Comics Review: "BATMAN #5" Goes on a "Date Night"

BATMAN (2025) #5

DC COMICS

STORY: Matt Fraction

ART: Jorge Jimenez

COLORS: Tomeu Morey

LETTERS: Clayton Cowles with Jorge Jimenez

EDITOR: Rob Levin

COVER: Jorge Jimenez

VARIANT COVER ARTISTS: Jim Lee and Scott Williams with Alex Sinclair; Julian Totino Tedesco; Leirix; David Aja; Mitch Gerads; Jorge Jimenez

36pp, Color, $4.99 U.S., (March 2026)

Batman created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger

Rating: 13+

“Date Night”

DC Comics recently relaunched its Batman flagship comic book series – the third time in 14 years.  It is written by Matt Fraction; drawn by Jorge Jimenez; colored by Tomeu Morey; and lettered by Clayton Cowles.  DC is pushing the series as the dawn of new era in Batman comic books.

Batman #5 (“Date Night”) opens in the Harborview district of Gotham City at the “Wayne Experimental Sciences Building.”  A “date night” for Bruce Wayne and Dr. Annika Zeller goes off the rails when the legendary 000 Gang marks the good doctor for death.  Meanwhile, the sinister assassin known as “The Ojo” awaits.  Plus, a Batman ally arrives in the nick of time.

THE LOWDOWN:  For years, I had a subscription to DC Comics' Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? ongoing comic book series.  It was quietly canceled within the last year, but I had 14 issues left in my subscription.  Midtown Comics in NYC, which manages DC Comics' subscriptions, gave me the option of choosing any new DC title I wanted to continue my subscription, so I chose Batman – just in time for this new era, and this is my fifth review of this new series.

I highly praised the first two issues of Matt Fraction and Jorge Jimenez's Batman.  The Fraction-Jimenez team offered third and fourth issues that each seemed to be in a holding pattern.  Now, the fifth issue brings back at least some of the intensity that had me comparing the first two issues of the Fraction-Jimenez's Batman to Frank Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns.

Meanwhile, Tomeu Morey keeps coloring the hell outta the storytelling, and Jimenez joins Clayton Cowles  to offer energetic lettering that gives this story an extra bump.  That's it.  Keep reading this new Batman, dear readers.

I READS YOU RECOMMENDS:  Fans of Batman comic books will want to read Batman 2025.

A-

[This comic book includes a six-page preview of “Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow” from writer Tom King; artist Bilquis Evely; colorist Matheus Lopes; and lettered by Clayton Cowles.]

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"

The first trade collection of Matt Fraction and Jorge Jimenez's "Batman" is entitled "BATMAN: DAYLIGHT" and is due in June in both hardcover and paperback editions, which will be available at Amazon.

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