Morrison creates a symbolic world filled with religious symbolism, Jungian archetypes which mix with chaos theory and medieval romance. Unlike regular graphic novels with only adult themes, Morrison delves deeper into the psyche of Batman, creating a high octane plot by mixing psychology and action. The narrative travel back and forth, quite disjointed yet they are connected but doesn’t seem to follow the classical mode of cause and effect. The montage between the panels, exploring different time and space get increasingly confusing. The novel becomes increasingly complex, as both narratives of Batman and Amadeus Arkham get intertwined. Batman is represented in a different perspective of emotional, irrational yet realistic manner.
Arkham Asylum almost forms a critique to the 80s interpretation of the superhero. It becomes a psychoanalytical play where lunatics avoid facing their true self by disguising themselves as knights and martyrs. Though the coin lands on its scratched side, he lets Batman live.Īrkham Asylum tries to find similarity between a hero and a villain. In the end Batman leaves his fate in the hands of Two face. Past memories of his parent’s death begin to haunt him and he almost becomes a schizophrenic battling his divided self. Batman continues to suffer from internal turmoil. Another parallel narrative runs which describes the journal of Amadeus Arkham. He soon encounters Clayface, Scarecrow, Mad Hatter and Maxie Zeus. Joker forces Batman to play a hide and seek game inside the asylum, giving him an hour before his adversaries hunt him down. Batman almost become psychotic, relating himself to be a ‘freak’, he thinks going to Arkham would be like his homecoming. The narrative begins with Joker and other inmates having taken over the asylum threatens to murder the staff members, until Batman agrees to meet them. Mckean often describes Arkham Asylum as “horrible calamity of form and content.” It’s true he fills the panels with schizophrenic design and fuses it with photorealistic iconic images.Īrkham Asylum is a mental institution in Gotham, where almost all adversaries of Batman are held captive. Perhaps no other artist could capture the claustrophobic psychosis of Arkham Asylum. Arkham Asylum itself was a part of graphic novel movement, yet it stood apart from other works in terms of its art work and revisionist storytelling style. The medium was revolutionary, as it tried to revise the aesthetics of usual comic books. Graphic novels had already found a foothold in the comic book industry. It was published in the year 1989 and it soon became collector’s favorite. Arkham Asylum was a graphic novel written by Grant Morrison and illustrated by Dave Mckean.
0 kommentar(er)
