DC Comics‘ Absolute Batman hasn’t held back from tweaking and changing the canon of the Dark Knight, from killing Thomas Wayne while leaving Martha alive, to entirely new origins for everyone from Batman to his rogue’s galley. But in this week’s issue, Absolute Batman #19 by Scott Snyder and Nick Dragotta, something that absolutely should not happen, happens. Spoilers past this point, but the issue kills off James Gordon.
While Gordon has been far removed from his normal role in the comics — aka a police detective and/or commissioner assisting Batman — he has been a part of the supporting cast since the beginning. Previously the Mayor of Gotham, he’s been slowly moving into his traditional role over the past few issues, albeit with the side-story of him shtupping Martha, much to Bruce’s consternation.
And this week’s issue seems to be finally giving us the dynamic we know and love. Gordon meets Batman on a rooftop after alerting him with the Batsignal (albeit a digital one, versus the spotlight of the main continuity). Gordon smokes, he talks about how they’ll meet further, and produces a file that’s labeled “Project Batman.”
Gordon hears a crow cawing, decides to burn the files instead as more crows approach Batman looks at the remains of the files that seem to indicate that perhaps the attack at the zoo that kicked this whole story off may have been manipulated by… Somebody. “This can’t be,” Batman says. “What the %& is this?”
“I’m sorry Bruce, for everything. But most of all… For what you’re about to find out,” Gordon says, as he plunges off the roof.
Batman screams “no,” and catches him as he falls. Except he didn’t catch Gordon, he caught his trenchcoat. In case there’s any doubt what happened, Gordon lies in a pool of blood, several stories below, splattered on the sidewalk.
All this seems to have been caused by the Absolute Scarecrow, and leads to this universe’s version of Deathstroke introducing the Robin program based on Batman seemingly murdering Gordon. He also recruits Stephanie Brown, Duke Thomas, Tim Drake, Dick Grayson and Jason Todd to wear giant mech suits, and more on that next issue.
But the real shocker is the death of Jim Gordon, a character who we’d expect would be around for the long run. But once again, Snyder is telling us this isn’t a story walking us up to the Batman we know and love; it’s something entirely different. Whatever that end result is, Gordon won’t be there to see it.
Absolute Batman #19 is in stores now.
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