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DC Universe

The Ascension of a Batman

It wasn’t that long ago that I reported – upon seeing it reported elsewhere – that one of the DC Universe’s favorite sons, Bruce Wayne, would be saying adios to life. It was a massive announcement that seemed to somehow get slipped underneath the proverbial welcome mat of the internet. Well, a few weeks on, and there is more news. 

All of the information is making its way in to the world via Rich Johnston, of Comic Book Resources. His weekly column, Lying in the Gutters, has been held in high regard for some time, so these “rumors” can be taken with a bit of weight.

Over the past two weeks, Johnston has passed on two more bits of information that, for my part, blew my mind.

Firstly, last week, Johnston expanded on another rumor that had picked up speed thanks to Valerie D’Orazio on her blog Occasional Superheroine. The rumor is that, all of the main DC heroes are to take a step up in the evolutionary scale and become ‘New Gods’, leaving their sidekicks to fill their vacant spots behind.

Now obviously, for some of you, this will need some explaining.

Created by Jack Kirby and first published in 1971, the New Gods are natives of the twin planets of New Genesis and Apokolips. As their names might suggest to the insightful, New Genesis is an Eden like planet and Apokolips is hellish. The inhabitants of these two planets belong to the Fourth World, and live outside of normal time and space, and are immortal, stronger, faster, and smarter than homo-sapiens.

Any more information can be found across the internet, especially Wikipedia, but that is the gist of what needs to be known for the moment.

According to D’Orazio, rumor had it that the DC universe was going to promote all their number one’s, presumably including Bruce Wayne, Superman, Wonder Woman, among others. However Johnston in last week’s Lying in the Gutters column said that DC had abandoned promoting the entirety of the roster, and reduced it to be only Bruce Wayne.

The reason for the promotions rested in the fact that currently, in various DC books, the New Gods are being killed off one by one. Jim Starlin is currently writing an 8-issue series entitled Death of the New Gods, in which he makes it very clear there will be very few to make it out alive, if any.

Furthermore, for fans of the current Countdown weekly series, we’ve already been shown that Darkseid – the ruler of Apokolips – is at least a player in the damages being wrought across the DCU. So as Johnston suggests in his column, could we be looking forward to seeing a Bruce Wayne versus Darkseid battle at the end of Countdown?

Another note is the change of name to the weekly Countdown series, which at issue #26 – half way through – the title changed to “Countdown to Final Crisis.” The name refers not only to what will no doubt be a massive climax, but also what will be the last of the ‘Crisis’ DC crossover books that have peppered the last two decades of comics.

Lastly, and possibly most newsworthy for the world at large, is who will be donning the cape and cowl after Bruce Wayne departs this mortal plane.

There has been a lot of speculation as to which protégé would fill the roll left behind, between Dick Grayson, Jason Todd, and Tim Drake. Well, once again, according to CBR’s Johnston, the name is now out there, and it’s Jason Todd.

Jason Todd was the unlucky second Robin that was doomed to die in the Batman event, A Death in the Family. However he has slowly been reintroduced in to the DCU and once again grown to prominence in the weekly series Countdown. From a sheer literary point of view, his promotion would have, and subsequently will, make the most sense. His reintroduction in to the universe has been strategically timed.

The DC Universe is pumping out some rather impressive books, and some decent storylines to accompany them. At first I was a little concerned about the death of Bruce Wayne, as I didn’t want them to just retrace the death of Superman, and bring Wayne back a few years later. But this seems a good way to give the Bat-universe a shift, while not adhering to stereotypical comic book conceits.

Needless to say, I cannot wait!