Warning: Spoilers ahead for Batman: Beyond The White Knight #6Since the debut of his ongoing White Knight continuity in DC’s mature Black Label, writer/artist Sean Murphy has been diligently and discretely rewriting the playbook on superhero comics, transforming the sometimes stilted world of Batman into its most human story yet. With his most recent main series within the universe, Batman: Beyond The White Knight, now winding up to its climax with issue #6, Murphy’s intricate and character-driven approach seems to be paying dividends. Demonstrating a flair for intense action alongside a bevy of rich, emotionally dramatic relationships, Batman’s White Knight is laying the foundation for how DC Comics should be building its future.
When Batman: Beyond The White Knight debuted earlier this year, it cut a strange figure even for a Black Label series. A continuation of Murphy’s kitchen sink odyssey featuring Batman’s White Knight self, this series begins as a fairly straightforward adaptation of the classic DCAU animated series Batman: Beyond, which pushed new Batman Terry McGinnis to the forefront as a replacement for the now elderly Wayne, who acts as his mentor. Bringing the future roughly four decades early in his White Knight-verse, Murphy’s series instead centers on a now middle-aged Bruce who breaks out of prison (following public disgrace in his previous adventures) in order to thwart former employee Derek Powers’ plot involving a theft of his experimental suit. Like always with Murphy, however, this superhero action proves largely secondary to the exploration of Batman’s relationships with his former friends and foes. He’s often spurred by a computer chip-implanted hallucination of the now deceased Jack “The Joker” Napier who appears in his head to give him advice.
With the series Batman: Beyond The White Knight (written and illustrated by Sean Murphy) entering the customary hero/villain showdown phase, what White Knight has accomplished in marvelously quick succession is nothing short of a quite intricate roadmap of how to reinvent the DC pantheon for the modern age. Murphy has devoted so much time, energy, and (most importantly) density to the relationships among the traditional Bat-family using a brush of mature emotionality. For instance, Murphy includes a villainous turn by Dick Grayson as an officer in Powers’ private police force, a surprisingly sane civilian Harley Quinn, and a realistically beleaguered Commissioner Barbara Gordon. Each moment and interaction takes on a certain uplifting dramatic weight. This tactic only grows more heartening under Murphy’s guiding hand which creates a robust illustration of the virtues of familial love and heroism that underlie the usual superhero fare. This all leads to a surprisingly adult spin on Batman.
Murphy Adds Slice-of-Life Elements to DC and Makes White Night Relatable
Adaptations or pastiches of older, beloved story-arcs or properties, such as what White Knight attempts with Batman Beyond, are standard practice in not only how the comics market often finds its hits, but how the greater field of entertainment finds them as well. With White Knight, Murphy brings to Gotham a future that is both clearly an homage/reiteration of the beloved Beyond timeline, but Murphy also manages to transcend this simple homage by expanding on the original’s thematic premise. Just as White Knight deconstructs Terry as a confused pawn of Powers rather than a straight hero, the Bat-family is now portrayed as estranged, where they’re desperately trying to find each other despite their divisions.
Unlike any other Batman story before it in its domestic and incidental tone, Murphy manages to find the elements of the characters within this strange world that immediately make them relatable, and their struggles familiar. Overall, Batman: Beyond The White Knight is an impressive feat of superhero storytelling which sets a template for how DC Comics can remain relevant in the future.
Batman: Beyond The White Knight #6 is now available from DC Comics!
