Damian: Son of Batman

A significant postscript to the Grant Morrison Batman run, Damian: Son of Batman takes us deeper inside the world of one of the run's key creations. Set, like three other Damian stories, in an alternate future where he goes on to become Batman, DSOB offers a look at what might have been, but was apparently derailed by the death of Damian in Batman, Inc.

We've previously seen Damian as the future Batman in three stories: In Batman #666, Batman #700, and Batman, Inc. vol. 2, #5. These stories and DSOB occupy realities related to one another, but not the same reality. Counting the pre-Flashpoint DCU, and the post-Flashpoint DCU, it's even possible that we have six different continuities in play, seven if you count a brief mention by Morrison of plans he might have gotten around to down the road. This is quite a mess, potentially, that Kubert inherited, and he did nothing to make it neater, establishing several facts that distinguish this world from most of those other continuities, or at least bearing too little connection to dwell upon. Most strikingly, the central role of a deal with the Devil and regenerative powers that came along with that are nowhere to be seen here. There's one hint of the supernatural, but the reality or relevance of that remain unexplained by the end of the fourth issue. The death of Batman shown in the first issue bestows upon Damian a sense of guilt as indicated by Morrison's stories, but the details are apparently quite different.

The major dynamic playing out throughout the series is the question of whether or not Damian will kill his enemies, displeasing his father (again). His decision is made and unmade and made again, to no apparent illumination on his part or ours. Killing is bad, but it sure is handy sometimes. Yes, and?

There are some surprises, with three Batmen, two Jokers, and two Alfreds, with a priest who occupies a confessional booth sporting a secret identity of his own. Kubert's writing is quite strong in general; several scenes have an inventiveness typical of Morrison. As good as his writing is, his art is of course better, identical in every way to the original Damian-future scenario, which was also a Kubert-drawn story. The details in word and picture are both pleasing. What's unsatisfying is the lack of direction. It's hard to identify, besides Damian becoming Batman, where this story is even trying to go. Is there a big bad? Sort of. Is it about transformation? No, Damian is in the same place on the kill-or-not issue as he was at the beginning. Does he avenge the death of Batman? Yes, but there's no satisfaction as the scene plays out.

In fact, the story ends by opening up the possibility of a long run, which ironically does no service to making the run seem worth extending. Damian's an angsty killer of a hero. Yes, and?

Because DSOB occupies a different continuity than the other three future-Damian stories, there's no impact on the story we had been reading. It remains intriguing to imagine what the future interplay between Damian and Doctor Hurt might have been. DSOB shows us a different world, a pretty one of which we have probably seen the last.

Batman Inc, #13

Batman and his allies square off against one of his oldest and deadliest nemeses, and this time, the battle almost destroys Batman. That's the story, as it was framed from early on, and that's how it ends. There is no swirling cosmic complexity added at the end, as we'd seen in Return of Bruce Wayne. The things we knew must happen happen, give or take a couple, and the artistry of the finale is largely in the soft touches, the feelings and how this battle staggered our hero and how he rises from it.

From the time Talia walks into the cave until Bruce walks out, needing stitches for the cuts on his face, probably minutes, only, elapse. Batman's allies are busiest as they go to work around the world neutralizing the threat of mass destruction, and Batman's allies come to his aid in the scenes that follow the end of his sword fight with Talia, one that she perhaps wins by cheating. Then two of Batman's allies enter the cave and cheat to save him. And then, intercut with all the action, Batman's fondest ally, Jim Gordon, helps to patch him up with words. And an extra surprise or two follows.

When Inc began, Batman and Selina Kyle stole a substance that Sivana had created, a meta-material that allowed him to turn invisible during his final battle with the Heretic. It also proved to have critical utility as an agent to neutralize Talia's ring of meta-bombs around the world, and in actions we see only in montage, the threat to the world at large is eliminated as Inc. agents make sure those seven bombs will never detonate. An old Morrison Batman principle at work: "The victory lies in the preparation."

But Batman loses the sword fight, succumbing to one or two poisons Talia snuck into the mix, and will die unless he begs for mercy. Just in time, Robin arrives. In this case, Jason Todd, who tricks Talia into giving Batman the antidote in return for the trigger to set off the metabombs. Talia accepts, but in vain, because with the metabombs neutralized, the trigger is worth nothing. And then, as she vows continuing revenge, Talia is abruptly taken down by a shot from the Headmistress, as expected, Kathy Kane, who briefly outlines her scope of operations in Spyral, and she departs leaving Talia dead and Bruce in a vacuum, the Leviathan threat at an end. But Batman is deeply shaken by the loss all around him. His child and the child's mother are laid to rest side by side, and he's unsure of continuing on.

This is the low point of Bruce Wayne in all of Morrison's run, the exact moment we saw in flashforward in Inc v2, #1, when Jim Gordon arrives to arrest Bruce Wayne, but in his interrogation of Bruce, Gordon plays the part of a sympathetic figure, a counselor, a priest. As Bruce talks through it, Gordon tries to understand the motives and how the madness was too large for him to control, and all throughout, Gordon knows that he might be speaking directly with Batman. And when it's over, he makes it clear that Batman is needed, and gives him the encouragement to suit up again, and return to his mission.

The events of #13 are full of mirrors to earlier stories. Bruce's lover enters the Batcave and belittles him, attacks him -- this is a key moment in RIP, with Talia serving a role now like Jezebel Jet did then. Morrison said that the image of a woman betraying Batman was the first thought he had for his run that began in 2006. Here, the same moment plays out, although the surprise of Talia's animosity has long been apparent. The sword fight itself is a mirror of one Bruce fought with Ra's in the desert in Batman #244.

Each of Morrison's long Batman arcs ends with a Robin coming to his aid. In RIP, Dick Grayson protects his blindside. In Return of Bruce Wayne, Tim Drake awakens the man inside the possessed Bruce-Hyper Adapter combination that returned from the future. And here, Jason Todd is the Robin who saves Batman, neatly giving each of the three Robins his turn. In fact, the coda of Inc's midpoint, in the Leviathan Strikes #1 special, gave Damian his turn to be the Robin who saves Batman, in a scene quite similar to this one, with Batman staggered and defeated at the feet of his enemy.

And so, in counterpoint to the grand message of RIP that the towering figure of Batman can defeat any enemy, rise above any menace, we have the grand message of Return of Bruce Wayne: Batman always had his allies; he was never alone. Inc #13 shores that up by showing Jim Gordon as the cop who comforted young Bruce Wayne on the night of his parents' deaths, a fact in Nolan's Batman films, but not -- previously -- in post-Infinite Crisis continuity. The appearance of a bat-themed woman ally who shoots the bad guy is also a key moment in Nolan's films, when Catwoman shoots Bane, remarking as Kathy Kane does here, that Batman's rule not to kill does not apply to her. And so the battle ends.

Bruce standing over two graves is a counterpoint to his childhood tragedy, he the only one left standing from a family of three. Jim Gordon's interview with Bruce Wayne is the counterpoint to whatever he gave young Bruce on the night of the Waynes' deaths (we may imagine it to be the same comfort we saw in the Nolan films). And we know from Gordon quoting it that Bruce saw all of this destruction as the "hole in things", Doctor Hurt's self-aggrandizing description, a void that nearly overwhelmed him until Gordon affirmed that Gotham needed Batman once more. So we see in montage that Batman does return, just as determined as before, and things really are much the same as before Morrison's run. Batman is Gotham's protector. Everything has come full circle. For Batman to rise again after having been taken down is how all of Morrison's runs have ended: Bruce returning from defeat while a narrator provides solemn acclamation is a fivefold Morrison ending/non-ending, something we saw in Batman #681, #683, #702, and Return of Bruce Wayne #6.

Kathy Kane, from the shadows, arranges for all charges against Bruce Wayne to be dropped. And then there is a surprise. As Ra's al-Ghul hinted in mocking comments he made to Talia in #10, he is the larger figure who will rise when she falls. Was he pulling the strings behind the Leviathan plot all along? No, but he saw opportunity lay on the other side of it. Ra's readies a continuation of his war against Batman and has the bodies of Talia and Damian as well as the lab and embryos to build an army of Damian clones he will control in the future. This opens the door for Talia to return, and in principle, Damian.

Inc was in its larger strokes more conventional than Morrison's other long Batman stories. The ambiguities and unreliable narration reached their peak in the middle, when Batman got lost in the traps and mind games of Otto Netz. The key distinction of Batman, Incorporated's war with Leviathan is in its scope. This story was 25 issues long, grander even than Morrison's long run up to RIP. It turned around the world and pivoted from literary references to Borges, to deep dives into Batman lore from the Fifties, Sixties, and Seventies, and it ended by renewing Batman in terms of his origin in the Thirties.

The power of this finale, unlucky #13, is in the extent that the reader shares the feeling that the sprawling epic which twice poisoned Bruce and left him waiting for a mortal blow at the feet of his enemy, succeeded in taking him to a dark place. Perhaps we're too certain by now of his ability to rebound to feel that it ever got so dark. Damian's death five issues ago and the mourning that followed were the psychological low point of the story, and for Bruce to rise from that surely indicated he could rise from this. After having seen Bruce face off against the Devil and Darkseid, to stand up after nearly dying in the past and in the future, we can't be surprised to see him rise again now. Perhaps what lingers longest from this finale is the clipped tone of his interview with Gordon, the caring Jim Gordon showed him, and the obvious sense that the two men were both shaken by all of the destruction this brought to Gotham. When Morrison was just seven issues into a run he didn't know would be anywhere near this long, he put Batman and Jim Gordon on a rooftop and let them share this kind of a moment when all the evils that awaited Batman in Morrison's run were just beginning to unfold. And with the same shared devotion, reverence, and mutual respect, they discussed the Replacement Batmen with Gordon asking, "Look at you, all beat up to Hell. Why did you have to choose an enemy that's as old as time and bigger than all of us, Batman?" And Batman answering, "Same reason you did, Jim. I figured I could take him. This isn't over." But now, for Morrison's glorious portion of the Batman legend, it is.

Batman, Inc #12

Perhaps the greatest surprise of Batman, Inc #12 is how many threads are left hanging for the series finale. This is an issue of action, with one battle fought and another set to begin, while the major themes are touched upon lightly, but perhaps with importance.

The events of the issue are straightforward: Batman, armed as a man-bat, with the Suit of Sorrows, and the power of invisibility, neutralizes Talia's man-bats with the antidote, then thoroughly bashes his genetically-engineered son, the Heretic, in battle. We see that the Heretic has a child's head on his herculean body. When the Heretic is defeated, he reports back to his mother who slays him for his failure, and goes to Wayne Manor to fight Bruce in battle.

An interlude shows Dick Grayson and Tim Drake arriving at the location where Jason Todd was a captive of Spyral, and the three former Robins find themselves not in a fight, but being told that Spyral is on Batman's side, but in perhaps the issue's biggest teaser, we are told by the Hood and the Headmistress (more clearly than ever, Kathy Kane) that the fight between Batman, Inc. and Leviathan is a minor facet of a much bigger picture, and describe Bruce Wayne's efforts in patronizing fashion.

This issue is filled with references to earlier stories, both by Morrison and his predecessors. Defeating and shaming the Heretic (now referred to, by both Talia and Bruce, directly as "Leviathan") in front of his troops is a mirror of Batman beating the Mutant leader in The Dark Knight Returns. Dick Grayson and the new Knight give the Heretic a double punch, a motif of Dick and Damian's in Batman and Robin. The Headmistress says "How you've grown" to Dick Grayson, a further clue that she is Kathy Kane, and moreover an exact quote of Doctor Hurt from Batman #678. Talia says that there are dozens more Damian clones in tanks waiting to be born, which was Darkseid's plan in cloning Bruce in Final Crisis. Talia identifies herself as Kali, Tiamet, Medusa, the wire mommy, an intriguingly direct reference to the upbringing of Professor Pyg. And finally, when Talia takes up arms to fight Bruce mano-a-mano in the Batcave, she says "To the death, my dear detective," a near quote of her father's challenge to Bruce before their desert duel back in Batman #244.

The perplexing matter is how much is left unresolved with only one issue left in Morrison's epic run. We know that plotwise, Bruce must fight this battle with Talia, then after a funeral marking a major death, will decide to end Batman, Inc, and will be charged with a crime, charges that will presumably be dealt with before Morrison's run ends.

It remains possible that the Heretic will fill the second foreshadowed grave. Even so, we need to see the aforementioned plot points play out, as well as the newly-raised tension regarding a bigger picture that will put Bruce and Talia's war in context.

In several ways, this story has subtly linked the forces of the Black Glove with those of the al-Ghuls. Talia had an agent inside the Black Glove. Her plot threatens to create the apocalypse we've seen in the future, with Doctor Hurt playing a role in that. Now, with Talia describing herself in the terms of Professor Pyg's upbringing, this raises the prospect that Talia and the Black Glove were somehow operating in parallel. Morrison has promised a coda for Doctor Hurt, and now we know that a plot involving Spyral overarches Leviathan. It seems that the events of #13 will be thematically and literally very expansive.

Grant Morrison Batman Reading Order

Batman Run (21 issues +)

“52” #30 and #47

Batman and Son: #655-658

The Clown at Midnight: #663

Batman in Bethlehem: #666

Club of Heroes: #667-669

Resurrection of R’as al-Ghul: #670-671 (6 parts in other titles)

Three Ghosts of Batman: #672-675

Batman, R.I.P.: #676, DC Universe #0, #677-681

Lost in Time (32 issues+)

Last Rites: #682-683

Batman #701

Final Crisis #1-7 (especially #1, 2, 6)

Batman #702

Batman and Robin #1-9

Return of Bruce Wayne #1-5

Batman and Robin #10-15

Batman #700

Return of Bruce Wayne #6

Batman and Robin #16

Batman, Incorporated (24 issues)

Batman: The Return

Batman, Inc #1-8

Leviathan Strikes

Batman, Inc vol 2 #1-3, #0, #4-13

Here is my suggested reading order for the entire Grant Morrison Batman epic, 2006-2013. There's really no one right order, because when multiple series titles were telling the story at the same time, the publication order, the story logic, and the chronological time within the multiple series were mixed up three or four different ways. In at least two cases (the Arkham scene in DC Universe #0 and the respective order of the Batman and Robin and Return of Bruce Wayne finales), I think the publication schedule mixed up the intended logic. I think the transition from RIP to Final Crisis in particular makes more sense as I've offered it here, taking us through Bruce's experiences chronologically, instead of withholding the resolution to small mysteries for very long stretches of time.

Not mentioned here are the old stories that Morrison tied in, and the most important two were the Zur En Arrh story in Batman #113 and "Robin Dies at Dawn" in Batman #156. Others were reprinted in a trade paperback called The Black Casebook. However, while the small details of those stories were interesting reading while the Black Glove was an ongoing mystery, they aren't necessary to understanding Morrison's work. A rather large number of stories from 1939 through the Nineties are referenced by Morrison throughout his run, so the amount of background reading one could do would seriously add to the length of the list.

Finally, I'll make my best-of list-within-the-list. My favorite issues and scenes from the run.

1) Batman #680: Doctor Hurt's trap for Batman in Arkham.

2) Batman #674: Batman struggles to escape... and remember the past.

3) DC Universe #0: Batman and the Joker in Arkham.

4) Return of Bruce Wayne #6: Bruce ends the story of all time.

5) Batman and Robin #13: The Evil Thomas Wayne scene.

6) Batman #655: A replacement Batman shoots the Joker.

7) Batman #673: Batman's showdown with Joe Chill.

8) Batman #681: The RIP finale.

9) Batman and Robin #2: Frank Quitely draws Dick and Damian fighting the Circus of the Strange.

10) Batman #683: Batman escapes Darkseid's death trap.

If anyone reads this whole list in the order I suggested, I'd love to hear about it!

Batman, Inc #10

In what is perhaps the most significant event of Grant Morrison's long run on Batman, Damian Wayne was killed by his brother/clone in Batman, Inc v2 #8. This was in many ways foretold, not the least of which that he had appeared to die in his fourth appearance and Morrison said later that he intended for Damian to die then. Now, more than sixty issues later into Morrison's mega-epic, that death has taken place for real, but rather than serving as the climax of the story, it comes with five issues to go, which leaves a mystery: What sort of story is Morrison telling? What is the intended payoff?

After an issue largely dedicated to grieving and the follow-up battle between Batman and his allies and the Heretic, we now see the sides prepare for another battle. Of course, Batman will have his retribution. Of course he will dismantle Talia's threat and leave Gotham safe. But something bigger is coming.

#10 is full of action and twists, with ten scenes in only twice that many pages. That starts with the fold-out cover that shows what the publicly-released cover does not: In his commitment to winning this war, Batman willingly becomes a man-bat, disfiguring himself to gain the power to physically defeat the Heretic and Talia's army of man-bats. Inside the issue, this scene comes last, after we see Kirk Langstrom working on an antidote that will surely set Batman back to normal when his victory is complete. We also see Batman use an experimental exo-skeleton which had proven dangerous and the return of Sivana's photonic crystal from Inc v1 #1 which will also power him in the coming battle, perhaps giving him the power of invisibility.

Talia's cool and collected facade beging to crack in this issue. She seems to be in control when she orders Gotham's mayor to declare Batman a fugitive, and when she uses control over the Heretic's nervous system to stop him from commiting mutiny against her. But she's frequently at a disadvantage. We learn that she did not plan on Damian's death, and in a rage she orders the brutal murder of many of her underlings. A visit to her father proves disturbing as he hints at one forgotten factor that is certain to lead to her defeat. As he teases her with this knowledge, we see on a chessboard, a dark knight knocking off the red queen, reprising the red-and-black game theme from earlier in Morrison's Batman work, with meaning all too obvious as Talia wears red throughout this issue awaiting her battle with the Dark Knight. Later, she's disturbed to see Bruce's new look. Having used her man-bats to defeat Bruce twice before, she knows that she's lost her tactical advantage on him.

In fact, she may have lost this war before it began. She may not even be the main villain. Earlier, we saw the Hood, representing Spyral, take Jason Todd hostage. Now, as the Knight and Ranger arrive to rescue him, we learn that the evil headmistress operation in the UK (raided by Stephanie Brown, who no longer exists in the DCnU) was never really serving Talia in the first place. The Hood's earlier declaration of Batman, Incorporated being a failure was not a statement of victory but of resignation. Spyral is aligned against Leviathan, but we have yet to learn why he cold-cocked Jason Todd and tried to force his cooperation instead of asking for it.

And this leads to the most significant part of the issue, its beginning. Batman visits Michael Lane to recruit him, and while doing so, works to piece together the vision of the future we saw in #5, while Lane recites lines from Nostradamus and bemoans his own fate ultimately to serve evil, while Batman taps him to play a significant role for good. This opening scene mentions the Devil and the Joker (at least, the word "joker") and indicates a bigger picture than we've yet had come into focus.

The simplest way this story could end would be that Batman would defeat Talia and the Heretic in a battle and send them off into incarceration, with Talia shaking her fist at the air and bemoaning that she underestimated him. There's too much story coming for that to be all that happens. We have three more issues (one more than the original plan) and numerous hints of a more complex arrangement than we, or Talia, or even Bruce realized. The portentous prophecies in the scene with Batman and Lane have to come true. The vision of Gotham's apocalypse has to fall into place. What R'as knows and Talia does not has to be revealed. Why Spyral is working against Talia but also against Batman has to be explained. The battle that this story requires may be a small part of the three issues left in Morrison's epic.

Killing Damian Wayne

In 2006, the world’s greatest superheroes suddenly got three sons. In the film Superman Returns, we found out that Superman and Lois conceived a child way back in 1981’s Superman II. In DCU continuity, Superman and Lois adopted a Kryptonian son they dubbed Christopher Kent. And in the pages of Batman, Bruce Wayne found out that he had conceived a child with his lover/enemy perhaps during the same events narrated in the 1971 story that introduced Talia. Three sons introduced at the same time. Now, all of them are gone.

It has long been noted that Grant Morrison planned to kill off the Damian character as soon as he introduced him. In fact, the Batman and Son story ended with events that might have been interpreted as Damian’s death. But seven issues later, a quick scene established that Damian, thanks to his mother’s access to remarkable medical technology, would survive.

Damian played a major role in an al-Ghul crossover story, then reappeared briefly during the long storyline of Batman, RIP. After Battle of the Cowl, Damian had his longest time in the spotlight, as the second title character of the Batman and Robin title. While Damian has appeared in several titles over the past three and a half years, the centerpiece of his character development was in Morrison’s first sixteen issues of that new title, with Damian and Dick Grayson inverting the familiar dynamic of a serious Batman and a cheerful, punning Robin.

It appears to have been Morrison’s intention for this third long storyline, that of Batman, Inc, to have Damian be murdered by his own mother. It has been foreshadowed generally that someone would die, and specifically that Damian was the object of a murder plot, and now, with Batman Inc v2 #8, we appear to have seen this transpire.

We have also seen, in Batman #700, a future in which Damian becomes Batman, although this future was never guaranteed to take place. It resembles the one seen in Inc #5, and Bruce Wayne, following the information he saw at the end of time in Return of Bruce Wayne #6, took steps to prevent this from coming true. By firing Damian from the Robin identity, and as the heir as a subsequent Batman, Bruce Wayne effectively chose to save his city while sacrificing, on some level, his son. In the final scenes before Damian’s death, we saw the cat that would have been his pet had he gone on to be Batman in the future seen in Batman #666 and elsewhere. Small references taking the story backwards and forwards in time, like a double punch shared by Dick and Damian, and the minor character Ellie, first seen in the same story back in #664-665 where Damian returned from the dead.

Will he return from this death? Impossible to say. Inc v2 #1 ended with the apparent death of Damian, which proved to be a ruse. Batman: The Return opened with Bruce saving a man’s son from apparent death. The theme has been established. Whatever Morrison’s plans are, it could happen sooner or later in any case.

But what are Morrison’s plans for this story? A grand death has happened. Batman has suffered a tragic loss. The man who lost his parents to murder has now lost his son.

The solicits for upcoming issues run as follows:

9: The fallout from last month’s shocking turn of events has Batman on the run! Is The Dark Knight a murderer?

10: When only one can survive, which will it be: the man or the bat?

11: Batman’s world has been devastated by his war against Talia, but is he willing to give up on his own humanity?

These point to the flashforward seen in Inc v2 #1, where Bruce, mourning a loss, plans to quit the Batman role, upon which he is promptly arrested as a murderer. Clearly this is a plan on Talia’s part. Clearly, Bruce Wayne has to prevail on some level, and will save the world and Gotham from destruction, and also return to be its protector. But what of the loss of his son? When Grant Morrison took over the Batman character, he spoke of the grimness with which his predecessors had handled it. In an interview as well as in the pages of his stories, he included the death of Jason Todd as part of a pattern that had led Batman down too dark a path. How can Morrison feel that way then and kill Damian off now? We had Batman, RIP end with Batman climbing out of a grave to fight and win again. Jason Todd himself had died and come back, as did Dick Grayson in the old story Morrison cited, Robin Dies at Dawn. Will the grave, having let these other Batman and Robin return, prove inescapable for Damian?

Batman #666: Back to the Future

Twenty-three issues and going on three years ago, the satanically-numbered Batman #666 presented what seemed to be a rare single-issue story in Grant Morrison's then-nascent take on the Caped Crusader. Given the numerological significance of the issue, it was a bit of a surprise that he chose not to feature Bruce Wayne at all, except in flashbacks and indirect references. It was also a surprise that that story in the far-off future actually offered clues to the mystery set in the present. The issue was a key part of the nonlinear narrative that introduced the idea of Lane in issue #665, showed his death in #666, then showed his main encounter with Bruce Wayne in issues #672-674 before he returned briefly in the final pages of Batman, R.I.P. in issue #681. The fact that issue #666 would be part of Morrison's run made it easy to anticipate that there would be a devil-themed story, as there was in Kurt Busiek's run on Superman. It was not as obvious that the Devil would be the main villain of his run, with an influence felt all the way from Morrison's very first issue of Batman through his very (so far) last.

Morrison promised that the story, though set in a "possible future" would "fit in" with his Black Glove mystery and have "some pretty major clues". Indeed it did. Now, Morrison promises that the issue will "form the basis for the final three-issue arc of year one of Batman and Robin." The third arc seems to focus on Dick Grayson's mistake in putting Bruce's skeleton into a Lazarus Pit and raising a monster -- the premise of W. W. Jacob's short story The Monkey's Paw (you may have seen it parodied on The Simpsons). The fourth arc has been the subject of multiple interview comments that align around this idea, most specifically "if people want to check back to Batman #666 and read about Damian selling his soul to the devil, you might get an idea of how some upcoming events might play out." That's a carefully-qualified statement which offers the possibility-expanding freedom that just about anything could happen so long as it ties into #666 -- as Morrison said in yet another interview -- "considerably." Yet another tip-off, not so suprising given the rest of the information, is "Doctor Hurt/Thomas Wayne/The Devil from Batman, R.I.P. will be making a comeback [in Batman and Robin] to finish what he started." The inclusion of "Thomas Wayne" in that descriptor is particularly pregnant with possibility given the pithy comment from the arc's artist, Andy Clarke, that "Bruce Wayne's family tree is the focus of the arc." While Damian alone is enough to fulfill that description, it implies that Thomas Wayne if not some earlier ancestor will likely factor in.

Given the relevance of #666, it's useful to list out what we know from that issue regarding Damian selling his soul to the Devil. That happened considerably before the events of #666, which according to its solicit (but nothing in the issue itself) was set 15 years in the future. Given the quoted ages and times we have, that would mean that Damian, now ten, should make that bargain four years from now at age fourteen, eleven years before the encounter between Damian and Lane in #666. We have several interlocking, but ambiguous, pieces of information that may pertain to the events of the bargain. I have re-ordered them here in likely sequence of their logical relationship:

1) The Batman in the middle of the display case has a large symbol on his chest.
2) Large-symbol Batman lies bloody at a crossroads beneath a grief-stricken Damian.
3) The bargain Damian makes is at a crossroads on the night Batman died
4) Damian has met the Devil
5) Damian bargained with the Devil when he was 14; Gotham's survival in return for his soul
6) Damian is driven by guilt

We also know

7) Damian was responsible for the death of Barbara Gordon's "good friend"
8) Gotham has been left by this time without Bruce or Dick to protect it
9) Something happened to Bruce to pave the way for a Batman like Damian

In principle, even the items that seem to be related could be unrelated; we have no promise that any given pair of these items must refer to the same event. (8) indicates that we have the absences of two Batmen to explain. The simplest explanation is that (1-6) refer to Bruce's death in some event that leads to Damian selling his soul to the Devil. However, we have no promise that what we see in Batman and Robin will adhere to all of those details. For example, suppose that instead of Damian selling his soul on the night of Bruce's death when Damian is 14, the key event is Dick's death when Damian is 10. Meanwhile, (9) could refer to Bruce's death but also to any other relevant event in the past, including RIP and/or the Omega Effect.

Meanwhile, we have other pieces of information about the two stories, some of which promises to interlock. #666 tells us that Damian was "engineered to kill and replace" Bruce. And the solicit for #10 tells us that Talia tries to manipulate Damian "into taking action against Batman." Those two facts point to the same prospect, that Talia will want Damian to strike down Dick Grayson now and begin a less-humane role of her design. Even if he begins to act against Dick and then reconsiders, could his momentary combat with Dick open the door for a tragic incident, perhaps in combination with some other attack? We know that El Penitente has "scores to settle" in Gotham. His revenge on Bruce Wayne could include the death of Dick Grayson or taking Damian's soul. The cover for #10 has another interesting parallel with #666: It shows Batman inspecting bloody footprints; #666 opens with Damian following bloody footprints. Covers do not always depict action inside the issue, but the similarity is striking.

The cast of characters from #666 also factors into the whole Batman and Robin run. Lane, working for the Devil, kills five "bosses", which includes two of the Circus of the Strange villains we saw earlier. Their plan seemed highly reminiscent of El Penitente's plan, but that doesn't mean that they are working for him. It is possible that the Domino Killer represents another big bad in this story, one who is at odds with El Penitente. Then, just as Pyg and Phosphorus Rex are targets for Lane in the future, it could be that Pyg, though he concocted the contagious addiction that El Penitente seems to want, represents another side. And if Pyg's following orders, it is likely to be from the Domino Killer, especially given Pyg's comment about dominoes in #3. We also know that Flamingo works for El Penitente and is one of Lane's recruits in #666. Finally, a coincidence that is not necessarily a tangible connection: One of Lane's henchmen in #666 is referred to as Nikolai -- that's the name of Sasha's father (Niko, the abbreviation of Nikolai) who was driving the car for Toad. Niko is dead long before the events of #666, but perhaps a Russian connection is an enduring part of this plot.

Whether there's one "bloc" of villains in this story or more, it's clear that devilish forces are returning very soon, perhaps constituting the "fearsome and familiar" who menaces Alfred and Damian by Batman and Robin #9 (which is exactly what the preview panel of Doctor Hurt with the keys of Wayne Manor seems to be). If the details of #666 are held to closely, then Damian's deal with the Devil is about four years away. But if they are treated loosely, then perhaps the bargain will come soon with the death of Dick Grayson, even though #666 is more likely referring to the death of Bruce Wayne. If the life of one of DC's oldest superheroes is about to expire, then very big events are in motion.

If the loss of Dick's life or Damian's soul is how Doctor Hurt settles his score with Bruce Wayne, the man who beat him, he's still going to have to give up something significant -- the powers that Damian displays in #666 trump those of the Devil's own messiah. Any bargain would have to be carefully constructed to ensure that the Devil is bound to give great power to a man who, cursing him several times in #666, considers him an enemy.