Acclaimed graphic album Batman: Black and White debuts as animated motion comic

Warner Premiere announced that the acclaimed graphic album Batman: Black & White debuted yesterday, as a Warmer Premiere Motion Comics series. Available exclusively on iTunes and coming soon to other distribution channels, including Amazon and Verizon VCAST, Batman: Black and White Motion Comics features 10 stories created by comic book legends that include Alex Ross, Dave Gibbons, Ted McKeever, Paul Levitz and others. The stories are available on iTunes as five episodes of two shorts each.

In addition, comic book fans can download a free podcast, also available on iTunes, featuring Batman: Black & White illustrator Alex Ross. Hosted by John Siuntres of the popular Wordballoon comic book podcast, Alex discusses Motion Comics, his work on the best-selling series and his current projects.

Warner Premiere’s Motion Comics are a new way for comic fans to connect with their favorite characters and the stories they know and love through short-form digital content. The Motion Comics slate draws on a deep reservoir of source material to bring a new visually engaging experience to life through the use of subtle movements, voice-overs, sweeping music scores and stunning comic book artwork.

A new addition to the Warner Premiere Motion Comics slate, Batman: Black & White is taken from three award-winning volumes of short stories starring the Caped Crusader. Animated by Sequence Post Studios, the Motion Comics reflect the original and diverse visions of various artists and writers as they tell stories in the now-infamous world of Gotham City.

The Batman: Black & White stories range in theme from the unsettling drama of solving a brutal murder to the light comedy of fighting bad guys with a broken nose. These short episodes also touch on elements of romance, mystery and even the supernatural. And like any exciting Batman story, classic villains such as The Joker, Harley Quinn and Two-Face make heralded appearances. It’s Batman as seen through the prism of some of today’s most eloquent graphic artists and writers.

Batman: Black & White Motion Comics features ten shorts:

  1. Here Be Monsters – Written by Paul Grist, art by Darwyn Cooke
    Madame X, attempting to poison Gotham’s water supply, doses Batman with a strange toxin causing him to hallucinate and see everyone around him as monstrous villains.
  2. Broken Nose – By Paul Pope
    Alfred treats Batman for the first broken nose of his illustrious career, right before the Caped Crusader has to go out and confront the metallic-armored Mabuse in a furious fist fight.
  3. Two of a Kind – By Bruce Timm
    Two-Face has his face reconstructed and is seemingly rehabilitated, but is tempted back to the dark side by a femme fatale.
  4. Case Study – Written by Paul Dini, art by Alex Ross
    The Arkham Asylum staff discusses the origins and dubious sanity of The Joker.
  5. The Black and White Bandit – By Dave Gibbons
    A painter who has lost his sense of color due to toxic paint fumes exacts his revenge in a series of black-and-white themed crimes, where everything he steals has a black-and-white motif.
  6. Punchline – Written by Doug Alexander, art by Rob Haynes
    Told silently, Harley Quinn attempts to trick another criminal out of their ill-gotten gains by inspiring the fear of Batman in them. Her attempts to mimic the Caped Crusader, however, cannot match up to the man himself.
  7. Good Evening Midnight – By Klaus Janson
    As Batman embarks on a dangerous assignment on his birthday, Alfred reads a note Bruce’s father had written long ago for his son which echoes the future for Batman.
  8. Hide and Seek – Written by Paul Levitz, art by Paul Rivoche
    At the scene of a train wreck which may well be the result of malice rather than an accident, Batman seizes on the smallest of clues to follow someone’s trail through the train system and up into the light. Here he finds a small boy and reassures him that he is now safe, telling him that he knows what it’s like to be young and lost.
  9. Night After Night – Written by Kelley Puckett, art by Tim Sale
    Bruce Wayne can’t shake the nightmares he has night after night that recall how his parents were killed, and uses the anger from it to fuel his crime fighting against the likes of The Joker.
  10. Perpetual Mourning – By Ted McKeever
    In this Eisner Award nominated story, Batman conducts an autopsy on a murder victim to help find her killer.