Review by Ian Keogh

One Bad Day is a series of hardcovers spotlighting the villains of Gotham and involving the idea of a single bad day, inspired by Alan Moore’s starting premise for The Killing Joke.

When Ra’s Al Ghul was introduced three factors distinguished him from run of the mill villains. He was obviously not American; he was effectively immortal due to baths that could restore him from death, and his prevailing agenda was preserving the planet. His methods are barbaric, but ecological imperatives remain his motivation to this day, and these are what concern Tom Taylor.

They’re of interest for seeming to have Batman on the wrong side of the argument for humanity’s future. As Bruce Wayne he heads a global company, and those running similar organisations with little concern for the future are being murdered. Complicating matters further is this being set during the modern era when Robin is Damian Wayne, grandson of Ra’s Al Ghul.

Ivan Reis is a formidable artist, but puzzling for having no distinctive stylistic quirks immediately identifying a page as his. Every page features impeccable storytelling and is dynamic or subtle as needed, but would you recognise a page of his art without his name attached? He’s been a class act almost from the start, though, and this is widescreen action that still brings out the finer nuances of Taylor’s story.

Taylor cheats on the One Bad Day theme, his outcome hinging on a bad incident rather than a bad day, but that’s quibbling. He raises an existential issue, and halfway through delivers a shock transforming what had been a perfectly acceptable story into something more.

All One Bad Day hardbacks are available with a standard cover, while the smaller comic versions feature four rarer alternatives, and despite being self-contained they’re all numbered as #1. The entire run is also available together as a boxed set packaged with a hardcover edition of The Killing Joke.