee and Batman. The first was good and did a good job setting up the character and had an interesting concept with his ability that was used well. The second was a bit more cliche with it being about the government but still an enjoyable read.

Overall this was a good Batman story I liked and enjoyed but isn’t really a must read.

[Julio Bonilla · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lee Hyland is a blind man who can see through the eyes of anyone he touches.

This Batman graphic novel is a total detective story about a man who can see the world through his hosts eyes after having touched someone reminiscent of Daredevil. Let's not forget, DC rivals Marvel Comics.

[Kyle Dinges · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

Batman: Blink collects issues 156-158 and issues 164-167 of the original Legends of the Dark Knight series. Originally published in 2002 and 2003, it’s written by Dwyane McDuffie and drawn by Val Semeiks. There are two different stories collected here. The first is the initial 3-issue Batman: Blink storyline and the second has the pair returning to the same characters a short time later in the Legends of the Dark Knight series.

Blink is a blind man that has a special power that allows him to see out of the eyes of anyone he makes contact with. For years, Blink has been using this power to get rich by draining people’s bank accounts after seeing all of their information through their own eyes after touching them on the street. Things get messy when Blink makes contact with a man who turns out to be a serial killer. While trying to help the woman about to be murdered, Blink is mistaken for the murderer and it’s then that he makes contact with Batman.

This conceit about Blink being able to see through others’ eyes is sometimes used effectively to tell a Batman story from a point-of-view that readers aren’t used to seeing all that often. Rather than a straight-away inner monologue and shots of Batman brooding, McDuffie and Semeiks leverage Blink’s power to tell some of the story in first-person. It’s an interesting tool that helps separate Blink from any number of other “Batman must stop serial killer!” stories that got told during this same period of time. However, I would have actually liked to see more of this during the first story collected here. There was much of less of it in issues 2 and 3 and it ended up being a more standard Batman story. As is typical of Legends of the Dark Knight, the story is more grounded and based on Batman solving street-level crime. Apart from Blink’s powers, what you end up with is pretty standard 90’s/early 00’s Batman fare.

The second story in this collection “Don’t Blink”, finds McDuffie and Semeiks teaming up again for a new Blink and Batman tale. With the groundwork already laid during the first arc, McDuffie jumps right in a few months after the previous story ended. Replace a crime ring with the secretive federal agencies and the stage is set for a story that’s not that dissimilar from the first. One thing that’s pretty striking is that you don’t see Batman stories like this that often anymore. As the twenty-first century progressed there were fewer and fewer of these street-level stories where Batman is solving crime and a more concerted effort at over-the-top villains and blockbuster action. It is refreshing to read something smaller in scale, even if some of the content likely wouldn’t make it past the editorial desk today.

Semeiks’ art throughout both arcs is pretty consistent with the DC house style from this period but wouldn’t necessarily be that out of place on the stands today. It doesn’t feel dated, apart from the obvious changes to Batman’s depiction from 2002 to 2020. McDuffie has given Semeiks a lot of ground level action to work with. Absent is the rogues gallery that Batman is so famous for, but Semeiks gets to spend about half the book rendering Batman doling out justice on criminals and crooked government men.

All in all, I thought this collection was pretty enjoyable. Going on two decades since it’s been released, it still manages to hold up pretty well. There are most definitely Batman story arcs that have aged much more poorly. It certainly feels like a late 90’s/early 2000’s Batman story, but it’s still pretty effective today. It’s not overly dense and flows well. One thing that stands out is how much the characterization of Batman has softened compared to this fairly brutal version that was en vogue for about two decades after Frank Miller first started writing the Bat. Batman: Blink wasn’t ground-breaking, but it was a perfectly serviceable small-scale Batman story and a pretty quick read.

[Shannon Appelcline · Rating 3 out of 5]

McDuffie's two stories tell of a blind who can see the world through others' eyes. The first story is pretty good, revealing how he stumbles across a serial killer, and decides that he has to get involved. The second just drags out the concept, mixing in a government conspiracy and another crime that the blind man helps Batman solve, though it's gotten pretty color by numbers at this point. Clearly, you can have too much of a good thing.

[Rob McMonigal · Rating 2 out of 5]

Two stories featuring a character who can see through the eyes of anyone he touches, but doesn't care he could find out Batman's secret ID. A bit of Silver Age thinking, but the tone of the stories is very much modern Batman, with child kidnappers and snuff films as the villains. It makes for a bit of a jarring read, and while enjoyable, not anything special, despite being written by the usually strong McDuffie--I'm wondering if he was handicapped editorially?

Val Semekis's pencils are amazing as always. I love his broad-shouldered Batman that looks very imposing. A few of the page breakdowns are a bit awkward, though.

Overall, an okay take on Bats, but nothing special. He's very much a Live Journalist here, though, which is...cool? Odd? Bad? You make the call.

[Corey Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it.

We follow this character, named Lee Hyland, who is blind and has the ability to see through other people's perspective. Lee gets himself into some trouble and ends up seeing through the eyes of a killer. This ultimately gets batman to team up with Lee and try to stop a number of villain's.

There's also some fun detective stuff with Gordon, which I always like. I also really liked the art.

SO anyways, I really liked and would recommend giving it a shot.

[John Yelverton · Rating 5 out of 5]

The concept, on the surface, seemed absolutely awful. A blind man who sees through other people's eyes? Really? But Dwayne McDuffie did a phenomenal job, and you will be touched and on the edge of your seat as you turn every page.

[Brittany · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been in the mood to read some comics lately, so I picked this up from the library. It was pretty good. I really liked the concept with Hyland. My one complaint is that it ended a little abruptly. Overall though, it was good.

[David Muñoz · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of my favorite writers writes one of my favorite characters, and I am very split on how I feel about it. Blink is a storyline running in the ‘Legends of The Dark Knight’ series, or what I like to call, ‘The Bat-novellas’. This 7 issue storyline is split into two sections featuring a character by the name of Lee Hyland. Lee is a blind man who has an amazing ability to see through the eyes of others after he’s touched them. He first uses this ability to scam people, and get quick money out of their accounts, but after looking through the eyes of a crazy psychopath, he tries to stop him from murdering an innocent woman, but instead stumbles over the body and is made a prime suspect. After Batman gets involved Lee convinces him that he is actually blind, has special abilities, and is not a murderer. They then team up together to stop a group of snuff film killers who Lee had tried to stop the first time. The second story shows Batman going back to Lee to see if he can help him with a child-trafficking case. However when he goes to Lee’s home he doesn't answer the door, it’s instead Lee’s girlfriend, Karen. She tells him Lee has been gone for a long time after he had been approached by some sort of government agents. They wanted to test Lee and find out more about his powers. Batman goes in for a rescue mission as he sees they’ve been using him to spy on terrorists, and not in the best conditions for Lee.

Dwayne McDuffie is the writer for this story, and I’ve heard mostly good things so my expectations were a little high. NowI found the premise of the 2 stories interesting. I liked the character of Lee Hyland and thought his ability was cool. I also liked McDuffie’s writing in the narration and dialogue, especially with Batman. However what brought it down a bit for me was the pacing of the book and the overall execution on how this 2 part storyline ended. The story never reeled me in as much as I wanted, and if not for McDuffie’s great work on writing, the plot of the story wouldn’t have been enough to get me to give it more than 2 stars. It wasn’t terrible, but in the middle it felt like it dragged, and there were some decisions made that felt silly for a Batman story. The 2nd part of the story was a little more well-paced, however there are a lot of unanswered questions from me, and as mentioned previously, I found myself thinking “why is this happening..why not just do this...how is this possible?” There were just some story plots that obviously needed to be a bit more thought out. Not bad, but not the best for such a well thought out writer.

The artwork was by Val Semeiks with Dan Green on inks and I found the work to be very enjoyable. Semeiks has a really great look for Batman and I particularly loved his choice for costume design. Semeiks’s style feels animated and gives the vibe that it could be a great style for a Batman cartoon.

Overall; I very much feel split on this story and although I think McDuffie’s writing was great, the plot and pacing weren’t as good of a match. The art was great though and in general the story wasn’t terrible but I was expecting more. So maybe it’s on me, but I still love McDuffie as a writer and wish he was still with us. FOREVER RESTING IN POWER.

[Jimmy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This volume is a reprint of some older Batman issues (the original work was not in 2015). This book collecting Legends of the Dark Knight issues 156-158 and Action Comics 847 and presents two story concerning a blind character name Lee Hyland. Originally I wasn’t going to read this book since it looks like “90s stuff” but it turned out to be better than I anticipated.
Actually the story telling was pretty good. Mr. Hyland is a blind man with an unusual supernatural gift of being able to see through the eyes of others whom he touched. You see how the character changes from the beginning of the story to the end. I liked that. I wish we saw more of that in comic books. Lee was originally a grifter and in the beginning of the book he talks to the readers and explain how he does his identity theft by touching others and having the ability to access their sight and therefore eventually over time he sees their check books, bank account numbers, etc. It happen that one time he bumped into a man that had an usual habit: he didn’t have a job but always had plenty of cash to buy things. But Lee Hyland soon discover that this was a murderer for hire. But who would believe a blind man if he went to the police? Lee goes to the scene himself and stumble upon the corpse and the police arrested him yet they can’t explain how a blind man was able to know about the crime or how a blind man would be able to commit the murder. Since Lee was taken by the police the criminal elements found out about Lee and now Lee’s own life is in jeopardy. Fortunately Batman believes Lee’s own testimony that he can see through touching others. The rest of the first story is Batman protecting Lee and also bringing down the criminal elements. The first story ended with Lee Hyland taking a new direction of his life of living straight.
The second story is a four part story titled “Don’t Blink” and it involved Batman on the hunt to take down a criminal ring trafficking stolen babies. He goes out to try to enlist Lee Hyland’s help but discovered that Lee’s taken away and enslaved by a rogue government agency for intelligence purposes. The rest of the story involves Batman freeing Lee and also working with Lee to bring down the trafficking ring while at the same time dealing with those who would want Lee again.
I love the written inner monologue showing what was going on in Batman’s mind and Lee Hyland’s mind. I enjoyed seeing their opinion of things; it also add to the drama of the story telling to know their own struggles, acknowledge their own missteps and their worries. It was nicely illustrated and the storyline was even better. I recommend this work.

[Ben Truong · Rating 4 out of 5]

Batman: Blink is a collection of seven issues from the original run of Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight. It mainly features a collection of a couple of stories that centered on Lee Hyland as Blink, who is a blind man with the ability to see through other people's eyes by touching them. Batman: Blink collect seven issues (Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #156–158 and 164–167) from the 1989 series run and collect two stories: "Blink" and "Don't Blink".

"Blink" is a three-issue storyline (Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #156–158), has women of Gotham City being killed in horrific manners. However, aside from the ugly nature of their deaths, there seems to be nothing that explains the reasons these women was targeted or who has been targeting them. Lee Hyland is the only surviving witness and the cops don’t expect he will be a useful one, because he is blind.

"Don't Blink" is a four-issue storyline (Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #164–157), has babies being kidnapped in Gotham City and used in a stolen-baby-selling racket. Bruce Wayne as Batman and the police knows that Carson Clarke is behind it, but they cannot prove it. Determined to put Clarke behind bars, Batman recruits Lee Hyland – at least he tries to as he has seemingly vanished.

Dwayne McDuffie penned the entire trade paperback. For the most part, it is written rather well. McDuffie has created a wonderful character in Lee Hyland as Blink – a blind minor villain that uses his meta-human powers of vision projection – meaning he could see through the eyes of those he touches. Lee uses his power to skim other people’s bank accounts, watching through his victims' eyes as they type in PINs and passwords, but when he touches a serial killer, he risks revealing his minor criminal present to stop him.

Val Semeks penciled the entire trade paperback. Since he was the only penciler, the artistic flow of the trade paperback flowed exceptionally well. For the most part, Semeks' penciling is wonderful, albeit a tad dated, which is rather apropos for a story early in Batman's vigilante career.

All in all, Batman: Blink is a wonderful trade paperback centering on a newly created character in Lee Hyland as Blink, which unfortunately is not memorable enough to survive the one (or two) story villain and enter the massive Batman's Rogues Gallery.

[Luana · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was initially turned off by BLINK cuz of the inciting incident is the shockingly violent (for a superhero comic) murder of a 22 year old woman. None of it was on-page, of course, and it’s simply a regular old crime scene, but the stuff Gordon tells Batman definitely made me wince a little. Kudos to Dwayne McDuffie (hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Static shaaawwwck) that he basically makes you forget this by the second issue because this was really just window dressing to get Batman into an elaborate series of twisty chases. Oh the bad guys turned on each other? Oh now one of them has a baby hostage? Oh there’s government agents now? There’s a real wild 1930s vibe to the story structure here (I almost wanna say Tintin-esque!) that just throws new shit at you every few dozen pages and you, like the titular character, are just along for the ride.

“Jeez Batman, don’t you know any NICE people?”

“Hmpf”

[Gregory · Rating 5 out of 5]

This story takes place during Batman's early years. A series of murders attracts the attention of both The GCPD and Batman. A man named Lee Hyland aka Blink is connected. He has the ability to see through anyone's eyes with a touch.

This story originally appeared in Legends of The Dark Knight that was written by the late Dwanye McDuffie. The story is solid and doesn't disappoint. The artwork from Val Semekis fits well with the story and its not overdrawn which I prefer in a comic book and graphic novel if the story and artwork connect together.

For a great mystery and fans of Batman, this is for you.

[Fraser Sherman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lee Hyland is blind, but when he touches someone he can see through their eyes ... ah, so those are the passwords to your online accounts? Thanks! When he becomes involved in a snuff-film case Batman's working on, the Dark Knight realizes Hyland can guide him to everyone who's watching the films.
That's "Blink." In "Don't Blink" Batman needs Hyland's help again, but Hyland's been taken by government spooks to exploit his powers. Can Bats get him back?
The first is a tightly written adventure; the second, as others have noted, feels like it's milking he concept some, but it still works. Batman's first person narration adds to the fun.
Overall, a solid little story.

[Dan Hensley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really great book. This contains two stories: Blink and it's sequel Don't Blink. In Blink, Batman gets help from a blind man to stop a snuff film ring. Due to how that story plays out, in Don't Blink the blind man's life is now at risk and Batman has to save him while also dealing with a group of child traffickers. All in all, I was presently surprised by this one. I had never heard of these stories before and expected them to be sub-par but they were actually great. McDuffie really understands how to write for Batman and it shows. Glad I have this in my collection.

[Daniel Kovacs Rezsuk · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Blink", the first story contained in this volume is a very good example of how to utilize Batman as a storytelling vehicle for introducing a brand new concept - in this case, character - and placing him in the center of the plot. This is how many Judge Dredd, Conan, Hellboy stories work. It's kind of astonishing how few Batman stories that I have read so far had taken this approach and made it work. Dwayne McDuffie was truly an excellent storyteller (R.I.P.). "Never Blink" (also collected here) lacks the same punch, but is still an excellent, albeit a little abrupt sequel to the original three-parter. Highly recommended, just don't expect heavy focus on Batman alone or other, more prominent members of the Batman mythos.

[Simon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow!
I have read a lot of Batman these last couple or so years thanks to the Eaglemoss collection. There has been stories I have read before and stories that are new to me. Stories that were good and stories that were bad. Stories I have heard of and stories that I hadn't.

The two stories in here were easily two of the best Batman stories I have read. I love the smaller lesser known characters. Stories that fit into Detective Comics frame rather than a superhero one. Blink is not only an interesting character but a great foil for Batman and for a writer.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved everything about this story. The protagonist was a blind guy who had the ability to see through others eyes through touch and this was his beautifully written story.

My favourite version of batman is when he first starts his vigilante career and is still hopeful and young, idealistic in his pursuit for justice. As he became involved with Blink, the unconnected murder of women and the trafficking of babies (over Batman's dead body) the caped crusader started coming into his own. I love seeing him flawed and learning.

Really great issue, gorgeous illustrations.

[Freya Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

I started this a couple days ago maybe a week but forgot, anyway it had that 2000s comic look so I had hope Tim would appear maybe Steph but it was a solo Batman comic, I didn’t mind that though because it was so good, I picked it up first because of the colours, I love the detective style and how it feels like he’s starting out as Batman but not a full beginner, which I think he is. The character blink guy was cool and overall the story was interesting

[Kenneth Clark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Way better than expected.

I almost didn't get this book because I hadn't ever heard of it before. I figured if it's reputation hadn't reached me by now, it must not be that good. Man, was I wrong. This book was exciting, inventive, and absolutely genuine Batman. I highly recommend that you give this a read.

[Rizzie · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Blink" and "Don't Blink" are surprisingly fun little tales that don't quite go in the direction you expect. They aren't going to change your life, but Dwayne McDuffie knows how to keep the audience engaged.

[Collin Henderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rock solid set of stories. Batman teams up with a con man who is blind, but can see through the eyes of others by touching them. I'm surprised this character of Hyland hasn't returned in some capacity.

[Phil Barnett · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyable read. Not the best, but by no means the worst Batman graphic I have read this year. The second instalment is a little more forgettable, but, all in all, a decent enough addition to my collection.