Arkham Knight Is One Of The Greatest Batman Stories Of All Time

Batman: Arkham Knight closed out Rocksteady’s stunning Dark Knight trilogy in June 2015, meaning it’s now four years since we said goodbye one of the most compelling versions of Batman in any medium. 

People still debate which game in the trilogy is actually the best, with many arguing that the original Arkham Asylum has the tightest gameplay, while Arkham City was more ambitious in scope while retaining the focus of its predecessor. Arkham Knight perhaps received the most criticism in terms of gameplay, mostly thanks to the divisive tank sections and an absolutely shocking PC port.

I’m not here to talk about that though. While Asylum is probably my own personal favourite from a gameplay perspective, I want to celebrate Arkham Knight’s greatest strength; its story. Put simply, I believe Arkham Knight is one of the greatest Batman stories of all time. Spoilers to follow, obviously.

Perhaps more than any other superhero, Batman is a character who is constantly defined by his moral code, and the grotesque rogues’ gallery that constantly push him to break his own rules, fascinated as they are by his strict “no kill” rule.

The very best Batman stories are the ones that present the Dark Knight with an ethical dilemma, rather than a simple test of strength. We always know that Batman will win – he’s the hero, after all – but we’re never quite sure if he’ll lose a piece of himself along the way, if Gotham will slowly chip away at his soul and he’ll reach his breaking point.

Just look at Nolan’s The Dark Knight, or The Long Halloween, or the Batman Beyond animated series, the latter of which literally hinges on the idea that an older Bruce Wayne forces himself into retirement because he’s lost his way to the point where he’s forced to pull a gun on a criminal – an action he finds abhorrent.

All of the above stories don’t just deal with whether or not Batman is the best at punching, but whether or not Bruce Wayne can remain a good man and still be Batman. Different interpretations of the character will reach different conclusions when addressing this question, but that’s what makes it such a compelling one.

And so it is that Arkham Knight hinges on three themes that make it such an engaging study of the character while attempting to answer the one central above: what does Batman stand for? How does the world perceive him? And perhaps most crucially of all, the nature of the symbiotic relationship between Batman and The Joker.

These questions are addressed by the three “core” villains of the story. The titular Arkham Knight wants to challenge what Batman stands for. Once it’s revealed that the Knight is none other than Jason Todd – the former Robin that Batman allowed to be captured and tortured for years by The Joker, it’s clear he represents one of the hero’s greatest failures.

Scarecrow, who has seized control of Gotham City with his trademark fear gas and a renewed sense of hatred towards Batman, wants to tear the hero down and make the world see him for who he is – a man. Not a symbol, or a hero, but a weak, terrified man.

While Batman assumed Todd to be long dead by The Joker’s hand, he returns to Gotham with Scarecrow, an entire army close behind. Todd actively challenges Batman’s no-kill rule, positioning himself as a hard-edged counterpoint to the Dark Knight, one who believes if he never would have had to suffer at the hands of The Joker, if only Batman had done what “needed” to be done years ago, and killed his arch-nemesis.

Finally, the question of the relationship between Batman and The Joker is addressed by the lingering specter of the clown himself, who died during the climatic events of the previous game. These three central villains weave in and out of the plot seamlessly, pushing Batman to his absolute limits, while constantly showing us just how easy it would be for him to go against the code he lives by.

The Joker might have died in Arkham City, but it’s revealed that the forced blood transfusion he gave to Batman in the last game hasn’t been entirely cured. Traces of The Joker’s blood linger within Batman, and we learn it’s slowly taking over his mind. It sounds ridiculous, but The Joker is, in essence, slowly possessing Batman, and it makes for a fascinating storytelling device.

While it seems Batman has typically been able to suppress The Joker’s presence in his mind under normal circumstances while he searches for a cure, Scarecrow’s takeover of Gotham City, not to mention all the fear gas floating around, and the appearance of the Arkham Knight all eroding Batman’s mental state, forces The Joker out with alarming frequency.

This leads to a number of imaginary conversations between Batman and his dead foe, in which actors Mark Hamill and Kevin Conroy – who have both embodied the roles since the 90’s animated series – do some of the best work they’ve ever done.

As our hero races to track down Scarecrow and the Arkham Knight, The Joker will constantly show up to remind Batman just how badly he’s screwed up. He’ll taunt Batman by reminding him of his past (and current) failures, criticise him for not using lethal force when it’s the easier answer, and generally attempt to goad him into snapping a neck or two.

The Batman/Joker dynamic is easily the most interesting superhero/villain pairing in comics, and Arkham Knight uses “ghost” Joker to dive in and examine the relationship in outstanding new ways. We’re given a genius representation of the inner conflict that is bubbling away in Batman’s mind at all times.

Like The Joker, he can be cold, calculating, and manipulative. Like Scarecrow, he uses fear as a tool to subdue his enemies. Like the Arkham Knight, he enlists others to fight for his cause, whether it’s Tim Drake, Barbara Gordon, or Dick Grayson – just how much really separates Batman from the criminals he fights?

As I see it, Batman is genuinely afraid that the one and only answer to this question, is the fact that he doesn’t take lives. It’s for this reason that he clings to his no kill rule with such conviction, not because he’s a good man, but because he knows deep down he’s just like the villains he sends to Arkham; damaged, violent, and dangerous.

Obviously, we know this isn’t the case. Batman doesn’t kill because he had his parents brutally torn away from him at a young age, and he does what he does so that no child ever has to feel that way on his watch again. His quest is a noble one, but as Scarecrow’s grip on Gotham grows and The Joker’s presence gets stronger, Batman is left wrestling with his convictions.

In other words, Scarecrow is working with the Joker without even really knowing it to bring out Batman’s greatest fear of all; that all that separates him from The Joker is one bad day.

All of this brings me back to my initial point, which is that the best Batman stories deal with the hero’s psyche, not his ability to punch his way out of a situation. Yes, Arkham Knight has some fantastic fight scenes, but none of the villains – not even the Knight himself – are a physical match for our hero.

Instead, Scarecrow, The Joker, and the Knight take it in turns to give Batman’s mind a brutal pummeling. Everything this triumvirate does to Batman over the course of the game only serves to bring The Joker out more and more, and those are the stakes of Arkam Knight. We know Batman is going to stop Scarecrow and the Knight, because he’s Batman – but can he do it without losing himself completely?

This all comes to a head when, during the game’s climax, Batman surrenders to Scarecrow in order to save Tim. After having lost one Robin, it’s clearly not something he’s prepared to do again. It’s here that the questions the game has been asking since the very beginning are answered.

Batman would never knowingly sacrifice an ally if given the choice, and would rather unmask himself to the world and risk everything he thinks he stands for rather than lose someone he cares about, because what he actually stands for is more than a violent, endless war on crime.

Batman stands for everything that’s good, right, and fair in the world. Batman makes the hard choices every time, because the right thing to do is so often the hardest, and because he will do whatever he can to make sure people never suffer or mourn the way he did. Not only does this show us what Batman really stands for, it also separates him from the Arkham Knight, who would have gone to any lengths to “win.”

When Batman is given one final dose of fear gas from Scarecrow, the game’s final fight goes somewhere completely unexpected. Instead of an epic duel to the death with a corporeal foe, we’re taken into Bruce Wayne’s mind, from the perspective of The Joker.

The idea is that Batman has finally given in, and The Joker has managed to take full control – just as he’s threatened to do all game. But after seeing a terrifying vision of just what a Batman driven by The Joker would do (reduce Gotham to ashes and gun down every single one of his enemies and allies alike), we learn that Bruce is still in there somewhere, and he fights back.

The Joker, we discover, has fears and foibles just as Batman does. But where Batman’s fears and insecurities all come from whether he’s good enough – whether he’s worthy of being called a hero – The Joker’s fears are entirely selfish. He doesn’t want to be forgotten now he’s dead. He wants people to remember his name and cower in fear for decades to come.

This sequence is what offers the final word on the Batman/Joker dynamic. While there might be more similarities between the two that Batman would care to admit, in the end, Bruce Wayne has always been able to overcome his fears and insecurities to do the right thing. He could easily kill, but resists that impulse every day, because it’s who he is.

The Joker is driven by his insecurities, and kills, maims, and causes chaos because he needs people to see him, to acknowledge his existence. Batman fights his demons, where the Joker runs from them. It’s through this that Batman is able to regain control and banish The Joker from his mind forever, because The Joker’s greatest fear – his greatest demon – is Batman himself.

Finally, Batman – already exposed to the world as Bruce Wayne – snaps out of his dream state, returns to the real world, and takes out Scarecrow with the help of Jason Todd, who appears to have retired the Arkham Knight persona for good.

The world then sees Batman, Bruce Wayne, for who he is. He isn’t some monster who hides in the shadows and rules through fear exclusively, like Scarecrow. While Batman might utilise fear as a tool, he’ll never fully rely on it. Instead, Batman relies on and believes in the inherent good in people, no matter how far they might have fallen.

Batman inspired Jason to come back to the side of good, and together inspired the millions of people watching his last stand, because Scarecrow was wrong; once you see Batman is just a man, you don’t lose faith – you understand that anyone can be like Batman, so long as they’re willing to stand up for what’s right.

That, to me, is what makes Arkham Knight one of the greatest Batman stories ever told. It brings together some of the Dark Knight’s greatest heroes and allies, and weaves them into a story that doubles as one of the most ambitious character studies of one of the most enduring icons of pop culture.

Arkham Knight addresses not just what it means to be Batman, but what it means to be a good man; Never give up, never give in, and never sacrifice your beliefs.

In an age where we have directors who think Batman should run around killing people, an award-winning video game that was built entirely around the ethos that Bruce Wayne doesn’t kill will always have an important place in my heart, because that is the kind of Batman I grew up with.