In a spectacular new piece of fanart, Batman’s doppelganger, the Batman of Zur-En-Arrh, has been reimagined with his own Batcave, harkening back to the 1950s sci-fi origins of the character. This art speaks to the enduring popularity of what was originally a relatively obscure design from comics early silver age, as the Batman of Zur-En-Arrh has been returned to multiple times over the years.
Tom Hoskisson (@tomhoskissonart) created the ‘Bat-cave of Zur-En-Arrh’, taking inspiration from the early silver age aesthetic of Zur-En-Arrh’s original appearance.
Hoskisson’s hyper-detailed style is reminiscent of artists like Geof Darrow and Chris Burnham, and also harkens back to the retro-futurist images of the 1950s, interpolating these different classic styles into this fanart.
Tom Hoskisson’s Fanart Incorporates Elements Of The 1950s Zur-En-Arrh
Hoskisson’s art takes the idea of the alien Zur-En-Arrh mirroring Batman to an extreme, incorporating analogues to many of the Batcave’s famous props, including an alien skeleton similar to Batman’s T-Rex, and alien Batman and Robin costumes behind glass. While later versions of the character – where Zur-En-Arrh was reimagined as a “back-up personality” for Batman, designed to emerge if his mind ever came under attack – are more in line with contemporary Batman storytelling, the alien counterpart to the Caped Crusader is a wondrous, gloriously ’50s sci-fi idea, one that Tom Hoskisson’s fanart gleefully pushes to its most extreme conclusion.
Part of what makes the Batman of Zur-En-Arrh brilliant in the modern day is that it’s the perfect example of how so many disparate and seemingly contradictory tones can fit into the same franchise. The original Zur-En-Arrh is quintessential late-1950s silliness, but Morrison’s version doesn’t invalidate this silliness, instead tying it into their holistic view of Batman and reimaginging the original story as a dream of Bruce’s that partially inspires his backup personality. Both Morrison and fan artist Tom Hoskisson clearly understand that the 1950s and 60s ‘silly’ stories have as much importance to Batman as the more realistic stories of the 70s and beyond.
Zur-En-Arrh Is Currently One Of Gotham’s Biggest Threats
The most recent volume of Batman, written by Chip Zdarsky, has taken Morrison’s version of the Batman of Zur-En-Arrh even further, turning him into a representation of Bruce’s worst impulses: his paranoia and his potential for brutality, his unrestrained id. It was Zur-En-Arrh that built Failsafe, the robot designed to kill Batman if he ever went bad, and as Zdarksy has dived into Bruce’s fears and unstable mental state, Zur-En-Arrh has been constantly in the background, taunting Bruce, hoping to be released. The Batman of Zur-En-Arrh now has a legacy far beyond the character’s 1950s roots, but those roots can still be appreciated thanks to Tom Hoskisson’s terrific art.
