Batman vs. Three Villains of Doom

Batman vs. Three Villains of Doom (1966)
Winston Lyon
([LibraryThing] [Amazon])

Original novel based on Batman television series (1966-1968) (Cover blurb: "Now a spectacular new ABC-TV network series starring Adam West and Burt Ward." Cover title given as "Batman vs. 3 Villains of Doom".) The Joker, Penguin, and Catwoman all vie for the "Tommy" award, given once every ten years by the heads of the underworld to "the man or woman who has done the most for CRIME". The mission each has to succeed at: the outwit or destroy Batman and Robin.

Okay, for what it is, a tie-in to the television series. Interesting more for being an early such tie-in (coming out while the show was still riding it's peak of success) than for the story told itself. Lyon (who also wrote a novelization of the Batman movie released in theaters later that same year, also starring Adam West, Burt Ward, and company) does an serviceable enough job. At times one can picture the television actors in one's mind's eye while reading Three Villains of Doom--and Lyon does at times capture the "feel" of the campy 1960s show--while at the same time Lyon takes advantage of being able to place parts of his book in locations and situations which would have been difficult to film on a television show budget.

The downsides are 1) an increasing sense of predictability that increases as one continues through the novel due to the nature of the story being told (villains get their challenge followed by each individually attempting to outwit or destroy Batman and Robin), and 2) a style of writing (rather common of the comics based superhero novels of this early period, I believe) that's pretty shallow, character wise. What I mean is very little (if any) room given to looking in on the primary characters' thoughts or motivations. All that matters here is plot, plot, plot (and a pretty simple plot, at that). And at times the narration is pretty clunky, especially with constant references to the characters by their "superhero" and "super-villain" names ("Batman and Robin did this", "Catwoman did that") and, when referring to the two leads, constantly referring to them in their secret identities by their full names ("Bruce Wayne turned to Dick Grayson"; two paragraphs later, "Dick Grayson replied").

Still, an interesting book for Batman (the comics character), the 1960s Batman television show, and/or superhero prose fiction fans. (As far as I can tell, this is only the second novel ever released based on a DC Comics character, following the much earlier Adventures of Superman novel by George Lowther in 1942. That'll be the next superhero novel on my reading list.*) Definitely worth taking a look, if you can find an inexpensive used copy somewhere. (Finished reading 6/10/09)

(* Please take a look at a project I've been working on the past three weeks or so. I'd been surprised that no one had put together a complete list of novels based on comics over on Wikipedia, so I finally decided to go ahead and put one together myself. At the time that I'm writing this blog, the list includes 312 separate novel and prose short story collection listings. This project has inspired me to read through my superhero novels, only a relatively few of which I've actually read prior to this point. Of course, this is in addition to everything else I'm reading at the time! So I'm sure that it will be an on-and-off sort of thing, as usual.)

Terminator: Salvation Movie Prequel #1-4

Terminator: Salvation Movie Prequel #1-4, Terminator: Salvation Movie Adaptation Teaser #0 [Grand Comics Database links: 1, 2, 3, 4, 0; Comic Book Database: 1, 1(a), 2, 3, 3(a), 4, 4(a), 0]
(February through March 2009, April 2009)
IDW Publishing
(Version read: Terminator: Salvation Movie Prequel trade paperback edition (2009) [LibraryThing] [Amazon])

Credits:
Writers: (Prequel #1-4) Dara Naraghi; (Teaser #0) Jeff Mariotte
(Teaser: "Based on the motion picture written by": John Brancato and Michael Ferris)
Penciller: (Prequel #1-4) Alan Robinson; (Teaser #0) Don Figueroa
Inker: (Prequel #1-4) Alan Robinson; (Teaser #0) Don Figueroa

Series Notes: Terminator: Salvation Movie Prequel: Numbers 1-4 of a 4-issue limited series. Most (if not all) issues originally released with both regular and variant covers (primary cover artist: Nick Runge); Terminator: Salvation Movie Adaptation Teaser: One-shot.

Comments: Terminator: Salvation Movie Prequel (story arc titled, "Sand in the Gears") focuses on human resistance fighters, primarily in the locations of Detroit, Michigan, and Arlit, Niger. Leads into Terminator: Salvation movie (2009), but only in an indirect way. John Connor is heard broadcasting via radio to his fellow resistance fighers in this series (as he does in the movie), and is also seen in a few flashback scenes with one of the characters here, but otherwise is not present. Several of the models of Terminators introduced in the movie are also seen here.

Average enough (actually, "okay", at best), but hardly essential reading. Basically just fleshes out what others in the resistance are doing during this period. Art wise, perhaps not surprisingly, the artist (Robinson) does a better job of drawing the various Terminators and associated technology than he does the human characters.

Trade paperback edition also includes Terminator: Salvation Movie Adaptation Teaser #0, a one-shot apparently reprinting just the first part of the movie (which is what makes it a "teaser", I suppose). Didn't read this as I initially thought that it was a preview for a longer movie adaptation mini-series and I don't usually read such previews. Glancing through it, the art does look better than that of the prequel mini, though.

(Finished reading 5/31/09)