Quite a few of Batman’s enemies make an appearance, and their various psychoses twist around each character, their word bubbles dripping down the page or dissolving. McKean’s artwork isn’t for everyone, but it’s hard to imagine anyone else doing a better job conveying the atmosphere in Arkham, where the inmates are now literally in charge. Batman often appears as a splash of black ink with the trademark cowl, while the Joker is right out of a nightmare, glaring lidless eyes (almost as if he’s sliced the lids away with a razor), sharp teeth, and a face that looks like it’s about two feet long, and always smiling. McKean mixes collages with character drawings that are done in an almost photo-realistic style, except when they morph and stretch as the character pictured laughs insanely, or screams. The work he does as an illustrator is like that, times a thousand. I practically grew up with Dave McKean’s abstract and symbol-filled covers for Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comic books. I’ll start with the artwork, since that’s the part the jumps out at you the moment you open the book.

Grant Morrison’s first Batman title, the complicated story illustrated by Dave McKean’s fever-dream artwork has been called “groundbreaking” and “daring” by some fans, “overrated” and “a mess” by others. The comic operates on many levels and, like it or hate it, the results are pretty disturbing. The kicker is that the riot is inside Arkham Asylum, and it’s the inmates themselves who have invited Batman to come home where he belongs. The story: Joker and many of Batman’s greatest enemies are on a rampage, and Batman has been called in to rescue hostages and save the day. For its 25th anniversary, DC has released a deluxe version of the title, complete with Grant Morrison’s original full script and storyboards. 1989 saw the release of Batman titles like Legends of the Dark Knight, a comic book adaptation of Tim Burton’s film, and a very pretty Elseworlds one-shot, Gotham by Gaslight. It also saw the publication of the graphic novel Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth, a story that takes the regular comic book format and the hard-boiled detective image of Batman, and throws them both out the window.

Arkham asylum a serious house