Batman The Dark Knight (The New 52) # 6

By Mark Rodriguez

Arkham's crazies are being affected by a Toxin that makes them super strong and even crazier, and Batman has to find the source of this. His search led him to the Scarecrow that hit him with the Toxin and his fear gas. As Batman faces his fears, he is crazy enough to attack Superman when he comes to help. The Man of Steel has to take him down, but did he hit him too hard??

Batman Dark Knight # 6 is titles ‘Run Rabbit Run’ and we begin with Batman’s flashbacks of losing his parents.. and waking up to see Superman apologizing for hitting him so hard. Supes wants Bats to get medical attention due to the toxin, but Bats sends him to find the Flash instead. Bats says the toxin runs on adrenaline, but if you go over your limit, that will undo the effects. The Flash was poisoned earlier on and was sent running to not let the toxin metabolize…but now Batman realizes that if he stops running, he will die. So he sends Superman off to help Flash break his limit the same way Batman did.

Elsewhere, Gotham PD locks up The Great White Shark, the last of the escaped Arkham inmates and Gordon takes more flak from Lt. Forbes. Lt. Forbes, the jerk that he is, blames the whole mess on Gordon and wants him suspended. Gordon’s men tell him they don’t know where Batman is.

Back to Batman, the White Rabbit shows up again and makes him chase her again. The chase leads him to Scarecrow once again, who spouts out the usual Fear this and Fear that jazz. Bats is sick of it and takes him out with knockout gas, or anti-Scarecrow gas. Whatever you prefer.

As Batman ties up Scarecrow, he tells the White Rabbit he’s seen her kind before. A woman budding with psychopathy falling in with a master of it. She says he figured her out, and then asks him if he knows how the Flash is doing.

Superman finds Flash and tells him to keep running. He says to think of it as a snakebite and he has to get the venom out of the bloodstream. Flash hears the word Venom and figures out who’s behind this. Just as Batman questions the White Rabbit, Bane appears and punches him.

Bane says he’s behind it and is impressed that Batman countered the effects of the venom. Bats asks about the bleeding eyeballs side effect, and Bane says it was to be sure he could control the ‘difficult ones’ when the effects wore off. Bane also talks about fear and how Batman was always afraid of him. Bats denies it and gets beat up some more. 

Bane tries to drown Batman, saying he will snap Gotham’s back like he did to Batman so long ago. Batman manages to tase Bane and buy him some time. He asks where Poison Ivy is, and Bane says she’s close enough to hear him scream. As Batman tries to get some distance from Bane, the villain tells him that this new venom now makes Bane smarter.

My Opinions

I do have to say, Batman must really be off his game if the Flash figured out Bane was behind this before he could. Not saying Flash is dumb, but Batman is supposed to be the World's Greatest Detective. I know this was probably to make the 'big reveal' a surprise, but this Toxin works pretty much like Bane's Venom, and Bats has gone from accusing Two-Face, Poison Ivy and Scarecrow without once thinking of Bane.

I do find it funny that to counter the poison in Flash's system, Batman's idea was to 'run as fast as you can' then 'no stop running' to 'wait, never mind, run faster than you've ever run before'. It's just silly. At least Flash returns here so that his cameo in that other issue isn't so random. I assume it'll look better in the trades, though this is such a silly story to pick up as a trade. Just for David Finch's art I guess. 

At the time of this comic, it was a good idea to put the spotlight on Bane since Dark Knight Rises was just around the corner and Bane was going to be the lead villain there. Also since the New 52 condenses Batman's lore, the fans were quickly trying to see what stayed and what no longer stayed within the canon, and this story shows that the events of Knightfall still did happen to some degree.

Of course the New 52 would most likely retcon this to make it as if Batman and Bane were wearing their modern costumes at the time.

We're one issue away for the madness to end and to also see if possibly we'll find out what the deal is with that White Rabbit.