Holy cliffhangers! Batman finally gets an answer
Spoiler alert: The following contains significant details from the comic book Batman No. 32 (out Wednesday).
After keeping us — and Batman — on Bat-tenterhooks for four months, Catwoman is finally giving the Dark Knight an answer to his marriage proposal.
In DC Comics’ Batman issue 32, Bruce Wayne confesses to Selina Kyle about a moment in his past when he tried to stab the Riddler with a knife but was stopped by the Joker, almost breaking his cardinal rule of never killing. He felt that before she said yes or no, his longtime girl- frenemy needed to know so she could make the right decision.
But Catwoman explains that all their sins, “earned tragedies” and pain can’t compare to the love they have for each other. She tells Batman to ask her again, “but this time, you poor boy, don’t demand.” Her answer: “Yes.”
“That to me is what true love is,” writer Tom King says. “It’s showing who you truly are to someone. It’s letting someone know deep down who you are and that’s horribly frightening, and it scares Batman as much as anything ever has.”
However, King adds, “they’re two broken people, and because they’re broken, they have the edges that fit together.”
So what’s next for the happy couple? A new status quo to get Bat-fans talking.
“That’s tough to do,” King says. “In 78 years of this character, he lives in every kind of medium humankind can produce. But we’ve finally taken you someplace you haven’t seen before, so we’re going to explore this.”
He’s calling the next storyline “Rules of Engagement,” but not everyone will be rushing to the Gotham City Bed Bath & Beyond to pick out wedding gifts. Batman has just made a decision very out of character for him, and when the news gets out, everyone has a reaction — from his Gotham family, including loyal butler Alfred, to the entire Justice League and the rest of the superhero community.
“Some people are going to think, ‘Oh, my gosh, he’s gone insane, we need to fix him.’ And others will go, ‘He’s gone sane. We finally have a Batman we’ve been looking for,’ ” King says.
“Most superheroes, you make them happy and you end conflict — you give Spider-Man a wife and where do you go from there? But Batman’s the opposite: You give him happiness and you create conflict, because he’s fundamentally a sad character.”