Batman #372 p. 1 (1984) - Full Title Splash

This page is both a grail and a metaphor. It's a personal grail because this is the first page of the first comic I ever owned. Those years as a kid I didn't acquire comics very often, so I read this book, and whichever others I received, time and time again. Though I skipped all the boring parts, and there were many for a 6-year old in Batman #372, I always started with page one, ingraining this title page in my memory. This page is a metaphor because when a personal grail like this finally pops up, as I predicted it would, and having followed the Don Newton market for a year and having lost a few pages from this issue at auction, I had to ask myself, What price, the prize?

Dough Moench, Don Newton, and Alfredo Alcala weave an archetypical noir tale in Batman #372. It's about boxing, fixed fights, racism and the men and institutions who uphold it, and of course, murder. Batman and Robin don't appear very much, just barely enough to call it a Batman story. The story mostly follows Tommy Dunfey, the #10 ranked contender, and the title holder Michael Greene, setting aside the differences in their skin color to stage a long-shot title fight. Meanwhile, George Straite, an unhinged racist who plots to assassinate the referee, Jake DaMaskey--who happens to be a great white, former champ--to spare DeMaskey the humiliation of having to count out a white boxer. Straite makes a cryptic threat against the Jake DeMaskey's life and this is what Batman is investigating. Meanwhile, Bats is clueless to Doctor Fang's machinations behind the scenes. Doctor Fang is fixing the prize fight. That's Doctor Fang on this page hitting the heavy bag as he conceives this plot with his spotter Woad, the Igor-like companion, accomplice, and servant.

This piece arrived with the indicia stats in pieces and hanging by a thread. I decided to remove it completely to at least get a scan of the "virgin" art with the blue pencil notes that would have otherwise lay hidden underneath. I may have the glue residue removed and the stats reattached at a later date.

11"x 16"
Ink over pencil.
Completely hand-lettered by Alfredo Alcala