Absolute Batman #6 arrived in comic book stores earlier this week and ended with another glimpse of The Joker. This world's Clown Prince of Crime was covered in what appeared to be several dead babies as he used their blood to restore his pale skin to a normal shade.
We've already learned that this take on The Joker is extremely wealthy, worldly-wise, and someone who has trained under the world's best teachers and martial arts masters. Oh, and he never laughs.
After Batman foiled his plans for Gotham City, Absolute Batman #6 also saw The Joker task Bane with taking out the Dark Knight. Now, we have a first look at the Absolute version of that villain, and he's even bigger than this reality's hulking Bruce Wayne!
"Bane, the one thing I'll say is he's really big. That's it," writer Scott Snyder told IGN. "People were like, 'Oh, he's going to be small.' He's not going to be small. He's not small. We wanted someone who makes Bruce's silhouette look smaller."
As for The Joker, he added, "The initial idea was if this is an inverted system, then Batman is the one that isn't order and part of the powers that be, he is the disruption. Who would be the system? It would be Joker. And so it was built into the DNA of the take."
"Those two things to me are always in relation. I've never written a Batman story, even if Joker isn't in it, where I don’t think about where Joker would be in relation to this take on Batman. He'd always be at the opposite end of the spectrum."
"I don't want to give too much away," Snyder continued. "All I'll say is that this Joker is already really terrifying by the time he meets Batman. But his relationship with Batman is part of something that really evolves as the series goes."
Absolute Batman hasn't reinvented the wheel with its take on Bane as he's very much in line with what we've seen in the regular DC Universe. However, given how formidable Batman is in the series, we can't imagine the villain will find it anywhere near as easy to "Break the Bat."
That alone should shake up their dynamic in a big way. Check out a first look at Absolute Batman #9's cover below.
AN ALL NEW ARK (M) STARTS HERE! The latest development in saving the derelict and despondent of our society is a facility known as Ark M—a fully operational institution that has played a rather sizeable part, on purpose or not, in the creation of evil. And it's active. So when Bruce tries infiltrate it and distill its secrets, a new villain from Gotham City arrives to deal with the problem…an old adversary of Alfred's…a man known only as Bane.
ABSOLUTE BATMAN #9
Written by SCOTT SNYDER
Art by NICK DRAGOTTA
Cover by NICK DRAGOTTA
Variant cover by GERARDO ZAFFINO and TIRSO
On Sale 6/11