I love Batman so much. I'm glad I finally got around to reading this. Such a great summarized history of Batman from beginning to 1999 (Batman Beyond) including some really awesome visuals to reference. I feel like I learned so much. I'm giving this 4 stars because it does feel dense at times for someone who has never been good at history class and thus never great at keeping up with names and numbers. For the most part it was chronological but there were some things that overlapped that probably made my brain do more year math than I'd like.

The selling point for this book is the treasure-trove of illustrations! From comics to collectibles, they're tons of fun to look at. The history is told from point to point without much exploration, which is expected. It's a "Team DC" history book with controversy quietly swept away. If all you want are the bullet points, this is the one. It runs out of steam towards the end when the author can barely disguise his yawns for the then-current goings-on in the comics and the Schumacher films of the mid-90s, which is in sharp contrast to his obvious love for the animated series (rightly so). It really brought home for me how little I care about Batman comics. I prefer my Batman to be animated.