Miller, Frank - The Dark Knight Returns, The Dark Knight Falls, page 47 (June 1986)

“I went through about a dozen versions of this last page, ranging from Wagnerian to this.” – Frank Miller, from the Absolute Dark Knight edition (August 2006), referring to the final page of ‘Batman: The Dark Knight Returns’

As I was contemplating pursuing this page, I went back and read ‘The Dark Knight Returns’ (hereinafter ‘TDKR’) and ‘The Dark Knight Strikes Again’ (‘TDKSA’). As an aside, I’ve always enjoyed TDKR, re-read it periodically and always feel like I draw something a little new and different from it at each reading – probably a function of my own views and perspective changing as I age. But, at all times, I have always considered it as fine a piece of graphic storytelling that has ever been done and one of the greatest Batman stories ever told. TDKSA is different – I read it when it came out, thought it was terrible as a standalone story and was worse as a sequel to TDKR. I gave it one more chance when it was collected – no help; still an intensely dark, fatalistic and joyless story.

Which brings me back to this page and my view of its multi-faceted importance. First, it’s the concluding page to a great story – that just happens to be about a comic book character – that uniquely speaks to the shifting sands of Batman’s world over his entire ‘career’. It’s a story of aging, life’s regrets and transitions, commitment, drive and finding meaning and purpose beyond the prime of our lives. The story begins with Batman confronting an old foe (Harvey Dent) and realizing that, notwithstanding all of the resources he threw as both Batman & Bruce Wayne at ‘curing’ him – Dent remains insane and a criminal. It’s the beginnings of a slow chipping away at the foundations of why Batman came to be following the murder of his parents. In this new world, confronting criminals and holding them accountable for their crimes is no longer done, let alone a means to improving society. Moral relativism rules the day and Gotham’s citizenry spend as much time questioning the motivations and behavior of Batman as they do the criminals he hunts.

Second, the panel speaks to the importance of 13-year-old Carrie Kelley, Batman’s newest Robin (despite the strong objections of the now 80+ year-old Alfred). She is an injection of youth into his life – and an important connection to Gotham’s future generation. She is the personification of the still positive impacts of school, athletics and Scouts on youth – and that such youth can still be inspired by the symbol of Batman. Everyone else in his life is aging and retiring and the next generation is completely rudderless. Without the emergence and presence of Kelley, you wonder what Batman would see as left to fight for as he confronts an unreformed historical rogue’s gallery, a new breed of criminal more depraved than ever and inept, leaderless government on all levels. She is why Bruce Wayne, in the final panel, may be the most hopeful and forward-looking he has ever been – a hope fueled by a newfound realization that the next generation is worth fighting for.

Lastly, the page capstones the central thesis of the story while marking the end of Bruce Wayne and the Batman. Lana Lang states the thesis early on - “We live in the shadow of crime, with the unspoken understanding that we are victims – of fear, of violence, of social impotence. A man has risen to show us that the power is, and has always been, in our hands. We are under siege – he’s showing us that we can resist.” In the much more complicated world in which he re-emerges from retirement in TDKR, Wayne realizes that today’s new breed of criminal is far different from the man who killed his parents – and against that breed, he grows to realize that a one-man war is ultimately a losing strategy. It’s going to take an army to resist the army facing him – and this panel marks the beginnings of him building it. With the death of Batman & Bruce Wayne, he can become a symbol for that army – and a symbol can be everlasting. When the inevitable confrontation with Superman comes, Kelley asks him, “You going to die or what?” His response, “Figure I will.” And die he does.

All of that leads to the beauty of this last page and it’s stark contrast to the beginning of the story. In the beginning of TDKR, Bruce Wayne is an alcoholic playboy, adrift and without purpose with his alter ego, the Batman, still lurking within. He's at the end and he frequently thinks about his death - "This would be a good death...but not good enough." At the story’s conclusion, Bruce Wayne ends as he began – he’s shed the persona he created to deal with the tragedy of his parents death – and like a parent he is now going to educate and train the next generation to attack the vastly different and growing complexities of their world - "This will be a good life...good enough." It’s an amazingly uplifting ending with imagery that speaks to the new doors being opened for the Batman mythos.

Too bad TDKSA slams every one of those doors shut.