"Death of The Family"
The film begins with Batman busting into Arkham Asylum, fighting inmates with ease as he gets closer to his destination. Mr Freeze, Bane, Clayface, and many others get their cheap hit in, but Batman continues to plow through them. He stops in front of a single cell door, hearing faint giggling behind it. Before he can reach the door, Poison Ivy's vine grabs him and drag him back to be dog-piled by his villains. The last thing he sees in the door he couldn't reach. Alfred's voice is heard and Bruce Wayne takes off his simulation helmet. Bruce has been in the rebuilt Batcave using new Virtual Reality technology to train. Bruce tries to explain how the system works, but Alfred reminds him just what day it is.
Bruce comes upstairs-walking cane in hand- to see his guests waiting for him: Dick Grayson (Nightwing), Barbara Gordon (Oracle), Tim Drake (Robin), Cassandra Kane (Batgirl), Stephanie Brown (Spoiler), Selina Kyle (Catwoman), Holly Robinson (Wildcat), and Commissioner Jim Gordon. Bruce welcomes them with a "Happy Thanksgiving" and everyone begins to mingle. Through the conversations we learn Bruce told Jim Gordon the truth after "Court of Owls", but that Jim had known for a long time and chose to keep it secret. Barbara teasingly calls her father a vigilante before going to take a photo with Cassy and Steph. Jim asks if Bruce has a boxing ring in the cave, when Bruce asks why Jim explains that when he found out Bruce was Batman he shortly learned later that Barbara used to be Batgirl. While Jim can't blame Bruce for The Joker crippling Barbara, he still wants to get his anger out on Bruce without ruining their friendship. Barbara was her own woman when she got involved in Batman's crusade, and if she hadn't joined him she would've probably found some other way of fighting crime. While Bruce, Dick, Tim and Jim play some catch, Selina shows Holly a vase above the fireplace and tells Holly that Selina almost stole that vase before she knew Batman's secret identity. Holly asks what stopped her and she claimed the portrait of Bruce's parents guilt-tripped her. Plus, Alfred walked in with a shotgun and she really didn't feel like beating up an old man. Before dinner, Bruce makes a speech on how for most of his life he felt the weight of being alone, how being Batman always reminded him of the family he lost, but seeing all of these people with him today reminds him that he has more family than he thought. Dick Grayson apologizes for ruining Bruce's moment, but he proposes to Barbara Gordon and she says yes.
While everyone is asleep in the manor that night, Bruce wakes Dick up and they go down to the Batcave. Bruce shows Dick a new bat-suit he had been working on. With a built-in exoskeleton, preloaded weapons, high-tech detective systems, jet propulsion, and titanium armor (for a description, it is identical to Luke Fox's Batwing suit and/or a Batman Beyond suit with a blue symbol). Bruce regards it's various modes and capabilities and Dick interrupts him by noticing the suit was made too small to fit Bruce. Dick assumed this was going to help Bruce fight crime, but then sees the measurements of the suit match his own. Bruce wants Dick to take over as Batman and protect Gotham City, but Dick couldn't be more angry. He just proposed to the woman he loves, he's planning on hanging up the mask and moving on with his life and only a few hours later Bruce tosses this on him. Dick claims he's done with Gotham, he's done with the cave, he's done with all of it and if Bruce can't accept the goals of anyone else but himself than the only part of Bruce's life Dick won't leave behind is Barbara. Dick walks back upstairs.
That night, Harley Quinn merrily skips into a dark warehouse holding a letter from "Mr. J". When she enters the basement of the warehouse she is surrounded by darkness and one faintly lit light-bulb. A set of clothes are tossed to her and a voice tells her to put them on, as she finishes getting dressed she notices how the clothes look like his. She then watches as The Joker walks out of the darkness and puts a red helmet on her. The next day, Alfred informs Bruce that everyone has left the manor and Bruce tells Alfred about his talk with Dick. Alfred is sympathetic, but sides with Dick on the matter. Alfred even thinks Gotham has become safe enough for Batman to retire completely. At the Gotham City Police Department, the room Jim Gordon and several officers are talking in goes dark and when the lights come back on all the police except Jim have been murdered, each sporting a sick grin. Jim grabs his phone to call Bruce and finds a note hanging off the door handle. Dick, Tim and Cassy return to the cave just as Batman gets back from investigating the scene. Batman looks over the note and finds its a request for Batman to meet The Joker at Ace Chemicals that night. Alone.
Batman gets to Ace Chemicals Plant while his allies wait in the cave. When he walks in he hears The Joker's voice reminiscing over the first time they met here at Ace Chemicals. Batman sees The Joker dressed as The Red Hood, the same identity The Joker used the night he fell into the chemicals that drove him insane. When Batman gets a hold of The Joker and removes the red helmet, he finds it is actually Harley Quinn in disguise. Harley is too horrified to explain herself, but manages to whisper "Mayor James". Batman radios the cave and tells Nightwing, Robin and Batgirl go protect the mayor, he calls Jim Gordon and tells him the same. Harley pulls Batman towards the exit and mumbles something about a bomb and the two run out just as Ace Chemicals explodes. Meanwhile, the doorbell rings at Wayne Manor. When Alfred answers the door he is pelted with a crowbar.
Batman and Harley Quinn walk into the mayor's office to find everyone infected with Joker Toxin. Luckily, Batman never stopped carrying the antidote and heals his allies, the mayor and the police of the toxin. Batman tells the police to take Harley and get whatever information they can from her, he then tells his allies to rest and let the antidote heal them while he follows The Joker. Harley mentioned "dancing the same steps" which tipped Batman off that The Joker is repeated the same moves he made when he first met him.
Barbara Gordon and Stephanie Brown go to Jim Gordon's apartment and find him infected with Joker Toxin, before they do anything a motion sensor goes off and fills the room with gas. Barbara tries to crawl towards a phone, but she is knocked out by the gas. Batman stands across the bridge of the Gotham City Water System. On the other side waits The Joker. The Joker reminds him of the first time they met here and what his plan was back then, but this time claims he just killed a bunch of people and tossed them in the water beforehand. The Joker uses silly-string ropes to constrain Batman and goes on to say his time away from Gotham has made Batman weak. Batman has been forced to rely on children to get the job done. He got his back snapped by a wrestler, played puppet in Wonderland, and couldn't even beat some old bird-men without help. The Joker wants to help Batman by cutting those who have dragged him down. Batman drops a flame pellet that torches the ropes and allows him to escape and attack The Joker. But when he has Joker close to him, The Joker lands a kiss on Batman's cheek. Batman starts to get woozy and The Joker tells him he drenched his own skin in poison. Non-lethal though, The Joker isn't done with Batman yet. Batman falls into the water below.
Batman wakes up in the Batcave surrounded by Nightwing, Robin, and Batgirl. They inform him that Barbara, Steph, Selina, Holly, Alfred, and Jim are missing. Batman has to research into The Joker's next move, but Nightwing is upset he puts The Joker before his family. Robin knows Batman is holding something back and Batman admits that after his third run-in with The Joker years ago, he went into the cave the morning after and found one of Joker's cards on his Bat-Boat. Everyone is shocked, if The Joker got into the cave once he could do it again and might know all of their identities, but Batman believes otherwise. Nightwing asks why he kept this a secret and why he isn't asking for help, Batman simply claims The Joker has gone too far and he can't risk getting anyone between him and The Joker. Batman has to follow a lead and refuses anyone's help, so Nightwing leads the others on a mission to find their friends.
Thanks to Harley Quinn's interrogation, Batman learns about The Joker's secret passage into Arkham Asylum. Batman enters the Asylum and is greeted by The Joker's voice calling Arkham "The Knight's Kingdom". The Joker taunts Batman as he walks by Arkham employees dressed as Batman and Joker being forced to dance, a canvas made of human bodies displaying the epic battles between The Joker an Batman, a hallway featuring a flaming horse, and a room full of inmates dressed as knights. Batman gets to the head office and finds The Joker in front of a throne. Before Batman can grab him, The Joker shows him a collection of screens showing Nightwing, Robin, and Batgirl being captured. With hostages in hand, The Joker escorts Batman up to the throne where more drawn-on-skin pictures show the death of the second Robin, the crippling of the first Batgirl, and the eternal battle between The Joker and Batman. When Batman sits on the throne, an electrical surge runs through him and knocks him out.
Batman finds himself in a cave sitting at a dinner table and strapped to a chair, around the table are Nightwing, Oracle, Robin, Batgirl, Spoiler, Catwoman, Jim Gordon, and Wildcat. Each of their faces are wrapped in medical paper and a covered silver platter sits before each of them. The Joker appears ready to host the royal feast and the last meal for Batman's allies. Alfred Pennyworth crawls out from a cavern-hypnotized by Joker's toxins-and opens the platters as instructed. The faces of Batman's allies lay on the platters and send their owners into a panic. Batman breaks from his chair, but triggers a flaming mechanism The Joker set up. The Joker runs into the caves as the flames grow, but Batman recognizes these caves as the ones near the Batcave, he uses a explosive in his belt to blow the roof of the cave. Water from above puts out the fires and Batman unwraps the paper on his allies faces, discovering their faces were never cut off and it was just part of The Joker's sick game. Nightwing tells Batman to follow The Joker while he helps the others. With his allies free and helping Alfred, Batman follows The Joker to the end of a cliff. The Joker tells Batman that his laughing toxin has been released into the dining cavern and that his allies will most likely go crazy and kill each other. But Batman trusts his family.
We see Batman's allies laughing hysterically, but holding each other tight as they brace the pain. Batman and The Joker fight it out until The Joker tries to escape by leaping down a waterfall, but Batman catches him. Batman tells him that all those years ago The Joker never entered the cave, that this is as far as The Joker got. The Joker stopped himself before learning who Batman is because he doesn't care, because knowing who Batman is would ruin the game. But when The Joker was missing, Batman looked into his background and learned his real name. As Batman begins to whisper The Joker's real name into his ear, The Joker pushes off of him and falls into water below.
Batman goes back to the dining cavern and is happy to see the laughing gas wore off, but he also sees his allies surrounding Alfred. Robin tells Batman that Alfred had been exposed to The Joker's poison the longest and that his heart couldn't take it. As Alfred begins to die, he lays a hand on Batman's face and tells him that he loves him.
Dick Grayson's narration is heard over Alfred's funeral, we learn that he and Barbara decided to postpone the wedding given the events and that the rest of the family is taking a leave of absence. Tim and Steph are heading to London, Cass has agreed to bring Holly to Hong Kong with her, Barbara and Jim are spending some time in Metropolis, but Selina decided to stay in Gotham and keep Bruce company. After these events, Dick has done a lot of thinking and has finally understood why Bruce wanted him to be the next Batman. With Bruce done as Batman and The Joker gone, Gotham needs a new kind of hero to push it in a better direction. Someone who can a knight without embracing the darkness. Dick hangs his Nightwing costume in the Batcave and opens the case holding the new Batsuit. Bruce stands beside him and tells him he'll guide him every step of the way, but Dick refuses. Bruce spent his entire adult life guiding people, saving people, but-just this once-Dick is going to be the one to save Bruce.
In the new Batsuit, Dick stands above Gotham City and talks over the communicator with Barbara. They discuss their wedding and argue over some of the details, but Dick gets a call from Officer Harvey Bullock about "some freak in a pig mask" kidnapping homeless people. Dick says goodnight to Barbara and spreads his wings. Batman jumps into the city below.
After the credits, we open on truck stop in the middle of the desert. A trucker wakes up in the bathroom next to a sleeping prostitute and sneaks out. When he gets to his truck, a short, disgusting man pulls the trucker off the vehicle and demands money for "his employees" services. When the trucker refuses, the little man begins beating him with his bare hands. A limo pulls up and one of Darkseid's minions-The Glorious Godfrey-finds the little man sitting on the trucker's corpse and counting money. Godfrey identifies the man as Sleez, another minion of Darkseid. Sleez refuses to help Darkseid after being banished to Earth, but Godfrey informs him that Darkseid can make all of Earth into Sleez's scum-shack. Sleez grins and says "try pleasure palace".
Thank you for reading.
What happened to Harley? Find out next time with "Harley's Holiday".
Facebook: The Panel Biter
Twitter: @ThePanelBiter
Podbean: Panelbiter.podbean.com
Bruce comes upstairs-walking cane in hand- to see his guests waiting for him: Dick Grayson (Nightwing), Barbara Gordon (Oracle), Tim Drake (Robin), Cassandra Kane (Batgirl), Stephanie Brown (Spoiler), Selina Kyle (Catwoman), Holly Robinson (Wildcat), and Commissioner Jim Gordon. Bruce welcomes them with a "Happy Thanksgiving" and everyone begins to mingle. Through the conversations we learn Bruce told Jim Gordon the truth after "Court of Owls", but that Jim had known for a long time and chose to keep it secret. Barbara teasingly calls her father a vigilante before going to take a photo with Cassy and Steph. Jim asks if Bruce has a boxing ring in the cave, when Bruce asks why Jim explains that when he found out Bruce was Batman he shortly learned later that Barbara used to be Batgirl. While Jim can't blame Bruce for The Joker crippling Barbara, he still wants to get his anger out on Bruce without ruining their friendship. Barbara was her own woman when she got involved in Batman's crusade, and if she hadn't joined him she would've probably found some other way of fighting crime. While Bruce, Dick, Tim and Jim play some catch, Selina shows Holly a vase above the fireplace and tells Holly that Selina almost stole that vase before she knew Batman's secret identity. Holly asks what stopped her and she claimed the portrait of Bruce's parents guilt-tripped her. Plus, Alfred walked in with a shotgun and she really didn't feel like beating up an old man. Before dinner, Bruce makes a speech on how for most of his life he felt the weight of being alone, how being Batman always reminded him of the family he lost, but seeing all of these people with him today reminds him that he has more family than he thought. Dick Grayson apologizes for ruining Bruce's moment, but he proposes to Barbara Gordon and she says yes.
While everyone is asleep in the manor that night, Bruce wakes Dick up and they go down to the Batcave. Bruce shows Dick a new bat-suit he had been working on. With a built-in exoskeleton, preloaded weapons, high-tech detective systems, jet propulsion, and titanium armor (for a description, it is identical to Luke Fox's Batwing suit and/or a Batman Beyond suit with a blue symbol). Bruce regards it's various modes and capabilities and Dick interrupts him by noticing the suit was made too small to fit Bruce. Dick assumed this was going to help Bruce fight crime, but then sees the measurements of the suit match his own. Bruce wants Dick to take over as Batman and protect Gotham City, but Dick couldn't be more angry. He just proposed to the woman he loves, he's planning on hanging up the mask and moving on with his life and only a few hours later Bruce tosses this on him. Dick claims he's done with Gotham, he's done with the cave, he's done with all of it and if Bruce can't accept the goals of anyone else but himself than the only part of Bruce's life Dick won't leave behind is Barbara. Dick walks back upstairs.
That night, Harley Quinn merrily skips into a dark warehouse holding a letter from "Mr. J". When she enters the basement of the warehouse she is surrounded by darkness and one faintly lit light-bulb. A set of clothes are tossed to her and a voice tells her to put them on, as she finishes getting dressed she notices how the clothes look like his. She then watches as The Joker walks out of the darkness and puts a red helmet on her. The next day, Alfred informs Bruce that everyone has left the manor and Bruce tells Alfred about his talk with Dick. Alfred is sympathetic, but sides with Dick on the matter. Alfred even thinks Gotham has become safe enough for Batman to retire completely. At the Gotham City Police Department, the room Jim Gordon and several officers are talking in goes dark and when the lights come back on all the police except Jim have been murdered, each sporting a sick grin. Jim grabs his phone to call Bruce and finds a note hanging off the door handle. Dick, Tim and Cassy return to the cave just as Batman gets back from investigating the scene. Batman looks over the note and finds its a request for Batman to meet The Joker at Ace Chemicals that night. Alone.
Batman gets to Ace Chemicals Plant while his allies wait in the cave. When he walks in he hears The Joker's voice reminiscing over the first time they met here at Ace Chemicals. Batman sees The Joker dressed as The Red Hood, the same identity The Joker used the night he fell into the chemicals that drove him insane. When Batman gets a hold of The Joker and removes the red helmet, he finds it is actually Harley Quinn in disguise. Harley is too horrified to explain herself, but manages to whisper "Mayor James". Batman radios the cave and tells Nightwing, Robin and Batgirl go protect the mayor, he calls Jim Gordon and tells him the same. Harley pulls Batman towards the exit and mumbles something about a bomb and the two run out just as Ace Chemicals explodes. Meanwhile, the doorbell rings at Wayne Manor. When Alfred answers the door he is pelted with a crowbar.
Batman and Harley Quinn walk into the mayor's office to find everyone infected with Joker Toxin. Luckily, Batman never stopped carrying the antidote and heals his allies, the mayor and the police of the toxin. Batman tells the police to take Harley and get whatever information they can from her, he then tells his allies to rest and let the antidote heal them while he follows The Joker. Harley mentioned "dancing the same steps" which tipped Batman off that The Joker is repeated the same moves he made when he first met him.
Barbara Gordon and Stephanie Brown go to Jim Gordon's apartment and find him infected with Joker Toxin, before they do anything a motion sensor goes off and fills the room with gas. Barbara tries to crawl towards a phone, but she is knocked out by the gas. Batman stands across the bridge of the Gotham City Water System. On the other side waits The Joker. The Joker reminds him of the first time they met here and what his plan was back then, but this time claims he just killed a bunch of people and tossed them in the water beforehand. The Joker uses silly-string ropes to constrain Batman and goes on to say his time away from Gotham has made Batman weak. Batman has been forced to rely on children to get the job done. He got his back snapped by a wrestler, played puppet in Wonderland, and couldn't even beat some old bird-men without help. The Joker wants to help Batman by cutting those who have dragged him down. Batman drops a flame pellet that torches the ropes and allows him to escape and attack The Joker. But when he has Joker close to him, The Joker lands a kiss on Batman's cheek. Batman starts to get woozy and The Joker tells him he drenched his own skin in poison. Non-lethal though, The Joker isn't done with Batman yet. Batman falls into the water below.
Batman wakes up in the Batcave surrounded by Nightwing, Robin, and Batgirl. They inform him that Barbara, Steph, Selina, Holly, Alfred, and Jim are missing. Batman has to research into The Joker's next move, but Nightwing is upset he puts The Joker before his family. Robin knows Batman is holding something back and Batman admits that after his third run-in with The Joker years ago, he went into the cave the morning after and found one of Joker's cards on his Bat-Boat. Everyone is shocked, if The Joker got into the cave once he could do it again and might know all of their identities, but Batman believes otherwise. Nightwing asks why he kept this a secret and why he isn't asking for help, Batman simply claims The Joker has gone too far and he can't risk getting anyone between him and The Joker. Batman has to follow a lead and refuses anyone's help, so Nightwing leads the others on a mission to find their friends.
Thanks to Harley Quinn's interrogation, Batman learns about The Joker's secret passage into Arkham Asylum. Batman enters the Asylum and is greeted by The Joker's voice calling Arkham "The Knight's Kingdom". The Joker taunts Batman as he walks by Arkham employees dressed as Batman and Joker being forced to dance, a canvas made of human bodies displaying the epic battles between The Joker an Batman, a hallway featuring a flaming horse, and a room full of inmates dressed as knights. Batman gets to the head office and finds The Joker in front of a throne. Before Batman can grab him, The Joker shows him a collection of screens showing Nightwing, Robin, and Batgirl being captured. With hostages in hand, The Joker escorts Batman up to the throne where more drawn-on-skin pictures show the death of the second Robin, the crippling of the first Batgirl, and the eternal battle between The Joker and Batman. When Batman sits on the throne, an electrical surge runs through him and knocks him out.
Batman finds himself in a cave sitting at a dinner table and strapped to a chair, around the table are Nightwing, Oracle, Robin, Batgirl, Spoiler, Catwoman, Jim Gordon, and Wildcat. Each of their faces are wrapped in medical paper and a covered silver platter sits before each of them. The Joker appears ready to host the royal feast and the last meal for Batman's allies. Alfred Pennyworth crawls out from a cavern-hypnotized by Joker's toxins-and opens the platters as instructed. The faces of Batman's allies lay on the platters and send their owners into a panic. Batman breaks from his chair, but triggers a flaming mechanism The Joker set up. The Joker runs into the caves as the flames grow, but Batman recognizes these caves as the ones near the Batcave, he uses a explosive in his belt to blow the roof of the cave. Water from above puts out the fires and Batman unwraps the paper on his allies faces, discovering their faces were never cut off and it was just part of The Joker's sick game. Nightwing tells Batman to follow The Joker while he helps the others. With his allies free and helping Alfred, Batman follows The Joker to the end of a cliff. The Joker tells Batman that his laughing toxin has been released into the dining cavern and that his allies will most likely go crazy and kill each other. But Batman trusts his family.
We see Batman's allies laughing hysterically, but holding each other tight as they brace the pain. Batman and The Joker fight it out until The Joker tries to escape by leaping down a waterfall, but Batman catches him. Batman tells him that all those years ago The Joker never entered the cave, that this is as far as The Joker got. The Joker stopped himself before learning who Batman is because he doesn't care, because knowing who Batman is would ruin the game. But when The Joker was missing, Batman looked into his background and learned his real name. As Batman begins to whisper The Joker's real name into his ear, The Joker pushes off of him and falls into water below.
Batman goes back to the dining cavern and is happy to see the laughing gas wore off, but he also sees his allies surrounding Alfred. Robin tells Batman that Alfred had been exposed to The Joker's poison the longest and that his heart couldn't take it. As Alfred begins to die, he lays a hand on Batman's face and tells him that he loves him.
Dick Grayson's narration is heard over Alfred's funeral, we learn that he and Barbara decided to postpone the wedding given the events and that the rest of the family is taking a leave of absence. Tim and Steph are heading to London, Cass has agreed to bring Holly to Hong Kong with her, Barbara and Jim are spending some time in Metropolis, but Selina decided to stay in Gotham and keep Bruce company. After these events, Dick has done a lot of thinking and has finally understood why Bruce wanted him to be the next Batman. With Bruce done as Batman and The Joker gone, Gotham needs a new kind of hero to push it in a better direction. Someone who can a knight without embracing the darkness. Dick hangs his Nightwing costume in the Batcave and opens the case holding the new Batsuit. Bruce stands beside him and tells him he'll guide him every step of the way, but Dick refuses. Bruce spent his entire adult life guiding people, saving people, but-just this once-Dick is going to be the one to save Bruce.
In the new Batsuit, Dick stands above Gotham City and talks over the communicator with Barbara. They discuss their wedding and argue over some of the details, but Dick gets a call from Officer Harvey Bullock about "some freak in a pig mask" kidnapping homeless people. Dick says goodnight to Barbara and spreads his wings. Batman jumps into the city below.
After the credits, we open on truck stop in the middle of the desert. A trucker wakes up in the bathroom next to a sleeping prostitute and sneaks out. When he gets to his truck, a short, disgusting man pulls the trucker off the vehicle and demands money for "his employees" services. When the trucker refuses, the little man begins beating him with his bare hands. A limo pulls up and one of Darkseid's minions-The Glorious Godfrey-finds the little man sitting on the trucker's corpse and counting money. Godfrey identifies the man as Sleez, another minion of Darkseid. Sleez refuses to help Darkseid after being banished to Earth, but Godfrey informs him that Darkseid can make all of Earth into Sleez's scum-shack. Sleez grins and says "try pleasure palace".
Thank you for reading.
What happened to Harley? Find out next time with "Harley's Holiday".
Facebook: The Panel Biter
Twitter: @ThePanelBiter
Podbean: Panelbiter.podbean.com
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