Batman: Second Chances (Batman (1940-2011))

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Second Chance is an episode of the second season of Batman: The Animated Series. It features Two-Face as the main villain and is also his last appearance on the series. Beyond that, the comics offer an interesting combination of classic silliness and more modern seriousness. On the one hand we have Two-Face, still committing numbered crimes and flipping coins; on the other hand we have stories like Starlin's "Victims" which could have come straight out of O'Neil's dark-and-gritty Question series. Overall, the stories are surprisingly well written and mature for the time period (and still good today). Before the operation can begin, gunmen burst into the room and kidnap Harvey. Batman and Robin pursue the thugs, who take separate vehicles, but neither of them manage to save Harvey. (Batman reacts to Robin's failure rather coolly, to which Robin is a bit resentful.) Later they consider where the vehicles were going and who they were registered to, and conclude that either Rupert Thorne or the Penguin was behind the kidnapping. Robin goes after Thorne while Batman goes after Penguin.

Red Herring: A plot point. This, as Bruce realizes in hindsight, was the clue telling them all along who'd really orchestrated the kidnapping. Two-Face being Two-Face, he compulsively left two red herring clues rather than just one. If Bruce's objectivity hadn't been compromised by his old friendship with Harvey, he would've seen it from the start. The nurse helping Harvey Dent recover from his Two-Face personality is the same therapist from Part 1 of the villain's debut episode. I also really enjoyed the beginning of that story with that girl that he becomes friends with as Bruce that then gets murdered. That didn't really get an end in this issue though so. :/ Upsetting.The issues are interrupted by Year One which makes things a bit funny in regard to Jason’s timeline. Take a Third Option: Two-Face has to choose between letting Batman save him, but letting his coin drop in the progress, or falling to his death. He drops the coin and refuses Batman's help, causing him to fall, but Batman saves him at the last second. But of course, the one and only Dark Knight easily defeated the delusional man before stating he’ll get Carma some help. Might as Well Not Be in Prison at All: Batman clearly thinks the Penguin is still a threat even when behind bars; while Cobblepot has nothing to do with the kidnapping, he never claims he couldn't have.

Faked Kidnapping: A strange example in that that the person being kidnapped and doing the kidnapping are one and the same, but the Two-Face personality kidnaps the Harvey Dent one. New Job as the Plot Demands: The therapist Harvey sees for his other personality is now a nurse who's part of the operation that seeks to heal his scars and get rid of the Two-Face personality. Even Evil Has Standards: The Penguin has done terrible things during his criminal career, but he admits that kidnapping "a fellow rogue" while they're in the hospital is going too far, and he seems disgusted both at being accused of doing so and the fact that someone went that far in the first place. Finally we have Annual #11, or half of it. It's fine. It's a Penguin story, a good Penguin story, and how many of those exist? It has a lot of humor and heart, and makes Batman relatable which almost no other story in this volume does. But to me, it can't help but be overshadowed by the Clayface Allen Moore story which is also advertised on the issue's cover and, for reasons unknown to me, not contained in this volume. I'm really sore over that. The elder man shut down after the two youngest Waynes' death. He didn't talk, he didn't eat, and he didn't even try to take care of himself.When Batman first meets a tough kid named Jason Todd, the boy is more criminal than crimefighter. But from that first encounter, a powerful new bond is forged. The Dark Knight sees Jason’s potential to be a hero-as well as the rage and revenge that torment him. To start off, I don't know what this collection wants to be. Inside are Batman issues 402-403, 408-416, and half of Annual #11. In theory this collects most of the Post-Crisis issues of Batman before those collected in the Caped Crusader volumes. But if that were the point, why leave out the first Post-Crisis issue, 401? I would understand if they didn't want to include tie-ins, it's a part of the Legends event, but #416 is collected and it ties into to Millennium. I understand leaving out the Year One storyline in 404-407 as that story has become a phenomenon unto itself that is somehow separate from the rest of Batman lore despite defining so much of it. But why leave out Allen Moore's contribution to Annual #11? Frankly that Clayface story which I went out of my way to seek out after reading this is as good or better than the best tale in Second Chances. Batman meets up with Robin and is now sure he knows who kidnapped Harvey. Returning to the scene of the kidnapping, Batman finds masonry dust on one of the kidnapper's footprints. He now knows where Harvey is and heads out, telling Robin that he has to do it alone. This collected edition chronicles some of the key adventures in the short-lived career of Jason Todd, the second Robin, after his origin story was completely rebooted in the wake of Crisis on Infinite Earths. In some respects, Second Chances forms the first of a "Replacement Robin" trilogy that continues in Batman: Death In The Family and Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying. These comics were published at the same time Batman was going at it alone in Tim Burton's first feature-film adaptation, but stand as a testament to what an important place in the Batman mythos -- and superhero pantheon in general -- the Boy Wonder occupies. Jason moved into the manor after the two youngest robins died. Jason took up the mantle of Batman and was CEO of the company. But the main reason why he moved in was to take care of Alfred.