Batman (1940-2011) #13

Batman (1940-2011)

by Bill Finger, Don Cameron, Eric Carter

Featuring the short stories "The Batman Plays a Lone Hand," "Comedy of Tears" starring The Joker, "The Story of Seventeen Stones," and the train caper tale "Destination Unknown"!

Genres: Comics, Batman, Comic Book

68 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 30, 1942

About the author

William "Bill" Finger was an American comic strip and comic book writer best known as the uncredited co-creator, with Bob Kane, of the DC Comics character Batman, as well as the co-architect of the series' development. In later years, Kane acknowledged Finger as "a contributing force" in the character's creation. Comics historian Ron Goulart, in Comic Book Encyclopedia, refers to Batman as the "creation of artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger", and a DC Comics press release in 2007 about colleague Jerry Robinson states that in 1939, "Kane, along with writer Bill Finger, had just created Batman for [DC predecessor] National Comics".

Film and television credits include scripting The Green Slime (1969), Track of the Moon Beast (1976), and three episodes of 77 Sunset Strip.

-Wikipedia

Reviews

[Tawfek · Rating 3 out of 5]

First story the batman says goodbye to robin temporarily, as he was scared for his life after getting threatened.
Second story is about the joker he messes up the lives of random people, but honestly i don't remember what else happened after that even though i read it yesterday.
Third story is about a guy obsessed with stones, and wants to kill a guy with it.
Fourth story is a train adventure where batman and robin rescue a train from crashing twice

[Dr Rashmit Mishra · Rating 3 out of 5]

• The first story involved Batman for some reason saying hurtful things to Robin and pushing him out on the streets of Gotham all alone , later revealed to be a ploy by Bats to keep Robin safe . It was rubbish to think about and very jarring , but again it was 1940. 2 out of 5
• The second tale had a clever plan of joker where he forged signatures for dirty deeds   , now this was a  clever tale and it was entertaining 4/5
• Third one detailed a mobster who recovers from amnesia and tries to go get some revenge Batman ofcourse stops him 3/5
• This was a fantastic story where Batman had to do some detective work and in the end the reveal was very nicely tied up to the story 4/5

[cauldronofevil]

The Batman Plays a Lone Hand! starts by telling us that Batman & Robin have put away countless evil-doers but last issue they said it was 118!

Dick Grayson is crying and walking out of Wayne Manor with his suitcase while Batman is ripping a poster of Robin out of its frame!

Flashback to Bruce Wayne packing up Dicks suitcase.
From. Now on the Batman works alone!

Bruce says he’s tired of fighting crooks and having to watch out for Dick at the same time. It isn’t right for a kid like you to be chasing around getting into fights!

Especially in speedos and pixie boots!

Bruce says goodbye and that he’s left money to take care of you. Maybe they’ll run across each other again sometime.

Dick things back to all the times they’ve been in peril together and the number of times when he’s saved Batman’s life. Is it that he just doesn’t like him anymore? Or maybe he thought Robin was getting too popular! Dick doesn’t want his money so he runs away to show that he can take care of himself.

I wouldn’t recommend being homeless in a yellow shirt, red sweater and green checkered pants. Hey! That’s a casual Robin costume!

Wandering through the poorer sections of Gotham, Dick sees a Bat-signal. He sees Batman swinging over the city getting shot at by crooks and then…

Wha…? Another boy in a uniform like mine, working with the Batman! l

Dick goes to pawn his two-way radio for $8.

Earlier we see the Batman chasing the Thumb a gangster that tried to kill the mayor. He and his gang are driving through town at 50 miles per hour!

Unfortunately the Thumb doesn’t have a costume. Just the striped suit and fedora of criminals everywhere.

When the Thumb sees Batman & Robin swinging across roofs they shoot at him.

The kid is the one I really want!
With th’ kid gone, ‘th Batman will go crazy!

They machine gun Robin down from the rooftops and he drops sickeningly. Batman then swoops down on the car and fights them all. But the sap him from behind and throw him out of the car.

Batman can’t catch the crooks but he then goes to pick up he dummy dressed up as Robin. He is laughing.

Towing this dummy behind me with a wire certainly fooled them!

Next day in the newspaper there is an advertisement for Batman and an address that promises ‘Interesting Information’. Signed ‘a friend’.

I’m not sure publishing the address of your hideout is the best way to set a trap.

Batman disguises as a Fuller Brush man to get into the hideout. He tries to fight the Thumb but a trap door in the floor puts him in the basement. They tie him up and brick him up in the basement so they can starve him to death.

They left him with the brushes so he uses one of the wire brushes to slowly cut his ropes.

Is this early product placement?

Once free he realizes he can’t get through the bricks. He hates to call Robin after what happened yesterday but he’s desperate and calls on his two-way radio.

When the pawn shop owner hears the call, he turns the radio off. He doesn’t like excitement during business hours.

Applying for a dishwasher job, Dick overhears two crooks laughing about Batman being buried in a basement.
His first case without me to help…and he failed! I’ll bet that other kid let him down.

Dick follows the three armed gangsters and changes into his uniform (which he kept).

But it doesn’t matter if they do kill me, now that he’s gone…

When Robin busts in they think he’s a ghost at first.

I’m here to even things up for the Batman!

They overwhelm Robin and take him to the basement. They have to chisel a hole in the brick wall to toss him in as well. When they make a hole however, Batman’s fist shots out. They all fight.

When the fight is over, Robin says that Batman won’t be needing him anymore.

Guess I’ll make a nuisance of myself somewhere else!

Batman shows a letter that the Thumb sent to Commissioner Gordon saying that they will shoot at Robin to kill unless Batman lays off of them.

A heartwarming story of a true partnership that has its roots in child abuse!

5 stars

Comedy of Tears starts with Dick waking from a nightmare of fighting the Joker. Joker has escaped again.

Dick has a wide variety of pajamas.

The next day men with sandwich boards and balloons advertise a that tragedy is the other side of comedy with the Jokers likeness.

Elsewhere little Johnny Blake finally gets a good report card which the Joker steals from him.

My first success in making people cry!

Aiming a little low aren’t you Joker?

Later he works his way up to a homeless guy who earned $5. A henchman takes it.

Then Joker takes the job references of a chauffeur.

Batman & Robin wait in costume and Batman suddenly realizes what Joker’s after.

Batman has guessed the secret of the Cry-Baby Crimes. Have you?

No. I have not.

At a movie studio a selected gala crowd is gathering to celebrate the filming of the final scenes of a great epic. The Joker and his henchmen get in because of passes with the signatures retrieved from the stolen paperwork.

Good thing they didn’t notice the Tommy guns under our coats!

They rob all of the guests and raid the dressing rooms for valuables.

Batman & Robin intervene. They fight. A cameraman films it. Joker tricks Batman and holds him hostage, telling Robin to trade the loot and jewels for Batman’s life. Robin agrees but Batman tells him:

Robin, those are not our jewels to bargain with!

Batman jumps over the cliff. Into a safety net. The Joker and his henchmen escape. But they dropped a newspaper article about Pretty Boy Duncan who will be electrocuted tonight.

At the prison, the Joker (in disguise) brings in a reprieve from the governor and takes Duncan to be ‘interviewed’ by the governor. But as they drive away from the prison, they see the Batmobile behind them.

When the Joker’s driver hits a dead end they jump out of the car to an exclusive beach club. Batman & Robin take out the henchmen but the Joker steals a sand sailboat. Batman steals another one and goes after him. Batman leaps onto the Joker’s vehicle. They fight. The vehicle crashes into reefs and goes into the sea.

Batman surfaces and swims to shore. The Joker doesn’t. So he must be dead.

Next week, the Joker uses forged servants references to rob rich homes.

So to act as bait, Dick puts an ad in the newspaper claiming that he is a champion autograph hunter and gets the autographs of Joe DiMaggio and Jerry Siegel, the creator of Superman. Also the famous author, Mr. Artemus Bigby.

Why didn’t you just get Bob Kane’s autograph while you were at it?

Someone steals the autograph book from Dick.

At the hotel a man walks up to the hotel desk and says that Mr. Bigby asked him to get the key to his private safe that he left with the hotel. Here’s his note. Joker thinks he can sell his butterfly collection for $100,000. That’s some collection.

Hmm… okay! It’s in our vault! I’ll get it in a minute!

When Joker and crew open the safe, Batman & Robin jump out. They fight. Bigby helps by using the chloroform he uses on butterflies on the crooks. But Joker grabs Robin and holds scissors to his head. He will let him live if he gets $100,000 from Mr. Bigby. Batman agrees and gives his word he’ll give him someone else’s money.

Joker takes Batman’s word for it. Batman hands him an envelope.

Pretty silly overall. And Batman has a few ‘Adam West’ moments in this one that are pretty ridiculous.

2 stars

The Story of the Seventeen Stones! starts in the Gotham City Prison yard where convicts are breaking rocks with hammers and pickaxes. They discuss Rocky Grimes getting out of prison after twenty years.

In front of the Warden, Rocky claims that he is not the gangster Rocky Grimes! But since he’s served twenty years he is released. Rocky doesn’t remember being a crook or anything about his youth.

Turns out that he is Rocky but a blow to the head caused comic-book amnesia! When he is freed, another blow to the head returns his memory!

Since stones got him into this trouble and he spent 20 years breaking stones and now stones got him out of this, he’s going to get revenge - stone style!

Lefty Slade gets crushed by rigged falling stones. Next ‘Fin’ Gonzy is stabbed with a touchstone.

Originally, it was a dark stone (like jasper or basalt) used to test the purity of gold or silver by analyzing the streak left when the metal was rubbed against it.

Next day Batman & Robin meets the mayor and the architect (Mason) of a new orphanage.

Hello, Batman! (What a strong face he has! I’m glad I went straight! I wouldn’t want him after me!)

When the cornerstone of the building is lifted by crane the cable breaks and the stone falls over Mason. Batman tackles him aside just in time.

Batman & Robin chase the crane operator. In Gotham City all orphanages are built on beachfront property so Rocky jumps into a boat but not before pouring oil all over the water. Batman & Robin steal a boat to go after him and Rocky lights the water on fire. Rocky escapes.

Batman & Robin visit Commissioner Gordon to find out what the victims had in common, but Gordon tells them a masked man with a Tommy gun took some cards from the criminal file and burned them all!

Batman sciences the charred paper and can now read it to determine that the criminals killed where all part of the Rocky Grimes mob twenty years ago. Two more crooks are left alive and one of them is a diamond-cutter who is will be at a jewel exhibit tonight!

At the exhibit Rocky paid to have a bloodstone cut into the shape of a bullet.

The night of the show, Rocky prepares to shoot the diamond-cutter when Robin attacks him. Batman joins the fight.

The police are eager to help.

All right, men! Shoot him down!

Rocky spills a bowl of gems around which distracts the crowd enough for him to get away. Batman & Robin chase him.

In Gotham City all jewel exhibits are built next to abandoned stone quarries so Rocky runs there. Rocky sets a trap so that Batman & Robin run right into a stone that knocks them out. Rocky ties them both up.

He ties a stone to Robin and throws him into a hole in the partially flooded quarry. Robin will be able to tread water until he gets tired.

He surrounds Batman with piles of sulfur that he sets on fire so Batman can breathe in the poisonous fumes. Brimstone!

Batman gets free using a grindstone and uses a counter balancing stone to fetch Robin out of the water before he dies.

The bat-thesaurus got a workout in this story, didn’t it?

Next they go to the Petrified Forest. Yes. The Gotham City Petrified Forest.

Rocky has gone to see his old pal, Parks. To beat him to death with petrified wood. But before he can, Batman chases him into the woods. They fight on a stone log bridge when suddenly the weather changes and they are beset by hailstones! This causes Rocky to slip and fall to his death.

…and finally ended up beneath one…a tombstone!

This had me entertained for a little while, but then the whole stone thing was taken a little too far!

2 stars

Destination Unknown starts in Gotham City’s Grand Central Station.

I wonder if this was ever used again?

Among the passengers are Clyde Clayborn and his secretary Miss Hibbs ride the train looking for oddities as the famous “Tricky-But-True” man. Mr Fortesque is traveling in an iron lung.

An iron lung, or tank respirator, is a large, sealed, cylindrical metal chamber used for artificial respiration. It works via negative pressure ventilation—lowering air pressure inside the tank to force the patient’s lungs to expand—to aid individuals, particularly polio patients, with paralyzed respiratory muscles.

John Keyes a man who escaped from a California prison and is about to be executed for a crime he swears he didn’t commit. Detective Guffey, the man who caught him.

Also an unnamed vagabond who jumped on the train to California.

But life is never dull when one looks beneath the surface… as a bit of mind-reading at dinner-time will prove…

I’ve never heard of thought-balloons referred to this way!

Oooo - and I don’t remember ever seeing in a Batman comic such an unfortunate portrayal of a person of color as the server in the dining car.

A mysterious person walks on the roof of the train until it gets to the engineers car, at which point it pistol whips the engineer. Then he cranks the throttle to eighty miles per hour! News gets out fast when the train reaches ninety miles per hour!

The teletype notifies Commissioner Gordon in Gotham City

The Comet running wild? How could anyone stop it. Unless…the Batman!

The Batman?

Bruce & Dick are in a rowboat on Park Lake. Bruce is rowing in his business suit while Dick is lounging back when they see the bat-signal.

The Bat-plane drops Batman to the train just as the mysterious saboteur is on the roof about to jump off the train with a parachute before it hits a curve over a bridge the train can’t possible survive at this speed. He shoots at Batman who quickly crawls into the driver’s cab.

Batman breaks the train and notices the unconscious engineer. He starts to put together the clues of the man shooting at him with the parachute pack. He calls Robin on his belt radio.

Meet me at Gopher junction!

The train stops at Gopher junction and the engineer is revived. No one knows what happened or who saved them.

Don’t ask me…I’m trying to forget that experience!

The vagabond flees but is caught by Batman.

Have you got a ticket? Or should I punch…?

The hobo explains his innocence.

When a fellow’s down and out, I never kick him! I’ll take your word…till I do a little investigating.

Batman ties him up in case he changes his mind.

Bruce buys a ticket while Dick buys a stack of comic books.

Miss Hibbs goes to the baggage car to get a book for Mr. Clayborn when she sees the hobo tied up. She frees him and he jumps out of the train.

Next time we meet, I’ll tell you how pretty you are…but right now I’ve got to get out of sight!

Dick walks through the train selling comic books.

Get your latest issue of World’s Finest Comics! 96 pages… only 15 !

When the conductor threatens to throw Dick off the train, Bruce offers to pay his ticket - at which point Dick gives him a free Batman comic.

Weirdest product placement ever.

Dick wanders around selling and listening.

The hobo then strangles the baggage handler. Detective Guffy is knocked out. The nurses with the iron lung patient kick him out. Miss Hibbs explains about the hobo with nice eyes to Mr. Clayborn Mr. Clayborn buys a comic book.

Dick reports it al back to Bruce.

Batman & Robin check on the man in the iron long and find that they have released poison gas!

Batman heads to the roof of the train to find two nurses running on top of it. One has a gun. Batman fights them both. Batman gets shot.

Apparently running on top of a train is no big deal for a lot of people.

Robin, on the roof of the train at the front end, hears the shot.

Swing on the extended arm of a semaphore signal, Robin jumps on the shooter before he can shoot Batman in the head.

Robin! Saved…my…life…

Hopefully this will put an end to the question of why Batman needs a Robin!

But swinging on the semaphore triggered a switch to the train tracks and now another train is heading straight for this train!

Batman runs to the front of the train and drops to the cowcatcher.

The bat emblem…ripped from the front of my uniform… maybe it will warn them.

And the engineer of the other train, seeing the bat symbol and knowing that means trouble hits the brakes!

John Keyes, escaped, went east and found new evidence to prove his innocence!

Detective Guffey’s promotion is now in doubt.

Trigger Yurk and Biff Bolton were the nurses and confess that they were the murderers in the crime Keyes was accused of and tried to kill Keyes in the iron lung in which there was only a dummy.

Miss Hibbs is going to marry the hobo, who is Ken Thorne, President of this railroad and it’s excellent safety record!

He got sick of his job and decided to look for adventure…

Mr. Clayburn’s reputation is saved.

I’ve lost a secretary… but look at the oddities I’ve got!

Umm…look, I’m not embarrassed that I loved that story and neither should you be. Batman is shot. Robin once again saves him. The most elaborate use of the iron lung as a murder weapon ever devised.

And a secretary finds true love in the hobo of her dreams!

5 stars and I dare you to take them back!

Overall this is 4 star book. Two great stories, 2 duds.