You know, it’s hard to go back to this one nowadays. Not because it’s a bad story or anything; on the contrary, A Death In The Family is probably one of the better Batman stories out there, even when you take the controversial circumstances surrounding its conception out of the equation. But rather because the big twist would be undone a decade after the fact and thus the impact of the story is ultimately lost.
So this is the story commonly known for the death of Jason Todd – at the time, the second character to assume the mantle of Robin and a somewhat unpopular character due to his more impulsive nature compared to the original Robin, Dick Grayson – who had assumed the identity of Nightwing by that point. In a rather bold and unorthodox move for its day, DC would place the fate of Jason Todd in the hands of its readership by way of a telephone poll where caller would call one of two numbers to determine whether Todd would survive his fatal blows or perish… and callers voted to kill the character off by an extremely slim margin, much to the chagrin and outrage of the mass media, appalled by the idea of DC killing off one of their most well-known characters, even if it isn’t technically the same character they were thinking of.
While A Death In The Family might be known for the killing of a major character, it shouldn’t detract from the fact that everything that comes before and after the scene of the crime is excellent, beginning with Jason Todd coming across information regarding the location of his birth mother in some foreign land. Unfortunately, also in this foreign land is the Joker. Things pick up steam, then Robin gets killed off, and now Batman has to deal with grief and a desire to end the Joker once and for all; a task that becomes a bit more complicated.
A Death In The Family remains one of the perennial Batman stories ever tol. Not only due to its main climax, but also for being a solid story overall with some fantastic art from Jim Aparo and Mike DeCarlo. And while Jason Todd has long since been resurrected because DC has run out of original ideas, thus rendering the big climatic turning point moot, this is still a good thrilling read from the days when such stories were done on a regular basis. Recommended.
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