Hello and welcome to the World of Bats, the Batman Book Club!
Normally, the month of October means that we’ll be looking at some more spooky, horror-tinged Batman stories. But, in case you don’t know, we’re going to be getting a new Batman/Bat-Family based video game, Gotham Knights, so this month we’ll be looking at comic book tie-ins to Batman video games, starting with Batman: Arkham City, written by Paul Dini and drawn by Carlos D’Anda.
It’s been a year since The Joker took over Arkham Asylum, and Gotham City is still trying to get back to normal in this all-new, 5-issue miniseries bridging the gap between the hit video game Batman: Arkham Asylum and the exciting upcoming sequel, Batman: Arkham City! And now an attack by a pair of super-powered twins increases the threat level and triggers Gotham City’s new mayor to call for drastic measures.
Reading will last from 2022-10-01T05:00:00Z→2022-10-07T05:00:00Z, but if you’re trapped in the ultimate private prison hell, you can always come back later.
Looking forward to reading these issues with you all!
Until this selection, I didn’t know Arkham City had a comic tie-in. It’s pretty good, definitely a fun way and it maintains the tone of the games.
My favorite issue is the on where Batman goes undercover as Lester Kurtz to foil Joker and Penguin. Just some good action in it and, I think I mentioned before, I enjoy seeing Batman going undercover
That’s a hard question because they all have their good points.
Asylum is a tight and concice Metrovania that started it all. City created an excellent open world and tightened up the combat. Origins has some of the best story beats and boss fights. Finally, Knight is a strong ending with the strongest gameplay and one of the best looking games I’ve played (seriously, that game came out 7 years ago, last generation, and it is up there with current-gen console games).
I do remember reading these when they came out, definitely agree that they keep the same tone. I loved that they got the character design artist for Asylum, Carlos D’Anda, to draw for this one.
That was definitely a highlight of the series – the whole “lone rider double crosses two warring clans against each other” is a classic story, very Red Harvest/Yojimbo/For A Few Dollars More.
At worst, I feel like this series doesn’t do a lot, it just sets up stuff, but considering that it’s the opening act for the game, I think it works out well enough.
You hit on the reason Arkham Asylum is my favorite; it’s a more focused game than the others I have played. I haven’t played Arkham Origins and I haven’t finished Arkham Knight (I got a little frustrated with the Batmobile sections, then Elden Ring dropped and Destiny 2 dropped a new expansion; I’ll get to it eventually).
