Dark Knight Strikes Again

Batman: The Dark Knight Strikes Again is Frank Miller's sequel to the Dark Knight Returns. It has all the same super heroes a long with some new ones like Wonder Woman and Dick Grayson. The story begins with Batman and Catgirl (formerly Robin) training a group of batboys to fight against Lex Luthor's control on the city. The batboys release many other super heroes from government buildings, where they were being forced to work for the evils that be. Superman, who is also under control of Luther, is told to stop Batman, but is defeated in the Batcave. Batman finds himself and his 'soldiers' to be pop culture superstars and start making public appearances preaching rebellion against the government. The Question, sort of a similar character to the Watchmen's Rorscharch in that he writes down his thoughts and observations in a notebook and tends to work alone, spies on Luther. The Question tries to get Martian Manhunter to kill Superman because he is too much of a powerful weapon for Luther to have in his power. However, while they are planning they are attacked by someone who looks like the Joker. The Question is rescued by the Green Arrow, but the mysterious bad guy gets away. Brainiac releases a monster on the city, which Batman ignores because he sees that it is an attempt to get him out of hiding. However, Brainiac makes sure that his monster defeats Superman and the other super heroes under his and Luther's control to make people stop believing in the power of super heroes. Superman does not die though because he is saved by his daughter Lara, who is also the daughter of Wonder Woman. Superman, Wonder Woman, and Lara run away from Luther to join Batman. But they also trick Brainiac into thinking they are going to give him Lara and by doing this they get the Atom to get into the bottle, where he lets out the Kandorians. This starts the revolution. Batman then lets himself be captured by Luther to distract him while the Green Lantern destroys his satellites that were going to kill most of the world's population. Luther is then killed by the son of Hawkman. Then Catgirl sends a message to Batman telling him that she is being attacked by Dick Grayson, who it turns out was the villain who looked like the joker, but he heals extremely fast and has the mind of the criminally insane. (Dick Grayson was Batman's first Robin). Batman throws himself and Grayson into a fiery pit of lava, but he is saved by Superman and Carrie.
Whew, summarizing is a lot of work for these books. I thought a lot of the same about this Batman book as I did about The Dark Knight Returns. I thought it was cool and fun, but not my favorite. I did like in this one how Miller explored a darker side of Batman by making it so he is willing to sacrifice the lives of innocents because the risk is too great. I also thought that Lara was an interesting character, showing traits of a villain even despite the fact that her parents were Superman and Wonder Woman. The art, again, was great; entertaining and lively. I also thought the pace of this book made it an easier read than the Dark Knight returns. All considered I liked this one better than the first.