I didn’t know this about Legends of the Dark Knight:
Legends of the Dark Knight was, at the time, an altogether different kind of monthly comic. Instead of launching with a stable creative team, the book was conceived from the get-go as an anthology, with rotating creators switching arcs. Additionally, the book was not set in the present of the DCU, but in the past – specifically, the “Year One” period popularized by Frank Miller in his work (with David Mazzucchelli) of the same name, which had also served as one of the stylistic influences for Tim Burton’s movie. So while LotDK was designed to fit into the then-modern post-Crisis continuity, filling in the gaps of Batman’s early years, it was still, like “Year One,” at a distance from contemporary goings-on. What this meant in practice – although this mandate loosened as time wore on and the “Year One” period became increasingly crowded – was: no yellow Bat-symbol, no other superheroes, and especially no Robin. Oh yeah, the Comics Code was conspicuously missing as well – although, at least for this first arc, the lack was often academic.
I always thought LotDK was supposed to be out of continuity stories, for a slightly more “mature” audience who didn’t want to sully their hands with the real thing. Whenever I read it, the stories were always vaguely disappointing, despite the talent involved. It always felt like trying too hard to imitate Year One or The Dark Knight Returns. To be honest, that was the case with most of the Batman and other DC “prestige” projects post-Watchmen/Dark Knight and to add insult to injury, mostly the “mature readers” labels on them didn’t even mean decent T&A, just more dreary superheroics with a bit of mock swearing.
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