Thank you, DC, for redoing this collection. I tried to read the previous attempt at collecting this series last summer (here, here, and here), and found it to be a huge challenge--the volumes were long out of print, and, as the story spanned a half dozen DC titles at the time, it had not been collected completely, and so was full of holes. I'm pleased to say that the new collection appears to be much more complete (the first volume is nearly three times the length of its first incarnation), but some of the art has been touched up to make it a little more tolerable.
For those not familiar with Batman, the Knightfall storyline is notable for the introduction of Bane, whose presence in the new Batman movie triggered the reprint. That's not the only notable thing about this story, though: It's one of the few instances where Batman actually loses (at least in this first volume). See, Bane isn't just a muscle-bound goon as he may have been depicted in previous Batman movies (Joel Schumacher, I'm looking at you...). He's actually one of Batman's more clever opponents: when he wants to take over Gotham, for instance, he doesn't take on Batman directly, but instead stages a mass breakout of Arkham. Over the space of a few days, an already exhausted Batman is forced to take on every villain he's ever faced and then some! It's only when he's at his weakest that Bane makes his move, leaving Batman gravely injured, and forced to place a substitute in the cowl to keep order in Gotham. This is riveting stuff; it took years to tell and (to my knowledge, at least) it's like nothing else that's ever been done in comics.
As I said, this collection does a much better job of collecting the story (even including a Scarecrow miniseries that seems to have been the basis for Batman Begins), but there are still a few holes--mostly concerning things that happened before this arc began. I can't fault DC for that though; at over 600 pages, there was a lot to cram into this volume, and the second installment looks to be about the same length. I'll be honest--the art is inconsistent, but that's to be expected with the wide range of writers and aritsts working on this project. Can't wait to read the rest of this story!
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