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Title: RIP: The Missing Chapter
Part 1: Batman's Last Case
Writer: Grant Morrison
Artist and Cover: Tony Daniel
Page 1
Days to Omega: 27
Location: The Hall of Justice
Superman declares “Condition Amber” to all the JLA members (Final Crisis #1 pg. 24).
Page 2-3
Batman takes the Radion Bullet and puts it in his utility belt to bring it to the Bat-Cave to further analyze it.
Note: Batman taking the Radion Bullet was first revealed in Batman #683 pg. 22 where he also began his recording regarding this event before his “death”.
Everything that Batman narrated in this issue is part of this recording which I suppose is addressed to Superman.
Page 4
Batman explains his theory (the Radion Bullet being the essence of all bullets) to Wally West, the Flash.
Note: We must remember that Wally West is the Flash from Grant’s JLA run so a chat between these two is not a surprise anymore.
This is also the theory that Wally mentioned to Jay Garrick in Final Crisis #2 pg. 28-29
Page 5
This scene, Superman talking to Batman outside the Hall of Justice first appeared in Final Crisis #2 pg. 20
“Essence of bullet” elaborated. Batman has this theory that the New Gods, their ways, and their artifacts are the essence of things rather than things themselves. For him, the New Gods are ideas that happen to interact with the real world. Just like Metron introducing fire to Anthro, thus born the discovery of fire to mankind. Darkseid’s Radion Bullet, the bullet that kills Orion, is the archetype of all bullets.
Note: In Final Crisis #6, Batman says “A gun and a bullet, Darkseid. It was your idea”.
At the time, it seemed that Batman was speaking only of Orion’s death, but here, he’s speaking of every such death. It is the origin of all the bullets that end many lives known to mankind, including his parents'.
Page 6-7
“that imprint on your palm”
Note: In Final Crisis #2, while investigating the crime scene (at Metropolis’ docks where Orion’s body was found) green lantern John Stewart was attacked by another green lantern, and was crucified by the attacker’s constructs to a shipping crate. Before he was put down, John tried to break free. He rips his arm from where it was pinned and punches his attacker’s hand.
Later it was revealed that John’s attacker is alpha lantern Kraken possessed by Granny Goodness, Batman discovered it when he saw the imprint of John’s ring in Kraken’s palm.
Batman calls for ‘Black Alert’. He tried to stop Kraken by killing the nerve cluster in her wrist but failed.
Kraken’s constructs are of giant centipedes. Batman says that her constructs felt like Joker Venom, Fear Gas, and Doctor Hurt’s smile all at once.
Note: Flowers in Arkham garden had these hideous centipedes crawling out of them in Joker’s fantasy of murdering Robin, Nightwing and Gordon using his Joker Venom, which he saw in the ink-blot test that Le Bossu gave him (Batman 676).
Batman believes that the New Gods are the essence of things. This suggests that Granny Goodness’ attack using Kraken’s constructs is the origin of all the things that Batman mentioned. Things that made him confront his worst fears.
“Too late I saw the shape of the trap that had been waiting for me since the day I was born.”
Batman blacked out after he vomited. The last panel is a black rectangle, the shape of an empty, deep grave. Death, his own mortality, is the ultimate trap, set for him since the day he was born.
Page 8
Days to Omega: 25
Location: Evil Factory, Bludhaven
Instead of Turpin, Batman is the one who said “there’s someone in my head”(Final Crisis #2 pg. 25).
Is this some kind of editorial error? Who knows?
Page 9
That “someone” inside Batman’s head is the Lump.
Note: The Lump is a powerful telepath and shape shifter from Apokolips.
In Final Crisis, Simyan and Mokkari used the Lump to help create an army of Batman Clones. The Lump toured in Batman’s mind for 25 days disguised as Alfred Pennyworth, His goal is taking Batman through his memories, to feed the clones with the determination and skill of Batman. However, Batman detected him which led to a mental battle between the two.
The emotional energy caused by this began killing the Batman Clones. To stop the mental link, Mokkari shot the Lump to death. Still inside Batman’s mind, the Lump feels he’s slowly dying. Batman swore if the Lump helped him, he would find the Lump's killers. From being an enemy, the Lump became Batman’s ally. Lump set Batman free before he disintegrates. Batman’s captors ran away when they saw him gets free, leaving Batman’s utility belt and the gun that they used to kill the Lump.
Lump’s tour inside Batman’s head is detailed in Batman #682-683.
Page 10-11
“There are HOLES in my awareness and they seem to be getting BIGGER”
As he breaks free, Batman sensed that he’s beginning to lose his memory, probably caused by the green syringes injected in his head.
“I can remember the smell of ANTISEPTIC, fear and human waste. It was as if I’d woken in a prison hell of BROKEN GLASS and chemicals where the dead men in the jars all had MY FACE.”
Note: This echoes the memories that the Clone-Batman repeats to Damian in Batman and Robin #9.
“I realized THEY hadn’t prepared for ANY of this.”
“That Hole in Things was EVERYWHERE. It was there in every BEST LAID PLAN.”
Batman remarks of his escape from the Evil Factory as what the Evil Gods hadn’t prepared for. Darkseid’s best laid plan succumbs in failure. Nothing’s perfect.
“They ran and left my belt behind…”
Note: Man, if you’re going to trap the Bat make sure that his utility belt is nowhere near him. With his mind and that belt combined, he’s invincible.
Batman found the Radion Bullet still inside his utility belt. Beside the belt is the gun Mokkari used to kill the Lump.
He loads the God-bullet in the gun then walks to find and confront Darkseid. He remembers his chat with Jim Gordon asking him “Why did you have to choose an enemy that’s…bigger than all of us Batman?” (Batman #665 pg. 18)
“I figured I could take him” Batman replied.
Page 12
Seconds to Omega: 00.53
Location: Depths of Command D-Bunker, Bludhaven
Batman came face to face with Darkseid. (Final Crisis #6 pg. 26-27)
“He might have been a WOLF once, a DRAGON or a TYRANT.”
“How MANY TIMES in human history had his moment played out?”
“The MONSTER…and the MAN standing in his way?”
How many times indeed? Whether real life or fictional? A brave knight fighting a dragon, a lone hunter face to face with a fierce wolf, and stories of people who stood up against tyranny.
Page 13
“He knew I WOULDN”T kill his human host but he didn’t knew I had the RADION bullet.”
“And a NEW MYTH of my own”
As Batman fires the gun, Darkseid’s Omega Sanction came out.
“A myth where Ultimate Evil turns its gaze on humanity and humanity gazes right back and says…”
GOTCHA.
Darkseid is the archetype of all terrible beings/ things that have plagued mankind. Batman stood up and fights the Ultimate Evil in front of him. Thus, his counterattack becomes an archetype, too. He now became humanity’s representative to stare down evil and strike fear into it. Batman altered the myth of evil and gave birth to that well known myth titled "Miracle in Crime Alley", Where a young boy gazed back at evil and vows to fight it. ^_^
Page 14-15
Darkseid’s Omega Sanction struck Batman. (Final Crisis #6 pg. 28-29)
And that brings us to this issue's biggest revelation. The Ancestor Box, unlike the “ping ping ping” sound of the Mother Box, this box creates this bell-like sound “domm domm domm”. Perhaps this is the “Bells of the All-Over” that people throughout history hear when they open the Bat-Casket (Return of Bruce Wayne). In addition to that, this box has a many tentacle thing creeping from it. Perhaps the hyper-adapter which the box contains creates the hyperfauna (Return of Bruce Wayne #2). It is likely that of which Jack Valor cannot speak (Return of Bruce Wayne #3) and that which Alan Wayne calls "sickening" (Return of Bruce Wayne #4).
“Then I GOT it.”
“Somehow I knew WHAT he was turning in his hands…”
Page 16-17
“It was TIME”
“time is PLIABLE”
“As I stayed IN PLACE, he manipulated whole CENTURIES around me”.
As the Omega Sanction struck Batman we can see his life flashes before our eyes as time bends and the coincidences and events became a conspiracy meant to trap and bring him Death.
Darkseid described the Omega Sanction as a trap that uses your history and your timeline that will bring you death over and over. It brings its victim in a series of alternate realities, each worse than the previous one.
Being struck by it, Batman’s reality is trapped (e.g, his various death and funeral in Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader - pg.16 panel 4) and his entire history is manipulated (e.g. Willowood Asylum – pg. 17 panel 1).
Trivia: Willowood Asylum is the place in a Pre-Crisis(1) story where Bruce's brain-damaged evil brother Thomas Jr.(2) was sent.
(1) Because of the extensive and substantial changes that the storyline Crisis on Infinite Earths implemented on many titles published by DC Comics, the series became a defining and critical moment in DC Comics' long-standing continuity. Characters and other elements established before the series, especially those eliminated by it, were referred to as pre-Crisis, while revised ones were considered post-Crisis.
(2) Thomas Wayne Jr.
The second son of Thomas and Martha Wayne, and the elder brother of Bruce/Batman. As an infant, Thomas Jr. had suffered head injuries in a car accident, and had been confined to Willowood Asylum for life. Upon his escape, he was manipulated into becoming the assassin known as the "Boomerang Killer" until Batman learned of his existence. In World's Finest #227, Thomas Wayne, Jr. appears to die, sacrificing himself to save his brother's life.
Question: By opening the gates of the said pre-Crisis asylum, could Morrison be opening the door to Thomas Jr. being Doctor Hurt?
Answer: Definitely, NO.
Thomas Wayne Jr. was only three years older than Bruce, Doctor Hurt on the other hand was already an adult in 1980's, clearly too old to be the son of Thomas and Martha.
And we flash to Superman, Tim Drake and Rip Hunter at the JLA Watchtower listening to Batman’s recording device. Somehow Batman’s buddies found his utility belt and listened to these notes, and that might be how they know that Darkseid turned Batman into a Doomsday Weapon. And now they’re (Superman, Hal Jordan, Booster Gold, Rip Hunter) doing all they can to stop him returning to the current timeline, for his return indicates his and humanity’s end.
Page 18
We can see Bruce’s funeral (first seen in Batman #673 and was detailed in Batman #687), and his gravestone beside his parents’.
During his heart attack and his near death experience in Batman #673, did Bruce saw his future? That we don’t know. What we know is, that wasn’t him they buried. It was the Clone-Batman which Dick resurrected using the Lazarus Pit in Batman and Robin #8
“I’m not dead”.
“I know you’ll search for me”.
We can also see Bruce plunges deeper into Darkseid’s trap with his cape and cowl glowing with Omega Radiation indicating that it’s the Doomsday Weapon.
Page 19
Bruce is now inside his pre-historic Bat-Cave. He takes off the cape and the cowl. He has to, because if being Batman is going to lead him to being Darkseid’s greatest doomsday weapon, he’ll have to be just Bruce Wayne to get through and survive. We should know that there’s no such thing as Batman and Bruce Wayne, because both are one man. With or without the cape and the cowl, there’s no doubt that Bruce Wayne IS Batman.
“I can’t remember my NAME anymore”.
Bruce slowly loses his memories as he leaves everything about him being the Batman.
Page 20-22
(Final Crisis #7, Epilogue)
As Bruce goes deeper in the cave he found Anthro who died peacefully upon sensing his arrival.
“I have to crack this maze. Before I forget EVERYTHING.”
“Like Theseus…leave a trail…And mark it with a BAT”.
“My last case…my ultimate trial…”
“Don’t FORGET. SURVIVE”
Bruce takes off his utility belt, and takes out his recording device (which shows us exactly when he last recorded all this information as he lost his memory).
“I should have known when I CHOSE to walk this path”.
“IT NEVER ENDS”.
Note: The path he is referring to is his decision on that very day when he dons the cape and the cowl and vows to fight evil.
Bruce draws the bat on the cavern wall. Now with his memory all gone, he steps out of the cave into the red dawn/dusk which is the very beginning of Return of Bruce Wayne #1.
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