Warner Bros. and DC Comics announced on Friday that they will be producing three new direct-to-video animated features featuring Batman for release in 2016. With Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice poised to explode onto the big screen next March, there will no doubt be another resurgence of interest in Dark Knight-related merchandise.

Among the three new animated movies coming our way next year will be an adaptation of what is arguably one of the greatest stories of the Caped Crusader ever told, Batman: The Killing Joke.

The release of the undeniably awesome Dredd last September failed to kick some box office ass. But its tremendous sales on Blu-ray and DVD proved you can’t keep a good masked lawman down for long. You just gotta love Mega City-One’s toughest cop; he’s been blasting his way through absurdly violent – and often just plain absurd – comic book adventures for 35 years and has yet to lose a step, kept alive and charging hard thanks to many top-notch creative teams. One of the artists who made their name on Judge Dredd is getting a very special tribute courtesy of IDW Limited as Judge Dredd: The Complete Brian Bolland will soon be released in a special deluxe hardcover limited edition.

You can check out images from the book here below.

A lot of sites are probably putting together several lists right about now in honor of this Friday’s release of The Dark Knight Rises that would name most of these as “must-reads if you’re wanting to get into Batman comics,” or something to that effect. But how I’d like to phrase this entry is in more of an academic sense. These books that I’m about to suggest to you are being referred to as “Read these first” because a lot of the more “higher learning” readings require a sophisticated palette that must be developed by learning the different takes on the character of Batman prior to jumping shoulders’ deep into the complex and clever stories of these more advanced works.

Now, that’s not to say that any of the comics listed are bad. Sure I may not like some of them as much as others, but based on my research and personal experiences, the comics listed here in Batman 101 are some of the books that have gotten most hardcore Batman fans to start loving the character in the same way I do. Keep in mind that this is a list of comic books, so you’ll look elsewhere to see things like Batman ’66 and Batman: The Animated Series. So, if you’re ready, let’s get started with something I like to call Batman 101: A Beginner’s Guide To The Dark Knight.