Alan Grant has a massive 2009 issues of writing credits, including reprints, under his belt according to the Grand Comics Database with fan favorite runs on characters like Judge Dredd, Lobo, and The Demon in addition to Batman in those credits. For the sake of brevity, I’m going to concentrate on his contributions to Batman, but there was a lot more to Alan Grant and it’s worth acknowledging.
Alan Grant was part of the great British invasion of the American comics industry in the 1980s which brought a fresh perspective to DC and Marvel and helped revitalize the comics industry. Alan Grant with temporary writing partner John Wagner, who apparently didn’t contribute much according to Alan Grant, took over as the regular writer of Detective Comics with issue #583 which hit the stands in November 1987. This was an era where creative teams were still trying to make sense of the changes that Frank Miller ushered in and how to apply them to monthly Batman comics. Alan Grant was following fan-favorite writer Mike W. Barr, was a virtual unknown in America, and was joined by carryover and newcomer artist Norm Breyfogle so it was not a hot fan-favorite creative team. And, apparently, editorial limited them from using most of the established Rogue’s Gallery. But sometimes lightning strikes and Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle would soon be one of the most beloved creative teams in the history of Batman comics.
The partnership between Grant and Breyfogle really blossomed over the next year. Yes, looking at it from the perspective of modern blockbusters, the initial run may not seem like it was full of monumental moments that can be mined for motion pictures. And perhaps that’s true, but reading those comics on a month-to-month basis was always a blast and I’d argue that they work as comics a lot better than many of the plot-heavy events. The ban on using the established Rogue’s Gallery actually made the comics Grant and Breyfogle were creating fresh and exciting. Sure, The Ventriloquist & Scarface, The Ratcatcher, The Corrosive Man, Mr. Kadaver, the Street Demonz, Anarky, etc. may not be A-lister villains that you’d expect to carry a movie nowadays, but what they were was fresh, new, unpredictable, bizarre, and fun. With one to four-part stories, no writing for the trade in those days, each issue delivered mystery, action, atmosphere, and fun. In many ways, it was a slightly more adult version of Batman: The Animated Series before its creation, and it was beloved by fans.
That integration didn’t matter to Grant and Breyfogle as they found themselves adept at switching gears. And, my personal taste just loves the structure of those single issue to four-part stories which always delivered the goods in terms of action, pacing, atmosphere, and character and never felt padded like many of the stories designed for the trade often feel. On a pure month-to-month comics reading basis, this may have been the best extended run of Batman comics during my lifetime.
Alan Grant was eventually swept out with editorial changes, but not after a remarkable body of work on Batman. Supposedly he had proposed some additional stories over the years, which were foolishly rejected by DC editorial. But, missed opportunities aside, the half-decade-plus run of Grant and Breyfogle was an absolute triumph that’s going to be long remembered. Here’s hoping that Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle are in a better place continuing their remarkable run. – Robert Reineke