Batman: "Stand aside, citizen. There's a miscreant on the loose in Gotham City."
One-shot
comic book, published by
DC Comics and
Wildstorm Comics (actually a subsidiary of DC) in August 2003. It was written by
Warren Ellis, with art by
John Cassaday and
David Baron.
Crossover comics can be tough to put together well, and Ellis' "
Planetary" series has had a rough time of it. The
JLA/Planetary crossover was just plain awful, with all the characters painfully re-imagined. Things were quite a bit better in the
Planetary/Authority crossover, but the two teams never actually met -- it wasn't much of a crossover anyway, since
the Authority weren't much more than background elements anyway. But I think he finally got it right with the crossover between
Batman and the Planetary crew.
I'm sure you've already heard of Batman, but you may not be familiar with Ellis' Planetary. They are a small team of
metahumans who travel the globe, bickering with each other and trying to uncover the
secret history of the world -- the super-people, the
hidden civilizations, the
secret societies that have made the world go 'round. They call themselves "
Archeologists of the
Unknown," and that's not a bad description. They include
Elijah Snow, a century-old hardass with ice-control powers;
Jakita Wagner, a beautiful powerhouse who works with Planetary because it keeps her from being bored; and
the Drummer, a goofball who can sense information of all kinds.
Elijah: "I don't believe it. The Drummer finally gets punched into unconsciousness and I didn't get to do it."
The story starts with the team arriving at the Planetary office located in
Gotham City -- not DC's version of Gotham, but the Wildstorm universe's version, which has a
Dick Grayson and a not-all-that-evil version of
the Joker called Jasper, but no Batman. Elijah, Jakita, and Drums are investigating a string of murders committed by a man named
John Black, whose parents were tortured in a secret lab run by an evil conspiracy called
the Four. Black has acquired the ability to move himself and others through
alternate realities, but the powers have driven him
mad. The team runs into Black just after he's killed a prostitute by shifting the flesh on half her body to another dimension, and as they pursue him, he panics, triggers a
dimensional shift...
...and everyone finds themselves in a
different Gotham City. One with a guy who dresses up like a
bat.
Drummer: "There's some kind of transvestite hooker running down the alleyway at us."
Elijah: "It's the cape guy, isn't it?"
Batman is somehow aware of Black's
crimes, but the Planetary team isn't willing to let some
weirdo with a
leather fetish take someone as powerful as Black into custody. So while Elijah and the Drummer chase after Black, Jakita tries to fight Batman. But when Black triggers another dimensional shift, the team finds themselves facing off against...
Adam West? Another shift, and they've got the terrifying badass from
Frank Miller's classic "
The Dark Knight Returns," then
Neal Adams' thoughtful 1970s Batman, then
Bob Kane's brutal gun-wielding 1940s Batman. Is there any way for the Archeologists of the Unknown and the various Dark Knights to resolve this
predicament?
What makes this Planetary crossover work where others had failed? First, I think it benefits from not having an
epic scope, like the others did. Most of this story is confined to Gotham's infamous
Crime Alley. There are no monstrous aliens to fight, and
the fate of the world does not hang in the balance. There's just the struggle for one
criminal, and that helps make the story more
personal and
intimate. In addition, this story focuses on both Planetary and Batman in fairly equal amounts -- and it does it in a fairly
interesting and
innovative way. While the members of Planetary are the main protagonists and the people who drive the plot, the Rotating Cavalcade of Batmen means that the story's real focus is on the
history and
legacy of Batman over the decades.
If you can find it, I recommend it. It is collected with the other Planetary crossovers in "
Planetary: Crossing Worlds."
Elijah: "You like him, don't you? He's your special Bat-Friend."
Jakita: "Get away from me."