Batman by Tom King Omnibus Vol 1

by Tom King, David Finch (Illustrator)

Genres: Comics, Dc Comics, Batman, Graphic Novels

984 pages, Hardcover

Published August 19, 2025

Reviews

[Rob Marney · Rating 2 out of 5]

There are some individual great moments here, which are typically the quiet conversations and small scale characterization. High points are Bat and Cat's memories of how they met, the Ballad of Kite Man, Elmer Fudd, and I Am Batman. The art is pretty good throughout, with some individual creative moments and a heroic effort to make up for the plot.

Unfortunately, the rest of the book is just windy story arcs that are both decompressed and insubstantial. Every arc is 6 issues to say what you could say in 2 but with a lot of rippling muscles and gritted teeth in between. Catwoman is clearly the heart of the run, but she doesn't get almost any agency or dialogue that isn't explicitly a mirror of the Bat. She just appears out of nowhere and so does their relationship. Tom King just doesn't get Batman well enough to spend 600 pages dwelling on his character alone.

There's also a ton of superhero crossover nonsense that doesn't fit the tone of the book. Why does Batman have a great working relationship and support system when it's time to fight kaiju but then kidnap his allies when it's time to fight Bane? Why is the Button such a ham fisted nothing burger?

Overall this book has too much testosterone for me.

[Cristian Grisca · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this omni overall but there were two stories that were incredibly boring. The most boring one was the arc with monsters: there is a reason Batman and his main villains have no super powers, ‘cause you can better empathize with them. Reading about Gotham getting destroyed by some kind of monsters was very cringe. The other story I didn’t really like was the jokes and riddles, big potential but fast writing.
Everything else was very entertaining… poor Bane, he just wanted to heal from venom but Batman made him come back to it, lol.
A good omni, would recommend!

[Robert Pulvermacher · Rating 5 out of 5]

My second favorite Batman run after Grant Morrison. Tom King has his tics, with the 9 panel pages and the overwroughtness, but he makes decisions about the character that drive it forward in a manner no one else has accomplished in modern times (until Absolute Batman came out and changed the entire genre.)

[Doug Mason · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some brilliant material here, but like any long run, some stuff just doesn't meet the grade.

Recomnended but most of this is just average bat not world changing.

Monster arc is dreadful, War of Jokes and Riddles goes on way to lobg

[Jared Vanderkolk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love this run!! I am Bane!

[Sam Eggers · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good read