Batman: Night Cries

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Two-Face. Harvey Dent's bout with his "evil" side of himself holds many classic struggles of one's internal thoughts. Not only is he unpredictable, well organized, and wily, but he's also shown to be adept and highly dangerous. From his obsession with the number two (.22 caliber guns, second place trophies, the 2nd National Banks, etc.) judging people's fate by a flip of his scarred sided coin, to being a creepy Stalker with a Crush with Renee Montoya. Everybody knows of his horrific mangled left-sided face. But when you delve deep into his character and history, one can understand and summarize on what drove him to become on who or what he is. All because of one instance during court by a certain thug Salvatore Maroni testifying during the infamous "Holiday" murders.

All of the possible origin stories for the Joker told by the insane patients were a bit unsettling.

The following issues explored Bruce going through the stages of grief, hurting his loved ones as he tries to (at the time) vainly attempt to resurrect Damian. Batman and Nightwing has Bruce gaining some cold closure that, in an ideal world, there could have been a way for Damian to live. Alfred then uses the same computer program to relive the moment that he allowed Damian to leave the Cave to help his father, and prevent it; apologizing in tears to his son for allowing the boy who was basically his grandson go off to die, the book ending with a painful step forward. Killer Croc. A terrifying semi-human monster. He's completely ruthless, has the strength of a crocodile, and can regenerate. As time has gone on, his mind has regressed more and more into that of a deranged animal. He now resides in the sewers beneath Gotham and preys on anyone unfortunate enough to get lost down there.

In Arkham Manor, a disguised Batman recruits Mr. Freeze to help contain a maddened Clayface. The two manage to contain the shifter inside Freeze's cell, and begin to leave the Manor. Batman begins to tell Freeze how to best escape without harming anyone, but Victor gently stops him and assures him he's going nowhere. When asked why, Freeze closes his eyes and starts making snow angels, before morosely answering he has, quite literally, nowhere to go. A brief Supergirl-Robin team-up reveals that on the one hand, Gotham's supervillains are completely out of Supergirl's league... on the other hand, Gotham's supervillains tend towards way more depraved than she's used to. Clayface. Formerly a prestigious actor acclaimed for a certain role, now he is just a sadistic, psychopathic killer. Sure, a humongous, hulking mud body may not be that scary to some (though it depends on the source material), but think about this: he can physically turn into anybody. From your best buddy to your loving partner, even to your mom or dad. And you may not even realize it until he decides to turn you into a pasty red smear.Earlier on in "No Man's Land," there's the story where Renee Montoya first really meets Two-Face, "Two Down". At first, Renee is understandably suspicious of Two-Face who is a prominent member of Batman's own Rogues Gallery... but as they work together, even though she never forgets what he now is, she starts bonding with him and seeing what he could have been—- to the point where she's willing to stand up to the Batman himself in his defense. Un)Surprisingly, Batman himself in one chapter. After locating Joe Chill, the man who killed his parents, Batman stalks him for several nights. Then Batman, the man who swore never to commit murder, drove Chill to suicide! No wonder so many Batman villains are nuts. Sane people don't last long enough. Scott Hampton’s meticulously painted artwork was the major selling point of Night Cries when originally released in 1992. This was in an era when not every Batman comic was subsequently reprinted in a collection, meaning an all-new story was even more of an event, and that feeling was accentuated by child abuse being a significant plot aspect. Batman's disturbing portrayal of drug dependency in "Venom" which has a good dose of Nightmare Fuel and Truth in Television thrown in full spades. Part of the Legends of the Dark Knight anthology series (issues 16-20), Batman's reason for turning towards the fictional synthetic drug is because he failed to save one little girl from drowning to death in a cavernous section of the sewer. He ends up working unwillingly with the creator of the very drug and the father of the said aforementioned girl, Randolph Porter, and begins developing sensational use of the drug. Batman starts undergoing many changes (physically, psychologically, and through motor functions). It's hard to read the whole story from beginning to end since we get to see firsthand that Batman's reliance and dependency on Venom end up showing an almost rarely seen human side of him. Begging and pleading for more of the stuff and wallowing in himself inside. And besides being weak, he becomes more highly deranged with occasional roid rages and enjoys causing pain and suffering on his foes (surprisingly without nearly killing them!). It's both disturbing and sad to see the beloved Dark Knight turn into a big shambling drug user. And not only does it affect him, but it also nearly destroys the kindled friendships of Commissioner James Gordon and Alfred, with him beginning to question Bruce's health and well-being. For Bruce to overcome the addiction, he needed to isolate himself for a straight 30 days in his cave! As you might expect, during his detoxing period, he undergoes various craves and also suffers horrific hallucinations. This very arc from beginning to end is just Nightmare Fuel, to begin with. Oh! And if you think just the description itself is bad... Wait till you get a ◊ load of ◊ This! ◊

Riddler: "You look around here these days, it's all different. It's all changed. The Joker's killing people, for God's sake! Did I miss something? Was I away when they changed the rules?" Now, take this insane thought process, and combine it with an impressive set of powers: pheromonic Mind Control, body-generated poison, scientific super-genius, and command over the plant kingdom. Ivy is one of the few metahumans in Batman's rogues gallery, and thus one of the strongest baddies he regularly faces. The idea of anyone with the power to hold a knife at all mankind's throat is scary enough; the fact that Ivy has actually managed to do just that more than once is even scarier. On top of that, she has a habit of using particularly gruesome methods in killing people like parasitic fungi or having plants grow inside them. There's a reason Victor Zsasz hasn't been featured or alluded to in any family-friendly animated adaptations. The man carves a mark on himself for every victim he kills... and he has a lot of marks. Zsasz stands out among Batman's rogue's gallery in being a simple, straight-up serial-killing psychopath. He has no supervillain origin, no sympathetic motives, he just likes to kill people. Or "free the zombies" as he calls it. Especially women. He doesn't wear a suit or rule an empire. He's just some guy. He could literally be anyone. Something that sets Croc apart from a lot of Batman's other villains is the fact he wasn't exposed to toxins, caught in a freak lab accident, given special drugs, nor did he perform experiments on himself. He was born like this. While investigating drug pushers, Batman and Commissioner James Gordon notice a common trend in a series of murders involving child abuse, and the death of the children's parents.Oh, about Joker's plan to kidnap babies? It's because he wants to kill them all off on New Year's, just to destroy the fragile spirit of the people of Gotham City. And let's not get started on what he does to Commissioner Gordon's wife. I don’t really want to spoil anything else, as this a story that you will just have to read for yourself to decide whether or not it works for you. I personally think it does a great job highlighting real-world issues, but that will be a mileage-will-vary kind of thing. The ending is a hell of gut-punch though, and I thought the Gordon subplot was unbelievably effective storytelling. The painted art by Scott Hampton is unreal as well, looking even better in this magazine sized hardcover. It adds a grimey layer to the story, and elevates the script beyond what it would have been if it had just been pencilled normally.