Batman: Knight & Squire

Knight & Squire

When I visited the library the other day to grab some more graphic novels to tide me over between books, I came across the namesake of this post. "Batman: Knight & Squire" the cover of which depicts a dynamic duo in the vein of Batman & Robin, the two things that caught my eye most about this particular cover though, were the fact that our titular heroes are stood in front of Big Ben, something I found very intriguing for what I took to be a Batman title, and the authors name, Paul Cornell.

Many of you may recognise Cornell's name and make the connection between he, and some of the best episodes of Doctor Who of recent years (Doctor Who being one of the other things I'm obsessed with) and so I figured that this, surely, must be well worth a read.

Upon reading said graphic novel, I couldn't find my hunch to be more validated. Knight & Squire is a wonderfully clever, well balanced, witty riff on our favourite billionaire and ward team while seeming as an almost entirely fresh, new piece of work in its' own right.

Initially I was apprehensive and worried that it was going to be an attempt to feed everything from the Batman universe into a British counterpart, however, this wasn't the case. Knight & Squire is set in the same universe as other DC heroes and actually makes reference to how each of our English heroes and villains seem like copies or "cover versions" of their American inspirations.

Jarvis Poker: The British Joker

Most notably of all (aside from The Knight as a wonderful take on Batman) is "Jarvis Poker: The British Joker" an absolutely ingenious play on the classic character. Poker is a so-called villain heavily inspired by The Joker, in fact, he's his "biggest fan" and admires his style yet could never bring himself to commit any crimes and, thus, is admired by the other heroes and villains for carrying himself with poise and dignity, commanding respect and admiration, even though he's dressed in a Chaplin-esque incarnation of a clown costume.

The artwork of this entire book is sublime and masterfully evokes the tone and style of many of the classic Batman stories without being a direct copy, the designs of The Knight and Squire are absolutely gorgeous. The Knight's armour is excellently referential while remaining a striking, original image, allowing the reader to buy into the stories within with much more gusto and fervour than if this were just an out and out British-Batman.

The Cidermen

The writing is wonderfully playful for British readers and equally action-packed if you're unable to spot some of the quirkier references, Cornell has laced the script for this book with so many pop-culture references it's almost mind-boggling. My favourite of all is when Cornell show's his Doctor Who fanboy side by incorporating a team of super-villains called "The Cidermen".

While reading this book I found myself questioning how absurd a lot of the action was, only to check myself and relate it back to its' American counterpart, only to see that, in actual fact, this is no more campy or sent-up than any of the earlier Batman comics; as The Joker himself says of England, "The sheer camp! For you people, it's like the sixties never ended!" and, if the world were really like Knight & Squire, that'd be okay by me!

Ultimately, Knight & Squire is a wonderful tweak of the established Batman & Robin we all know and love, and it's a welcome change, the story telling is excellent, with the right balance of humour and action, the illustration is rich and detailed and the inside-jokes for the whole of Britain are a wonderful flavour that may well have gone over the heads of many an American reader.

Jarvis Poker holds the Lincoln Performing Arts Centre hostage.

All in all, I'd recommend this as a sterling read. It's a shame it ended so soon.

Finally, I couldn't let you go without telling you about how giddy I got when I saw that my adopted home-city of Lincoln was featured, most notably the LPAC theatre. It got me ridiculously excited.

Thanks for reading chumrades!