This Fan Favorite Batman Story Isn’t The Masterpiece It’s Made Out to Be (And I Will Die on This Hill)

With Batman: Hush 2 currently playing out in the pages of Batman, now feels like the perfect time to revisit the first one. For over 20 years, Batman: Hush has been heralded as a modern classic. And why shouldn’t it be? The story brought together one of the best writers to ever pen a Batman adventure — Jeph Loeb — and artist extraordinaire Jim Lee. On paper it sounds like a match made in heaven, and for some, it is. For me, however, Hush is a narrative mess with art that doesn’t match the tone of the story and characters that don’t feel like themselves. While I sincerely hope it doesn’t get my geek card revoked, I finally have to speak my truth: Hush is not the masterpiece you think it is, and it’s a hill I’m willing to die on.

Hush, for those who don’t know, is a 12-part mystery that brings Batman face to face with some of his deadliest foes. The story was originally published in Batman issues #608-619 from 2002 to 2003 before being collected into the graphic novel most fans know it as today. Partly told in the past, one of the story’s biggest hooks is retconning Bruce Wayne’s childhood to include a previously unmentioned best friend, Tommy Elliot, the titular Hush. And that’s where my grievances begin.

Look, I have no problem with retcons. I could hardly call myself a DC fan if I did. The problem comes when the retcon throws already established canon out the window. Before Hush, it had long been established that Bruce Wayne was 8-10 years old when his parents were gunned down in front of him. Hush raises his age to around 12-13 years old for seemingly no reason. Why does this matter? Well, for starters, it messes with continuity. DC pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths was all over the place in terms of when events happened, and comics would contradict each other all the time. Post-crisis, however, the editors made a strong effort to keep everything more or less consistent. Honestly, that’s not my biggest problem with the retcon, though. What upsets me more is that Bruce shouldn’t be that mature when his parents were killed.

Losing a parent at any age is traumatic, but there is a sweet spot — just old enough to form lasting memories but before adolescence — where their death would be impactful enough for their child to start dressing up as a flying mammal and kicking clowns in the head night after night. Bruce should also be young enough that his parents are his whole world. He shouldn’t be old enough to be distracted by girls and calculus finals. Also, as long as we’re putting it all out there, he shouldn’t have friends. Young Bruce should be a shy kind of awkward kid who spends more time with his parents than his peers because, again, his origin only works when his parents are pretty much the only important people in his life aside from Alfred — and even that relationship shouldn’t become very familial until Bruce needs a new guardian.

The addition of Tommy Elliot into Bruce’s childhood complicates things in a way that does Batman a disservice. But honestly, Elliot is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to my gripes with Hush, so let’s move on to a really controversial opinion: I don’t like the art. Don’t get me wrong, Jim Lee is one of my favorite comic book artists of all time, but his kinetic penciling style is better suited to a bright and colorful team book like X-Men or even Lee’s own Wildcats. His art is too bright, too clean, too comic-booky for Batman, especially Jeph Loeb’s Batman.

Batman is a noirish pulp hero at heart, and Loeb writes him like one. One of the reasons why Loeb’s Batman: The Long Halloween is so good is because of Tim Sale’s moody art style. Sale’s linework is a bit rough, his anatomy is out of proportion, and his panels are dripping with shadow. In other words, the perfect style for Batman and his Rogues. Jim Lee is too busy making sure you can see Batman’s ears through his cowl — easily my least favorite thing about how he draws the character — to ever draw the Joker with a million teeth in his oversized mouth the way Tim Sale does. To put it in simpler terms, Lee’s style doesn’t vibe with the Batman Universe.

After the art, I suppose I should touch on the writing. Jeph Loeb has written two of the best year-long arcs in Batman’s history, Batman: The Long Halloween and Batman: Dark Victory. Both of these stories explored Batman’s early years in new ways, recontextualized old villains, and added value to the overall Batman mythos. Hush, by contrast, feels like a weird hybrid of Batman’s greatest hits and a showcase for Jim Lee’s art. Sure, Long Halloween used all of Batman’s most iconic rogues to tell its story, but they felt like they were there for a reason. Hush shoehorns villains like the Joker and Killer Croc into its narrative basically just so Jim Lee can draw them. Croc, in particular, was subbed out for Bane in the Hush animated movie, and it barely made a difference. On top of that, the “mystery” behind Hush is so convoluted that I can’t really determine which rogues should be there. Maybe they’re all superfluous.

Perhaps Hush‘s biggest crime — besides being a pale Long Halloween imitation — is that it doesn’t get Batman right. Loeb writes The Caped Crusader out of character several times throughout the story. Take Batman’s famous line while he’s fighting a mind-controlled Superman: “Deep down Clark’s essentially a good person…and deep down, I’m not.” You mean to tell me that the same Batman who adopted a parentless tween because he didn’t want him to be alone after his parents died, the same Batman who sat with Ace and held her hand because she was afraid to die, that Batman is a bad person deep down? Sorry, but I don’t buy it. Then again, Hush also sees Batman punching Catwoman full force in her bullet-wounded shoulder to incapacitate her so she won’t stop him from murdering the Joker, so maybe he is a bad guy after all.

Almost all of my problems with Hush would have been eliminated with one simple change: making it an Elseworlds tale. By setting the story in the main Batman continuity, DC presented Hush as a sloppy, ill-fitting arc starring a not-quite-right Batman and a bunch of famous bad guys that didn’t need to be there. Overall, not exactly the modern “classic” everyone makes it out to be.

What do you think of Hush? Am I completely off base, or is it one of the weaker stories in the Batman canon? Let us know in the comments.