I spend a lot of time, perhaps too much time, watching TV and reading comics. I’m going to talk about a some of my favorite comics during the next few days.

Batman is one of the best comics being released at the moment. I say “Batman,” I’m referring to the main title rather than the numerous others devoted to the character. It’s written by Scott Snyder, who is a graduate of the top creative writing grad program in the country and the author of a collection of literary fiction stories put out by a division of Random House (which I haven’t read). His current run on Batman began when DC did their whole “New 52” thing where all their stories started over from the beginning, although he also wrote it previous to the big change. Because of this, it’s really easy to catch up, starting with the first issue of the comic, which has been collected in a trade paperback. Snyder also writes a comic about vampires for Vertigo, but Batman is my favorite character; perhaps my favorite character ever from all works of fiction. Although this is the case, there are few writers who have written issues of Batman that I’ve been really into. Grant Morrison is one of these authors, but Snyder’s writing is a lot more traditional, which is a nice change. From the start of his current run, the primary antagonists have been an organization called the Court of the Owls. They sound pretty stupid, but the issues with them have been great. Also, he recently started writing his first story arc featuring the Joker, which has been a real treat. Check the comic out if you get the chance.