Detective Comics #875
Written by Scott Snyder
Art and Colors by Francesco Francavilla
Lettering by Jared K. Fletcher
DC Comics
Release Date: March 30, 2011

Scott Snyder has been teamed up with two of the most consistently amazing artists on his recent run on Detective Comics. Initially, before DC drew the line at $2.99, the outline for Detective Comics was set for Jock to do the art for the main, featured story, and for Francesco Francavilla to have backup feature duties while Snyder wrote both. The main story was to focus on Gotham City’s new Batman, Dick Grayson, while the backup was to focus on Gotham’s favorite Police Commissioner, James Gordon. The stories were set to intertwine and change places in positioning ever once in a while, but it was always going to try to keep them together.

Since January, however, the limited page count has forced the stories apart, and I, for one, could not be happier. In the instance of Detective Comics, it has given us the ability to see a completely focused story from Snyder and, in the case of Detective Comics #875, Francesco Francavilla, and oh what magic they work.

The story centers around Commissioner Jim Gordon after meeting with his son, James, on a snowy winter night. If you know anything about weather and crime, which Snyder obviously does, you know that weather can negatively impact the ability of a police officer to solve cases. This thought invokes Gordon to remember a cold case that he was unable to crack because of the winter weather, and Gordon is determined to solve the case of “The Peter Pan Killer” while we are lead down a 20-page road that shows the similarities between Gordon’s prime suspect, and his own son, James.

The beautiful thing about this issue is how amazingly well Snyder and Francavilla work together. Snyder scripts an incredible, although twisted story entitled “Lost Boys” (inspired by J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan), while Francavilla adds on layers of expression and storytelling to add to and complete the already complex writing. And it’s seamless. While the initial read can be done simplistically enough, there is so much more to the book. This is the second issue by these two, and if they keep giving us amazing quality one and dones, I couldn’t be more happy. And that’s the best thing, you can pick up Detective Comics #875 without any prior knowledge of the series, it’s a perfect jumping-on point!

In Detective Comics #875, Batman is only featured in the last pages of this story, but it lives up to its namesake by truly being a detective comic book.