Batman: The Dark Knight Returns

The Dark Knight Returns
The Dark Knight Returns No. 1 (Feb. 1986). Cover art is by penciler-inker Frank Miller and colorist Lynn Varley.
Publication information
Publisher	DC Comics
Schedule	Monthly
Format	Limited series
Publication date(s)	February – June 1986
No. of issues	4
Main character(s)	Batman James Gordon Carrie Kelly The Joker Superman
Creative team
Written by	Frank Miller
Penciller(s)	Frank Miller
Inker(s)	Klaus Janson
Letterer(s)	John Costanza
Colorist(s)	Lynn Varley
Editor(s)	Dick Giordano Dennis O'Neil
Collected editions
Batman: The Dark Knight Returns	ISBN
Absolute Dark Knight	ISBN

The Dark Knight Returns (alternatively titled Batman: The Dark Knight Returns) is a 1986 four-issue comic book miniseries starring Batman, written by Frank Miller, illustrated by Miller and Klaus Janson, and published by DC Comics. When the series was collected into a single volume later that year, the story title for the first issue was applied to the entire series. The Dark Knight Returns tells an alternative story of Bruce Wayne, who at 50 years old returns from retirement to fight crime and faces opposition from the Gotham City police force and the United States government. The story introduces Carrie Kelley as the new Robin and culminates with a confrontation against Superman.

A three-issue sequel written and illustrated by Miller, The Dark Knight Strikes Again, was published in 2001. An nine-issue third installment, The Dark Knight III: The Master Race, co-written by Miller and Brian Azzarello, was published twice-monthly starting in late 2015. Frank Miller has said he is working on a fourth series. In addition, a 64-page prestige format one-shot co-written by Miller and Azzarello, Dark Knight Returns: The Last Crusade, which serves as a prequel to the original series, was released on June 15, 2016. Additionally, Spawn/Batman was released in 1994 as a companion to The Dark Knight Returns, and, according to Miller, the series All Star Batman & Robin, the Boy Wonder can be considered a prequel.

In the pre-Flashpoint DC Multiverse, the events of The Dark Knight Returns and its associated titles were designated to occur on Earth-31.