Batman: No Man's Land, Vol. 3

Batman: No Man's Land (1999-2001) #3

by Devin Grayson

GOTHAM CITY: a dark, twisted re ection of urban America. Overcrowded, overbuilt, and overshadowed by a continuous air of menace, this gothic nightmare is a breeding ground for the depraved, the indifferent, and the criminally insane. It's also the object of one man's obsession. Witness to the brutal murder of his parents, Bruce Wayne has dedicated his life to protecting this city, taking a form to inspire hope in the innocent...and fear in the guilty. He is the masked vigilante known as the Batman.

Now the battlefield has changed. Leveled by a massive earthquake that left thousands dead and millions more wounded, Gotham City has been transformed into a lawless wilderness � a No Man's Land � where the survivors are turning against one another, and where the city's protectors are torn by a crisis that may consume them all.

Collects:
- Batman #566-569
- Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #120-121
- Batman: Shadow of the Bat #88
- Detective Comics #734-735

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Batman, Dc Comics, Comic Book, Superheroes, Fiction

206 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2000

About the author

Devin Grayson is an avid gamer, former acting student, and enthusiastic reader fortunate enough to have turned a lifelong obsession with fictional characters into a dynamic writing career. She has a B.A. from Bard College, where she studied creative writing with novelist Mona Simpson. Best known for her work on the Batman titles for DC Comics, Devin has been a regular writer on Catwoman, Nightwing, and The Titans, and contributed to the award-winning No Man’s Land story arc. With the publication of Batman: Gotham Knights in March of 2000, she became the first (and, sadly, only as of 2020) female to create, launch and write an ongoing Batman title.

Additional career highlights include the launch of the critically acclaimed series Omni for Humanoids, Doctor Strange: The Fate of Dreams, an original novel featuring Marvel’s Sorcerer Supreme, and USER—a highly personal three-part, creator-owned miniseries about gender identity and online role-playing, originally published by Vertigo and newly available as a collected edition hardcover through Image. Devin is also the creator of Yelena Belova, a Marvel character staring in the upcoming MCU Black Widow movie (played by Florence Pugh), Damien Darhk, a DC character now appearing regularly in CW’s Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow (played by Neal McDonough), and Catalina Flores, a DC character recently featured as the super-villain Tarantula in The Lego Batman Movie.

Frequently cited for compelling character development and nuanced exploration of complex themes, Devin’s work has been showcased in mainstream media such as USA Today and Working Woman as well as in alternative press such as The Village Voice, The Advocate, and Curve magazine. Over the years, she has written in several different media and genres, from comic books and novels to video game scripts and short essays. She is currently working on an original graphic novel for Berger Books.

Devin lives in Northern California with her husband, step-son, devoted Early Alert Canines Diabetic Alert Dog, and somewhat less devoted cat. Openly bisexual, she is a passionate advocate for the GLBTQ community, as well as being a committed environmentalist, and a public speaker for T1 Diabetes awareness and Diabetic Alert Dogs. She is always happy to take on a new challenge, especially if it involves making some new fictional friends.

Reviews

[Sean Gibson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Dear No Man's Land,

I think it's time we break up. It's not you, it's m...no, no--that's not true at all. It's totally you, with your flimsy premise, inconsistent characterization, and disconnected, overly preachy pseudo morality plays. It's not as though I haven't worked on this relationship; I've slogged through three long volumes with you. We went through counseling together (it really hurt when you said that I didn't appreciate your line work, though I'm sure it did't feel very good when I pointed out your lack of tight editorial control, either). We even tried eating the same plate of noodles together, Lady-and-the-Tramp style, but all I ended up with from that is a paper cut because, you're, you know, made of paper, and also, you probably shouldn't eat pasta because, you know, you're made of paper.

So, I'm done. It's over. It's not even a "hate to see you go, love to watch you leave" kind of situation--you don't look any better from the back than you do from the front (then again, neither do I, so I guess I'll withhold that critique). I'd like to say it's been fun, but, well, then I'd have to start saying that about getting bikini waxes, and those certainly aren't fun.

Er, um, I've heard. I wouldn't know.

Anyways, please take your Nelson CDs and "Frankie Says Relax" t-shirt with you, because otherwise I will burn them. (Well, maybe not the Nelson CDs, because After the Rain, well, it touches my heart.)

I hope you find happiness. Or an open fire pit.

Your Former Reader,
This Guy

[Katherine (Kat) · Rating 2 out of 5]

Cassandra Cain is the only good thing about this. I'm getting real bored of No Man's Land

[Mizuki · Rating 4 out of 5]

I managed to tear myself from Batman fanfics long enough to finish reading an actual Batman comic.

Huh, it isn't as awesome as the previous volume and the Huntress is probably acting OOC--hell, I don't understand why would she wants the recognition from the Batman so badly anyway. She could have done her own things, ran her own district just fine instead of needing Batman's recognition, Batman seems to respect what she had done in order to keep order in her district, right?

Anyway, it's nice that Poison Ivy shows up and she is caring for orphans in her park.

There are not enough Two-Face and Commissioner Gordon, by the way!

PS: I really really love the rest of the Bat Family showing up, and how Cassandra Cain is introduced to the story.

Will read the next volume ASAP.

[47Time · Rating 4 out of 5]

The volume begins with two skippable stories. Innocent, square-jawed Superman thinks he can fix the city on his own, starting with the power plant. Eventually realising the city is broken far beyond his ability to fix it, Superman gives up and leaves. It's all down to Batman now.

Next up Batman faces Mr. Freeze in a confrontation featuring both one-liners and phylosophical dialogue. Batman destroys Freeze's perfectly functional power plant.

The Cain story is longer and features an assassin sent after Gordon who is protected by the assassin's long-lost daughter. She is also Oracle's best courier. The story is made even more dramatic because she is mute. It sounds like a soal opera, but it's quite good. Batman gathers his allies - Nightwing, Robin, Azrael, the mute girl - trained as an assassin by Cain, just like Batman was - and Oracle. Huntress/Batgirl still wants to help, but is finding it difficult with Batman way of doing things. The newly formed team is Batman's admitting he can't save Gotham alone.

Poison Ivy has held Robinson Park since the very beginning of the crisis, keeping it and a bunch of orphaned kids safe from the other gangs. Given that it's the only source of fresh fruit for Gotham, Clayface offers her a deal to sell it for major profits. Batman finds that it's more of a one-sided deal - Ivy is imprisoned, forced to produce the fruit and the kids distribute them. Batman frees her and together they fight Clayface. Though Batman tries to prevent it, Ivy delivers a killing blow to Clayface using her plants. The story ends with a deal - Batman will allow Ivy to keep the park if she makes no other deals with the gangs and sends fresh produce to the city regularly.

[Daria · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot less cohesive than the last volume. Starts off weak then really picks up at the end.
We're back with a mixed trend of cohesive storytelling VS having random one-off issues about the life of some random gothamite shoved in our face (like, what the hell was the random guy that started hearing voices in his head telling him to go to the cemetery and also knowing babs somehow).
Some of them were good, especially the one about that one police officer that controls those 10 blocks. That one really was a good read since we /kind of/ already know his character and all of the supporting characters we are already aware of, so the recipe of "oh look what's going on in Gotham rn through the eyes of a random citizen" actually works.
There was the story that introduced Harley for the first time (to me) which wasn't /that/ exciting, but she as a character is super exciting to read about, and she actually has like. Not the stereotypical woman personality that a lot of characters tend to fall into. She jumps into Huntress's arms and also out the window, and that truly is a vibe.
The Robin issues were not great until the end where they became amazing. His father sending in the entire nation to look for Tim? Spectacular. I am READY for this arc. He does seem to get sick a lot lately though, he's just not doing great. Got bit by rats and is now feverish. It did lead to one lovely panel where Bruce worried about him so you know, you win some you lose some.
And speaking of Bruce's kids, Batgirl is amazing and I would kill for her. The first issue of the story is her getting the lesson that Helena never seemed to understand as Batgirl, which is a cool parallel between the two (the fact that they shouldn't take out their frustration on the evil guys). But besides that she doesn't really appear, and neither does Babs, or Nightwing for that matter, so we're mostly just hanging out with Bruce. Which is exactly what I wanted, but again, no overarching story-line, therefore no character arc, therefore not very compelling.
Speaking of hanging out with Bruce though, the little Superman issue? Adorable. He just came in to check up on Bruce and make sure that he's alright. "are your boys here" Mr Clark Kent Do You Want To Make Me Cry? It was great. Bruce standing alone in the sunny rain at the end? Correct imagery.
Sadly, Bane was here. I don't really wanna complain about the things I didn't enjoy because it's not that they in themselves were terrible but more so that they just pulled the overall reading experience down for me, but there's nothing inherently /bad/ with these arcs. Just, not compelling for me as a reader. My one complaint however IS uh. What the hell happened to Selina????? Like??? Hello???? There was this entire story-line in volume two that was literally like. 1/3 of the volume that just isn't brought up (I assume it's just not collected) which is kind of weird considering Bruce presented it as "Oh Boy Gotham will have A Very Bad Time if Catwoman doesn't manage to collect these things for me" and that happens and there's no reaction whatsoever. It just feels a bit weird. All I can say is that I would have collected these volumes differently.

[Vinicius · Rating 4 out of 5]

Um bom encadernado, mas um pouco inferior aos volumes 1 e 2. No geral, têm boas histórias da Batfamily recuperando Gotham com Tim no subsolo e Dick em Blackgate. A história do Batman com a Hera é interessante também; os momentos da Cass como sempre são incríveis, mas as histórias aqui, em sua maior parte, deixam pontas soltas a serem desenvolvidas no próximo encadernado, por isso acho que este volume é um pouco inferior. Tem vilões novos aparecendo, os azulões com problemas internos... muito a se desenvolver.

Destaque nesse volume é que revemos a Salteadora aparecendo em uma trama pessoal, achei bacana.

[Sam Quixote · Rating 3 out of 5]

The series continues with an interesting and promising start: Superman appears! What I thought would end this whole bizarre setup actually doesn't in a strange way. You'd think Superman would help with the infrastructure, gathering the gang leaders in one fell swoop, and putting everything right, but that would be too easy so the writer Kelley Puckett makes the human case instead, emphasising humanity's own backwardness in the face of the clear path forward. It's clever, kind of, but I still feel the story's resolution and dismissal of Superman to be too narrow. But then if Superman were included in this series then it'd be over sooner rather than later and obviously DC wanted to keep it going.

Which leads into the other stories. There's a Mr Freeze story that's very average, same goes for the Poison Ivy/Clayface story, and Batgirl changes identity from one character to a new one (though they don't explain how the woman can see given her mask is entirely black cloth covering her face).

So-so art with so-so storytelling, it seems that this is what the "No Man's Land" series is, just another collection of Batman tales with a hint of post-apocalypse that never really takes off. I'll keep reading as the end is in sight but this isn't an amazing series and this book continues the "meh" factor for this reader. Could've been better, unfortunately it isn't.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Batman can be a real dick sometimes.

You know that thing he does when he figures something out quite early in a story and then reveals later on that he knew the whole time? He does that here. In the process, he really pisses off a character. In all fairness, Batman is pretty smart so that person probably should've guessed he'd figure it out.

Also, Superman shows up in the very beginning. Armed with nothing but good intentions, Supes decides he's going to help out Gotham thus bringing it back to it's original glory. Scoffing at the idea, Batman tells him that basically, he's an idiot. Once again, Batman gets to show up about 24 hours later just to rub it in with a big fat "told you so". While it's pretty dick-ish, I'll give him a pass as Superman is generally lame.

While Batman's absence at the beginning of this crisis is explained, he still maintains a feeling of betrayal in the eyes of Commissioner Gordon. The two have a pretty heated exchange which ends in an event that shocked me.

While it's not the strongest of the 3 released so far (I'm still annoyed with the lack of Joker), it continues the series nicely. Looking forward to the next two volumes.

[OmniBen · Rating 3 out of 5]

(Zero spoiler review for the omnibus, with the score for this volume) 2.75/5
When a Batman event... scratch that. When what is possibly the greatest Batman/Gotham event on paper manages to fumble the ball over and over, taking what was an absolute sure fire hit into a middling, rollercoaster of quality, then you know that the comics event rulebook needs to be torn up, burnt and scattered to the wind.
As I said, this was a great idea. An outstanding one in fact. But because 'comics have to comic' with pointless, pathetic tie ins, and a seemingly in-exhaustive laundry list of writers and artists all get a turn writing or drawing this event, as if Batman (who should be the pinnacle of DC quality) is now the town bike and anyone can have a ride, regardless of quality or merit. They took an easy slam dunk, tripped over their own ineffectiveness and avarice, and stumbled awkwardly into an increasingly apathetic crowd. How could you screw this up? Oh yeah... comics event. My bad.
Now in fairness, there is some good stuff here, and because its Batman, the average is always made a little bit better, and at the same time, the disappointment hurts a little bit more at the same time. The few decent writers turn in some decent writing. The few decent artists turn in some decent art, apart from Jim Balent on the Catwoman tie in, who singlehandedly is bringing sexy back to comics. Or at least he was two decades ago. God help us all now.
I will never understand who was calling the shots here, who kept putting overly stylised, cartoonish artists on a Batman book, about the dystopian destruction of Gotham. Cause nothing says the darkest days of Gotham like kiddy-ish cartoons and bright colours. Fuck off with that garbage! The revolving door of writers didn't help matters either, with the lacking a consistent narrative feel and direction. Instead, you feel like you're being pulled in a dozen directions at once, and most of them are inane and unnecessary, and not executed very well. What we got, was pretty average, and what we didn't get, could have been awesome. This should have been the story of one or two very talented, very committed writers. Instead, it was the equivalent of letting a five year old bake a cake when given the ingredients but allowed to determine their own quantities. This should have been brilliant, and if you skip about half of it, it's pretty good. But pretty good isn't good enough, and again, that's if you know which half of it to avoid. Though it is usually pretty obvious a few pages in. I gave up halfway through and began skipping the issues that made my brain hurt and my eyes sad.
So is it still worth reading? I mean, yeah... kind of, I guess? It's not offensively bad for the most part, and the opening third is pretty damn good. Just bring a big pair of gum boots, cause you'll definitely be wading through some shit to get to solid ground. 2.75/5


OmniBen.

[Mia · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars

The way Cass back must hurt for carrying this.

[John Yelverton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Batman must attempt to protect a destroyed Gotham city which is filled with villains trying to either pick over its bones or finish the job completely. It's a little dark for my tastes, but it's still a good graphic novel.

[Charles · Rating 5 out of 5]

A dark premise in combination with the Dark Knight makes for an excellent story of struggle against the power of darkness. The premise is that a massive earthquake has struck Gotham City and the federal government has declared the city uninhabitable. The residents were ordered to evacuate and then the city was sealed off from the rest of the country. Those that remained are engaged in a ruthless battle for survival with criminal gangs carving out territory. A few sections are controlled by people (such as Police Commissioner Gordon) that genuinely want to make things better, but most are controlled by those with a lust for power. Some of the bosses are the traditional adversaries of Batman such as the Penguin, Two-Face and Mr. Freeze.
Within this mix are Batman in one of his darkest forms as well as Robin and a second generation Batgirl. Superman flies into town with the goal to aid in the recovery and meets Batman, who tells him to get lost. Puzzled, Superman ignores him and flies off to do some good. With the help of an engineer, they are able to get a power generating station back online, but this creates even more problems. Faced with an “I told you so”, Superman flies off and leaves the solutions to Batman.
Commissioner Gordon and Batman are not allies; in fact Gordon is showing signs of the same mental instability that plagues Batman. Gordon is so opposed to Batman that he is willing to make a temporary alliance with criminal gangs in order to capture territory from another.
Post-apocalyptic battles to recover civilization have been a staple in literature and the movies for decades, sometimes they are well done and sometimes they are ridiculous. While there are some questionable premises in this story, it is easy to ignore them as Batman and his entourage struggle to restore some modicum of civilization to the ravaged streets. Great artwork and dialog about people under tremendous stress.

[Chris Browning · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite Batman ostensibly being a hyper stylised variation of pulp characters such as the Shadow and the Spirit, he exists among the world of superheroes and at some point this series had to address that. How it does so is very interesting: Superman turns up and tries to do his stuff but soon realises this Gotham won’t work with his usual approach and departs knowing he has fundamentally failed. Then the book slowly returns to the status quo with a few of the more extreme Batman villains - Clayface, Mr Freeze, Poison Ivy - in time for some of Batman’s supporting cast to turn up, and in one case have a brief change in identity

Which sometimes works and sometimes really fails badly. The Mr Freeze section is a case in point, where Batman and said villain exchange the sort of vague aphorisms that Mystery Men’s Sphinx punctures so beautifully and that feels wholly jarring in this new world order. Similarly, the new Batgirl introduction has some fantastically muddled storytelling, as if the usual origin story is trying to settle on top of the darker tales No Man’s Land has been so good at doing but instead just keeps bashing against the tone uncomfortably. The problem seems to be that when you start returning to familiar Batman iconography what makes this experiment so fascinating starts to lose focus, as if all concerned are yearning to return to the status quo of sinister lunatics battering seven shades of shit out of a slightly less sinister and less insane (slightly) hero. It’s fascinating but kind of messy too

[Ben Truong · Rating 4 out of 5]

Batman: No Man's Land is a massive story arc that ran through the various Batman family comic book series that was published by DC Comics. The storyline centers on Gotham City after a massive earthquake, which resulted in the United States government officially evacuating Gotham, then abandoning, and isolating those who chose to remain in the city – A No Man's Land.

Batman: No Man's Land, Vol. 3 collects: Batman #566–569, Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #120–121, Batman: Shadow of the Bat #88, and Detective Comics #734–735.

Batman and his allies continue their fight to save Gotham during its darkest hour. The Batgirl mantle was transferred from the Huntress to Cassandra Cain – becoming the new Batgirl, while the rest of the Batman Family continues to try to help the city's remaining citizens in any way they can.

Kelley Puckett, Greg Rucka, Larry Hama, and Janet Harvey were credited as the main writers of the trade paperback. The continuing narrative seems to go spiraling down as disaster after disaster has fallen unto Gotham City. The pencilers for the trade paperback were done by Jon Bogdanove, Damion Scott, Mike Deodato, Jr., Dan Jurgens, Rick Burchett, and Sergio Cariello. For the most part, their penciling styles mesh rather well with just minor disturbance in the artistic flow.

All in all, Batman: No Man's Land, Vol. 3 is a rather strong continuation to what I hope would be an equally wonderful story arc.

[Andrew Robertson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the perfect example of a good story done badly. And I'm starting to feel that way about the entire No Man's Land series.
This volume covered 3 smaller story arcs (according to my own naming convention) within the overarching No Man's Land story arc: the "power station" arc, the "Cain" arc, and the "Poison Ivy vs Clayface" arc. The plots were interesting; the situations added to the No Man's Land mythos; all of the stories in this volume were essential to the core No Man's Land arc. Each one of these could have been very interesting stories. (These are the reasons why it even gets 3 stars.)
Instead, it was like the writers could not get through the stories fast enough, and we are left with bare-bones stories filled with plot holes and more questions than answers. Each of these smaller arcs could have been at least 4x longer and built a richer story. Too bad we will never get that.

[João Batista · Rating 4 out of 5]

Uma personagem da época do Dr Langstrom; um pouco do poder da TV mostrando a verdadeira Gotham pós-cataclismo; Asa Noturna consegue recuperar Blackgate das mãos do Carcereiro? Frutas frescas para o Pinguim... mas como? Agora, Gordon tem um problema de verdade entre os seus. E quando uma Gata tem uma missão e decide agir por instinto de raiva do "amigo"? Quem é o Rei de Gotham? Duas personagens em cena para tumultuar ainda mais a vida de Batman e do Robin.

Quanto ao texto brasileiro, detalhes do verbo 'esquecer' e do 'lembrar', além da expressão 'antes de' sem revisão.

[laz | harley!!!! · Rating 4 out of 5]

apart from some weird one shots in this that were kind of boring this was actually kind of awesome?? especially with cass and nightwing robin azrael and huntress and by far the best thing was the whole issue centering around leslie and her whole character is so interesting and cool? and her monster being batman is so insane and her being his mother and tragedy behind that is just so cool??

I like the idea of Bruce finally realizing he needs help and it’s kind of awesome although where is Alfred??????

[Jamie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book! Probably the third best in the series so far! Gets off to a Good start with a Superman and Mr Freeze story which was really interesting. You later discover Batgirls secret identity, which I didn’t see coming. There were also some Good chapters involving Clayface and Poison Ivy. Out of all the volumes so far, this one has the most Consistent art work, all of which was really great. The book finishes off with a Good ending about the new Batgirl. Overall, very good volume and would definitely recommend!

[Dr Rashmit Mishra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cassandra Cain centric book as Barbara passes on the legacy of Batgirl to Cass and Cass also meets and helps Batman stop her dad , we learn more of her past and it's a fascinating read .

The art was actually acceptable in this one .

Btw I did read all this in single issues so I think the Nightwing books also come under vol. 3 for me , and those books were fun as Batman tasks him to retake Black gate prison and Nightwing has to fight and Ally himself with people he has helped put in there .

[Sotofunkdamental · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un terremoto destruye la ciudad de Gotham City, lo que provoca que el gobierno de Estados Unidos ordene la evacuación inmediata de la ciudad y se desentienda de aquellos que decidan quedarse. Los villanos más memorables de Batman aprovechan la situación y se hacen con el control de varias zonas para gobernar Gotham. Batman y sus aliados harán todo lo posible para recuperar su ciudad. Tierra de Nadie fue una gran etapa, de lectura muy aconsejable para los fanáticos del murciélago.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Easily the best of the first three volumes of this trade featuring Gotham City and its people dealing with the aftermath of an earthquake and isolation from the outside. My favorite storyline was a three parter written by Greg Rucka called “Fruit of the Earth” with dynamic art from Jurgens and Sienkiewicz featuring villains Clayface and Poison Ivy.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cassandra Cain has surfaced. Without having read all that much with her, Cassandra Cain has become a favorite character/curiosity with me. She was the highlight of this volume. The other stories of the collection were okay. I was surprised to see Sienkiewcz pop up as an inker, but it sadly is not his most interesting inking work.

[Matthew · Rating 2 out of 5]

Astonished how revered the ‘No Man’s Land’ arc is when there doesn’t seem to be one really good entry in the whole series. This edition has some lovely artwork and designs but this time it’s letdown by an incoherent, rambling, disconnected plot that makes little sense. If I hadn’t been leant the entire series I would be binning this storyline off.

1.5 Stars.

[Jolyne Kujoh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe it's because I'm not familiar with the first two installments, but I quite enjoy this volume. At its worst it can be a little muddled in messaging, but it almost never ceases to be entertaining.

[Cristhian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mes de Batman 14/23

[Shaun Stanley · Rating 3 out of 5]

No Man's Land Volume 3 seemed like a step back and was very average.

[July · Rating 4 out of 5]

Me encanta Cassandra Cain

[Enigmaticblue · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm still enjoying this storyarc for the most part, but I've had a few issues with continuity, and in some respects it feels as though the story is being drawn out unnecessarily.

[Emmanuel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked superman’s appearance. It’s brief and sums up very well the limits of his power. What Batman can do and what he can’t. Other than that, it’s meh.

[Marialuigia · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5