Batman Hush is quite possibly the greatest story arc that’s come out of comics in the last 20 years. Launching in 2003 with Batman #608, for the first time Jim Lee teamed up with acclaimed writer Jeph Loeb, at the time most known for his Batman Long Halloween work with artist Tim Sale. The art collaboration between Jim Lee and Scott Williams along with the storytelling of Loeb was an instant success. Batman Hush ran for a 12 issue series from Batman 608-619 and a Wizard interlude recognized as 616A with record sales across the board and where the storyline has been reprinted numerous times as well as a hit animated movie and he most recent Batman movie in 2022 inspired by the Hush series.
For the first time in nearly 20 years since since Batman 619 released September 2003, 5 new pages have been released from the same creative team of Jeph Loeb writing with Jim Lee and Scott Williams art. The hype on these new story pages hit every major comic publication worldwide with articles coming out from everywhere from Bleeding Cool to Screen Rant and IGN to name a few. Similar to the interlude released in the Wizard #0, also referred as 616A, these new story pages immediately follow the end of issue 619, titled as “Prologue The Aftermath”. As IGN reported prior to the release of the book, the 5 added pages are part of the original story…
“DC's upcoming Batman: Hush 20th Anniversary Edition hardcover will feature the 12-part series written by Jeph Loeb and illustrated by Jim Lee, as well as tons of bonus material. And as revealed by IGN, that includes five new pages that have been added to the original story.”
When the cover to the Hush 20th Anniversary was announced and the art was released, it was a frenzy from comic art collectors to pick up the cover. The bidding started north of $50k and 2 bidders quickly took it past $70k, ending at an incredible $90k! Our understanding is the bidding may have very well gone higher, but Jim was happy with $90k and ended it there. I told Albert Moy, Jim’s rep to please let me know when the Hush pages are released. Lucky for me when Albert was at The Baltimore Comic Con when Jim just passed over the 5 pages to him. When he described the pages over the phone my first thought as always, was to pick up an actual Hush (Tommy Elliott as the villain) page, seeing there are so few of them out in the flesh and command a premium. Once I saw page 4 the half splash of Hush getting out of the river I was immediately sold, but then I saw page 5, a cover quality splash of a rogue gallery of sorts featuring not only Hush but a classic pose of both Harley and Joker pointing a gun to Hush’s head. Albert and I work out a deal for both, but then looking at pages 1-3, which all feature Batman, I’m thinking the opening splash of Batman in the rain jumping in the river is such a classic moment. Once I decided to get 3 of the 5 pages, I decided to work out a deal to get all 5 pages to the story. Here they are in detail...
Jim Lee Pencils & Scott Williams Inks Batman Hush 20th Anniversary Splash Page 1 "Into The River" (DC, 2022)
We kick off the story directly following the events of Batman #619 Bruce goes back to the bridge every night to search for Tommy Elliott aka Hush… As mentioned above this is an incredible opening page of Batman diving into the river with the rain pounding at night reminiscent to the finale scene in Batman #619. I especially love the subtle homage on the bridge on the lower left to Infantino and Miller, though later for print Miller was replaced with the great Tim Sale after his passing in June 2022.