The Brave and the Bold may sound like a title from a bygone era, but it still represents the most fun ever printed in comic books.
The series was a cornerstone of DC Comics’ Silver and Bronze Age, running from 1955 to 1983 with one purpose: to serve up unlikely and entertaining team-ups between DC’s characters. It’s where great swathes of DC history happened, like the first appearance of the Justice League in issue #28.
You may be familiar with the name from the good-natured animated show it inspired between 2008 and 2011 and two short comic revivals, but you’ll be hearing it far more in the future. The publisher’s sights are set on the Dawn of DC initiative after the onslaught of Dark Nights, Death Metal, and Dark Crisis… and The Brave and the Bold’s return is part of that brighter future. The great news is that an array of comic talent has been lined up to let loose on DC mythology with ludicrous and inspired team-ups to match the original run.
Since The Brave and the Bold’s first volume ended in 1983, things have moved on. At the time, the multiverse handily explained away contradictory history. Before Crisis on Infinite Earth streamlined continuity by flattening every parallel universe into one, DC used two Earths to define the ages of superheroes that stretched from the 1930s. While the Silver and Bronze Ages of the 1960s and 1980s occupied Earth-1, earlier Golden Age heroics took place on Earth-2.
From issue #74 in 1967, The Brave and the Bold became an exclusive Batman team-up book inspired by the popular 1960s TV series. This list picks up with those stories that saw the Caped Crusader join forces with war heroes, supernatural entities, rogues, and Earth-2 friends.
Batman and The Spectre (#75)
An unexpected team-up for modern audiences as the Dark Knight partnered up with DC’s Spirit of Vengeance as soon as the title became a Batman book. In the mid-1970s, DC was keen on pairing its superhero lines with ever-popular horror comics, and The Brave and the Bold was the perfect place for it.
When Year of the Bat celebrations in Gotham’s Chinatown were interrupted by the ancient spirit Shang-Zi’s attempts to dominate Earth, Batman was locked in Gotham by a mystical barrier. Fortunately, the Spectre could pass through and distract the spirit as the dark detective tracked down the magical wheel powering their enemy. It’s odd to see the Spectre help a city resume its celebrations, but the entity must have recognized a like-mind as they teamed up again in issue #199.
Batman and the Creeper (#80)
Batman’s three adventures with the Creeper were exciting, given the antihero’s passing resemblance to a feral Joker. Although, in his original pre-Crisis on Infinite Earth form, journalist Jack Ryder’s transformation involved a costume and a lot of make-up.
The garish superhuman’s enhanced fighting expertise, superhuman agility, and healing factor could be a help and hindrance in Gotham. On their second team-up, the Creeper got in Batman’s way when he mistook the Dark Knight for a criminal (an easy mistake to make). The pair teamed up to stop a criminal with vertigo-inducing weaponry and then tackled an origami monster. But their first adventure in issue #80 remains the classic as they pursued the insectoid Hellgrammite through Gotham. Batman’s view of the Creeper’s weaponized laughter remains unknown.
Batman and Wildcat (#88)
The Brave and the Bold saw the first Silver Age appearance of Wildcat Ted Grant, the former heavyweight boxer and superhero. We’d previously met the Earth-2 Wildcat, but future DC resets ensured this Earth-1 version only existed in five team-ups with Batman. Their adventures tackled a South American criminal (#97), solved a curious rights issue surrounding a new fuel source (#110), stopped Joker from contaminating a prison (#118), and broke a people-smuggling gang (#127).
The winner’s belt goes to their first team-up in issue #88, which played out like a proto-Rocky IV. Grant is hired by Bruce Wayne to coach a U.S. boxing team and ends up taking on his Russian counterpart, Koslov the Hammer, to prove which nation has the best fighter. The biggest punch lands as the aging hero realizes there’s life in the Wildcat yet.
Batman and the Phantom Stranger (#98)
Batman had teamed up with the Spirit of Vengeance, so why not this occult wanderer? The Phantom Stranger is one of DC’s most mysterious heroes. He’s a high-powered character, but since his debut in 1952, we’ve learned little about his name or origins (although several possibilities have been put forward).
Naturally, the pair’s two meetings involved the supernatural. On their first meeting, they broke a Satanic cult, with Batman benefitting from the Stranger’s skill for distraction. In issue #145, they solved the mystery of a high-profile criminal controlled by voodoo magic.
Batman and Sgt. Rock (#124)
Sgt. Rock is the World War II soldier introduced to DC Comics by Robert Kanigher and Joe Kubert in 1959, who’s proved to be a period character with staying power. In five appearances in The Brave and the Bold, Sgt. Rock and Easy Company offered Batman the chance to enter war stories, including issue #84, where a flashback revealed Bruce Wayne’s spy missions during wartime.
In issue #117, Bats and Rock rooted out a traitor in Easy Company, while #162 saw them team up to track down their old enemy, the Iron Major. Their second team-up in #108 was one of the whole run’s most perplexing stories, as the duo was haunted by a mysterious figure who might just be Adolf Hitler. Things were still head-scratching during their final team-up (#124) when a terrorist group broke the fourth wall to stop the real-life DC comics team from completing a story in which Batman and Sgt. Rock defeat them.
Batman and the Demon Etrigan (#109)
A partnership with Jack Kirby’s colorful and occasionally rhyming Etrigan gave Batman another chance to enter horror comics. It found the Demon’s alter-ego, Jason Blood, investigating a series of strange murders in Gotham docks in parallel with the Dark Knight. When the pair teamed up, they realized there was a mysterious connection to an old shipwreck in Gotham Bay.
Any step into the occult and magical suits Batman, especially in his versatile Bronze Age incarnation (Jim Aparo draws Adam West). This pairing was popular enough for them to team up again in issue #137, when Chinatown was subjected to another supernatural attack. The chemistry also carried over to The Demon Within episode of Batman: The Animated Series.
Batman and Joker (#111)
Batman teamed up with members of his rogue’s gallery several times, but the most surprising had to be Joker, right? Of course, things weren’t quite as they appeared.
After a savage murder with all the hallmarks of the Clown Prince of Crime knocked Batman over the edge, the Caped Crusader realized his arch-enemy was being framed. The two formed an uneasy alliance to track down the criminal framing Joker while keeping the GCPD at arm’s length. The thing is, you can never trust the Harlequin of Hate.
Batman and Swamp Thing (#122)
The Bronze Age Swamp Thing was a different beast to the modern incarnation, or so thought carnival owner B.B. Riggs, who put the captured hero on public display in Gotham City. On their first team-up, Batman freed Swamp Thing just in time for the pair to tackle giant roots that sprung up to threaten the whole city.
Their second team-up in issue #176 was an intriguing story, brilliantly named The Delta Connection. After an appeal from Catwoman Selina Kyle, Batman traveled to Louisiana to help her sister Felicia, who had escaped prison and was being pursued by assassins. Shockingly, Felicia’s death in the swamps led Batman and Swamp Thing to team up to bring her killers to justice. The Delta Connection was a great example of the title’s ability to manage adventure and darker themes. This partnership was left troubled — Batman by his failure to save Felicia and Swamp Thing by his detachment from humanity.
Batman and Batman of Earth-2 (#200)
Volume One of The Brave and the Bold bowed out with its 200th issue and a satisfying slap on the back as Batman teamed up with himself. Fittingly, it was a tale of two parallel Earths as the Golden Age hero of Earth-2 and the contemporary Bronze Age Batman of Earth-1 met two years before Crisis on Infinite Earths collapsed the multiverse.
An intriguing idea brought the Caped Crusaders together. When Nicholas Lucien, the villain Brimstone, woke from a coma on Earth-2, he realized he’d missed his chance to kill the Batman of his world. Good job there was a Caped Crusader on a parallel world he could take revenge on instead.
After this issue, The Brave and the Bold made way for Batman and the Outsiders as team-ups and the wider DC universe headed toward the Modern Age of comics.
Published: Feb 1, 2023 10:51 am