Sunday, April 21, 2024

Detective Comics #27: Reimagined - The Italian edition

Batman: A Celebration of 75 Years is a hardcover collection of classic Batman comics published by DC Comics in 2014:


Amongst the reprinted material is a story exclusive to this volume - [The Case of the Chemical Syndicate (reimagined)]. As per the GCD listing: 

"This is a reimagining of the first Batman story. Designed by Chip Kidd, it combines the original Bob Kane artwork from Detective Comics #27 (1937 series) with the script from the modernized version of the story that appeared in Detective Comics #27 (2011 series) written by Brad Meltzer (based on the original script by Bill Finger). The original art is blown up to a larger size, with only 1-3 panels per page. As a result, the art from the original 6 page story is stretched across 29 pages."

This exclusive story has not been published by DC elsewhere, however a three-page preview was published in Detective Comics #27 Special Edition (Batman 75 Day Comic 2014) #27:


Whilst I'm not aware of any other printing of this story by DC, it was reprinted as a one-shot issue in Italy in Batman 75: 75 Anni di Batman:


Under an Alex Ross cover, which originally appeared on Batman: No Man's Land #1 [Standard edition], this story appears in an Italian translation:


As you can see the translators are credited in the first panel.

The Italian edition is identical to the US edition apart from some small variances. For example, the US edition has two all black pages interspersed to offset a couple of panels which are blown up to two-page spreads, whereas the Italian edition replaces the black pages with Kidd-esque images of Batman from the story:


These two pages are interspersed at different points to the US version but still serve to maintain the two-page spreads which necessitated them.

The other difference is the cover. The US edition included the following cover page as a lead-in to the story:


Batman 75 is cover-dated July 2014 and is published by RW Edizioni under license from DC Comics.

This is an attractive book with quality production values, with a cardstock cover and glossy pages. I do not know if similar editions were published elsewhere, and I'm surprised it does not appear on the GCD. If DC published an English language edition with the cover from the hardcover collection, I would happily add it to my collection.

No comments: