Tangent Comics/The Batman

(DC, 1998)
™ and © DC Comics

In the Tangent Universe, nothing is the same as in the DC Universe except the names. According to the legend at the bottom of the cover, this is the ninth and final installment of DC's second run of comics set in the Tangent Universe in 1998, but it appears to be the eighth storywise.

So far, the Tangent Universe has avoided looking like part of DC's Elseworlds line, but in this issue the appearance is unavoidable. The history is different, more like Azrael's than Bruce Wayne's, but he is still recognizably a version of the DC Universe Batman. Here, he truly is a dark knight, a knight of the Round Table, cursed by Merlin to stay in Castle Bat, his House of Secrets, until he can atone for his betrayal of King Arthur. Hoping to end his curse, Sir William sends his spirit out in a mechanical suit of armor to defend Britain, with the distinctive profile and behavior of the Batman we know.

Investigating a break-in at a laboratory in London, which is blacked out like the rest of the world by the electromagnetic pulse generated by the creation of the Ultra-Humanite in Tangent Comics/Nightwing: Night Force, he encounters a scientist who appears to be the reincarnation of his medieval wife Tasmia, but whether she is or not, she seems destined be part of his present life, the Beauty to his Beast.

— David Wright

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Notes

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Artist

#1

September, 1998
Cover Price: $1.95
9 copies available from $0.65

Dan Jurgens