Okay, so some little game has been out for about a week by the name of Batman: Arkham Knight. You may have possibly heard of it? If you haven’t, you should pick it up, because it’s pretty awesome. However, there’s one thing about it that isn’t so awesome, so get ready to check the expiration date on the fruit in your fridge because we think it’s time to spoil some shit. Namely, the Arkham Knight himself.
In keeping with the theme of the Rocksteady Arkham games having titles that are very literal (ie, Arkham Asylum was actually in the asylum, and Arkham City likewise), the Arkham Knight subtitle relates to a person instead of a place. About an hour or so into the game, you meet said Arkham Knight in the flesh, who wears a militarized version of Batman’s suit, complete with a fancy helmet with LED readings and metallic ears. You know, as one does. But it’s not his gear or his own private army that makes him such a threat. He knows Batman’s tactics, knows who his allies are, and even knows his actual identity. The mystery of the game is who the hell this guy is and why he’d have a grudge against Batman, and at the end the truth is revealed. The Arkham Knight is none other than: (SPOILER AHEAD! LAST CHANCE!)
…Jason Todd. Holy plot twist, Batman!
For those who don’t know, Jason Todd is the second Robin who joined Batman’s crusade after Dick Grayson grew up and became Nightwing. The street punk got the Dark Knight’s attention by trying to steal the wheels off the Batmobile, which is pretty impressive in and of itself. But because he grew up on the streets and had to do whatever he could to get by, Jason was reckless, impulsive, and violent, none of which Batman fans were particularly keen on. In the Death in the Family arc running from 1988-1989, Jason’s fate was decided by the fans via voting with a 900 number. He was kidnapped by the Joker, beaten with a crowbar, and blown up, leaving Batman in a state of grief for quite some time until Tim Drake took up the mantle as the Boy Wonder.
Jason was later brought back as the anti-hero the Red Hood in the 2005 arc Under the Hood, revived by the Lazarus Pit but with the bonus of not being entirely mentally stable. In Arkham Knight, Jason was kidnapped by the Joker and tortured for a year (the Clown even branded the kid with a ‘J’) before being shot and presumed killed. His mental breakdown at the hands of Joker caused him to hate Batman for abandoning him, hence allying himself with Scarecrow and wanting to kill the Caped Crusader so much. Thus, Arkham Knight isn’t really a story about Scarecrow getting his vengeance on Batman and trying to break him so much as it is a Red Hood origin story.
This could be the stupidest twist ever in Batman continuity. It has no reason for existing either in the context of the story or even its own marketing. When the Knight was first revealed during the initial announcement via Game Informer, Rocksteady’s Dax Ginn flat out said that he’d be completely new, so I’m not sure what world Rocksteady is in where “someone we haven’t used yet” is a well-known Batman character….
“…We are excited to announce that we worked with DC Comics to create a completely new character… Arkham Knight. We’ll talk about him in the upcoming months.”
Of course, even before it was revealed to be a blatant lie people were smart enough to figure out the the Arkham Knight was Jason. There’s only so many people who hate Batman enough to dress like a military version of him and have the ability to physically go toe to toe with him and not walk away with eight broken bones. Once the Joker hallucinations head toward to the topic of Jason, there’s little to no doubt that he and the Knight are one and the same. In fact, it’s a bit of a mystery how it took Batman and Alfred so long to figure it out themselves, especially when Jason himself wasn’t being all that subtle near the end.
It also doesn’t help that Jason’s transition from Arkham Knight to Red Hood is pretty instant, and sloppy at that. Once he unmasks himself to Batman, he just tosses off the LED display and changes his helmet and suit colors to red. Batman tries to help return him to “normal”, then he just disappears and shows up at the end for about 10 seconds to shoot Scarecrow and disappear, presumably to do his own thing in the Red Hood DLC. Don’t get me wrong, I like the Red Hood as a character and what he represents; there’s already a strong case for why hedeserved a game of his own. But when we’re told that the bad guy we’ll be facing is a “completely new character”, one expects someone that’s never been seen before that could be integrated into the comics later on like Harley Quinn was, not a stop gap to a character assuming an identity they’ve had for the past decade.
Hiding the Arkham Knight’s identity has the problem where the writers think that doing so was a lot more of a clever move than it actually was. Now, one can see why they’d go this route; just saying “oh hey, here’s Jason Todd and he wants to kill Batman!” would’ve thrown non-comics fans for a massive loop. Problem with that is that shrouding his identity in mystery robs the story of any potential emotional weight of seeing Batman confront someone who he just couldn’t help. The boss fight between them doesn’t feel like a tragic reunion so much as it just feels like two dudes hashing out their problems from a week ago. But for all his talk about wanting to kill Batman, the Arkham Knight only shows up during certain moments, and not long enough to leave a real impression beyond “man, this dude is annoying”. He’s trying to be the Winter Soldier, but he’s more like a very talkative and arrogant gnat. Superheroes are supposed to have secret identities, but sometimes it’s best to just take off the mask and show us who they are right from the outset.
How did you feel about the Arkham Knight’s secret identity? Let us know in the comments below.
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