There is No Hope in Crime Alley, Night 1: Out of the night when the full moon is bright

It's June again. Comics fans and scholars know June 26 as one of the most vital and fatal nights in comic book history. There are other dates contested for the event, some even within comics (and in the usually-reliable Super DC Calendar 1976 — I'll address that when we come to the date they think it is), but I've found most people choose to accept June 26, and that's the day (and month) I write about it here on Comics Oughta Be Fun. Except, it's really not all that fun, is it, to continually return to the scene of the crime? I don't think Batman would approve of this feature. The Joker, maybe, but I blocked him from reading this. Still, DC Comics returns to the scene with frightening regularity, which is why there's so many comics accounts of this night, on which, at 10:48 PM following a showing of a Zorro movie,, Thomas and Martha Wayne are murdered in front of their son Bruce by lone gunman Joe Chill in Gotham City's Park Row — later to become known as Crime Alley.


from Batman Special #1 one-shot (DC, April 1984), script by Mike W. Barr, pencils by Michael Golden, inks by Mike DeCarlo and Michael Golden, colors by Adrienne Roy, letters by Todd Klein
Each year in June on my blog I recount this scene — the origin of Batman — in comics panels. Here's the first time that story was depicted:


from "The Batman Wars Against the Dirigible of Doom" in Detective Comics (1937 series) #33 (DC, November 1939), script by Bill Finger, figure pencils and inks by Bob Kane, background pencils and letters by Sheldon Moldoff
Here's a list (yes, I have a spreadsheet for this) of the previous years I've covered this: 2012 • 2013 • 2014 • 2015 • 2016 • 2017

This year, let's continue. Nightly, I'll bring you a look at that night in Crime Alley of the experiences of young Bruce Wayne — and sometimes others — through the medium of...you guessed it, comic books. (There won't be repeat panels from any of the nights I did it in those six previous years.)



from Batman/The Maxx: Arkham Dreams (DC, November 2018); script, pencils, and inks by Sam Kieth; colors by Ronda Pattison, letters by Shawn Lee
So join me here each night in June — and find out why...There is No Hope in Crime Alley.