Year One Batman: Scarecrow (a review)

Well, we can’t have Halloween without visiting our favorite master of fear, now can we?

The Scarecrow a.k.a. Dr. Jonathan Crane is one of Batman’s oldest villains. He debuted in September of 1941 in World’s Finest #3; he is older than the Riddler and the Penguin. And he’s just what he sounds like: a skinny dude dressed as a scarecrow running around terrorizing people with conventional weapons or his trademark fear toxin.

Of course, like any comic book character, his origin story has gone through quite a bit of tinkering over the decades. It’s mostly writers trying to add more details or go in a slightly different direction. And that’s exactly what today’s comic attempted to do.

Year One Batman: Scarecrow is a two-part comic published by DC back in 2005. Essentially, it’s a retelling of Scarecrow’s origin story for the 21st century and is supposedly a part of the whole Year One universe DC tried to make a thing. Bruce Jones was the writer and has done a crap ton of work for DC and Marvel, including issues of Batman and The Incredible Hulk. The artists are Sean Murphy, Punk Rock Jesus and Batman: White Knight, as penciler and Lee Loughridge, Arkham Asylum: Living Hell, as colorist.

But before I get to it, here’s a quick run-down of Scarecrow’s past origin stories for my dear family members who are still…