Gotham Academy #1 Review

Written by Becky Cloonan & Brenden Fletcher Art by Karl Kerschl I’m so pumped to begin this journey with you, let’s go straight in! You remember that feeling before the first day of school? You bought all new clothes and imagined walking in the building, collecting hugs and pretending your new style was as effortless as Nas’ flow? Secretly you were nervous though, because your hair was so different, your mom scoffed at the price of the kicks you really wanted, and you calculated with mathematical certainty you really only had 9 days of mixing and matching outfits until you actually ran out of new school clothes. This must be the way the homies at DC felt when they launched Gotham Academy. Gotham Academy is different from anything else we’ve read from DC. It’s a fresh perspective on the city, introducing new characters and insight into the lives of the “regular” people Batman fights to protect. Different can be scary though, and while I imagine Cloonan and Fletcher knew this is the beginning of a beautiful series, they were probably felt the same jitters of their character named Maps as she waited outside the office of the school Headmaster.

Maps – nicknamed for her affinity for cartography – is a lovably young and naïve student beginning her first year at Gotham’s premiere prep school. She is matched with a second-year student, Olive, to help show her the ropes. That’s an unfortunate drag for Olive, who is the quintessential angst-ridden teenager. Olive feels misundersto…