Absolute Scarecrow traumatizes Batman

Added: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]Look at the face of this guy. If ever there were a comic to say such and such villain is nightmare fuel in the Absolute Batman comics, Absolute Scarecrow is it. I told you guys I was taking a break from my break to cover Absolute Batman. So, this picks up 1,500 miles outside of the city of Gotham. And you just have Scarecrow showing up here while these two guys are tending to their land. And when he just like steps out in front of this combine harvester, the first guy is just like, "What in the heck is this?" Right? The second guy comes back and he asked the question, "Hey, what in the hell do you think you're doing?" And Scarecrow just says, "I was just going for a walk." Now he's out there barefoot. He just looks like a crazy guy out in the middle of nowhere.

[00:00:42]And so the first guy refers to this other guy as Buck, right? And he says, "Look at this guy's face." And that's where you find out that the first guy's name is Vern, right? And Buck just says, "It's probably a mask, Vern." Right? The guy probably got it at the party store on Central, right, Freak? And Scarecrow just responds and he's like, "You got me, right? The party store on Central.

[00:01:00]How did you guess?" And where Buck starts talking, Scarecrow interrupts him and he says, "Gentlemen, come on now.

[00:01:06]We're all friends here. Am I right?

[00:01:07]Heck, you guys have been best friends for more than 30 years." And Buck, that's despite the fact that Burn is banging your wife, Lannne. And in that moment, Buck's just like, "How do you know my wife's name? And what are you talking about?" And the response of Vern is like, "Me and Lanne, right?" Like, "What is this? This is one of those internet pranks." And Scarecrow is like, "Exactly, an internet prank. Spot on, Vern." And so in that moment, Buck goes to reach into his pocket and he takes out his phone. And when he looks at it, Vern's just like, "Buck, what is it?"

[00:01:36]Right? And Buck just says, "It's you sneaking out of my bedroom window with a giant tube of oh my god." Now, while that's going on, all these crows start flocking around. That'll become important here in a little It's something I want you to keep in the back of your head. But in that moment, Buck goes after Vern. And Vern's like, "Dude, I didn't mean anything. I swear." And Buck just attacks him. Anyway, now this plane is flying through all these crows.

[00:02:01]It hits him and the plane seemingly starts to malfunction. So, while that's going on, Buck knocks Vern to the ground, and then Buck goes to get in the combine harvester. And the whole time, Vern's pleading to him, right, Buck, please, brother. Right? And Buck just says, "Brother, this." And runs over Vern with a combine harvester. So, as you can imagine, there ain't a whole lot of ern left over. And Scarecrow is just watching all of this and he's like, "Come to think of it, maybe this isn't just a mask." And so, Buck gets out of the whole thing and he's just like, "How does that feel?" Right? But then he realizes what he's done. And seemingly this temporary insanity wears off and he's like, "Oh my god, Vern." Right?

[00:02:38]What have I done? And he just says, "I don't know what came over me. The thought of you and her, Vern, I was just so angry." And in response, Scarecrow just says, "No, Buck. you were scared.

[00:02:49]And so Buck just looks at Scarecrow and he's like, "Mister, maybe we can still save him, right? I'll scoop up what's left." You call an ambulance. And Scarecrow just says, "How about a plane?" And the plane just comes crashing down into Buck and kills him on the spot. Right? That's what we're talking about here. Right now, this begs a lot of questions. Historically speaking, Scarecrow in DC comics has always used a kind of fear toxin, but there's no indication that a fear toxin has been emitted here. More than that though, the fear toxin affects the mind mentally. And while that can affect the physical world in terms of how a person perceives it, the idea of Buck taking his phone out of his pocket and seeing incriminating evidence on his phone that seemingly doesn't actually exist in the real world. There's any number of things that you can draw from this. Right now, the statement maybe it's not just a mask seems to come from the idea that like whatever abilities he has stem from the mask itself. So, is it some kind of a fear toxin? Or are we talking about an elevated level of scarecrow where it's not simply just about emitting a fear toxin? It's some kind of telepathy. And that is even more horrifying. A telepathic scarecrow who can just put these horrendous fears directly into your brain or manipulate you. That sounds more terrifying than the original. I'll be honest with you guys.

[00:04:03]despite the fact that Scarecrow became a member of the Sinestro Corps. Even with all of that, Absolute Scarecrow still sounds more horrifying. And so what this does is this picks back up in the city of Gotham because we're kind of following up with everything that's happened in relation to Batman. And we'll kind of talk a little more about this as we get through, but it says, "In just the past couple of weeks, the kid has shifted into an entirely new gear. I came back from MI6 to find him driven like never before. No friends, no distractions, nothing but Batman. Now, this is an important distinction. Keep in mind, in the aftermath of everything that had happened with Absolute Bane, one of the things that Scott Snyder has been consistently hitting on is the course of Batman has irrevocably changed. Right up until the point of Absolute Bane, Batman, I wouldn't call him just kind of like quote unquote joying through the vigilante space, but I will say he didn't fully understand what he was getting into. And it's one of the things that Alfred kept telling him, right? You are messing with things that you don't understand. You're getting into powers and abilities that you don't understand. Right? Folks out there who can do things that will turn your life upside down and inside out and bring horrors to your doorstep that you cannot even imagine. Right? And if you can't imagine them, they'd be darker than anything you've ever experienced in your life. But in Bruce Wayne's mind, and to his credit, right, the mission of improving Gotham was the most important thing. It's not that dissimilar from like Gar Inis's Punisher storyline, the slavers, right? Where you have like that whole trade happening in New York. Frank Hassel understands the grittiness of it.

[00:05:35]He understands the reality of it. The social worker who's doing what she can doesn't really understand what she's getting into. But the motivation, the intention, that's what really matters here. Sure, that social worker was in over her head, and Batman was in over his head, too. It wasn't until Absolute Bane showed up and literally tore apart his friend group, right? crushed Oswald Cobblepot into this just kind of small shrunken thing that we now call the penguin when he totally screwed up the head of Edward Nigma when he burned the entire other half of Harvey Dent and even before Absolute Bane when Whan Jones was taken by Ark M and converted into Killer Croc that's when the reality of the situation started to set in that's when he really started to understand what was at stake here and that's what Alfred's talking about with all of this because Batman's beling straight for the cops I mean this dude is public enemy number one. And whatever view people had of Batman before, they're going to see him in an even worse light here in a minute because as he's beling towards these cops, right, the cops are just like, "Boom, right, we got you now." And Alfred chimes in and says, "Kid, they're 20 cars deep.

[00:06:38]There's no exit routes. Why aren't you slowing down?" And even the cops ask, "Why isn't he slowing down?" And Batman just says, "Because I'm speeding up."

[00:06:46]Which is an amazing line, I got to be honest. And so Alfred goes on, right?

[00:06:49]And he says he goes to work and uses every penny to build things. Wild new bat things only he understands. And he says in a way I understand he created Batman to tell people the real story of their city. The greed, the corruption.

[00:07:06]He never wanted Batman to become the story or the savior. How strange everything must suddenly feel to him turned all about. And that's true, right? That's the other part of what Scott Snyder has been hitting on. The reality here is that when you have people living in a state of desperation and then somebody comes along and by whatever manner and whatever means has the ability to shine a light on the source of that desperation and then takes pot shots and is even successful in varying ways against the source of that desperation. People will lift them up as a champion not because of the fact that people are like ah uh somebody needs to do something about this and by somebody I mean somebody else. It's because most people just don't know what to do, but that person does. So, we will champion their cause. And that's what it turned into with Bruce Wayne. That's what it turned into with Absolute Batman. He's a champion of the people now. But it's something he never wanted.

[00:07:59]He never wanted to be a champion of the people. He just wanted to be the guy trying to make some kind of a difference in the city, but he just makes more of a difference than he thought he would. And that becomes important. What's also important here is that we've basically got the Batmobile if we're being honest with ourselves, right? And it's funny how this whole conversation unfolds because at that point the cops just kind of contact each other over radio, right?

[00:08:21]Like he's flipped over, boys. Flipped onto his roof. Get him out. And then in that moment, he kicks back in again. And it's like the back of the car is becoming the front and the front of the car is becoming back. And one of the cops is like, I get it, right? Stop him.

[00:08:34]And so that's when you start going back and forth between Alfred and Bruce on what this thing should be called, right?

[00:08:39]Because Alfred asks like, "What do you call that thing, kid?" And Batman's just like, "It doesn't have a name yet."

[00:08:43]Right? And he's like, "How about the bat gimbal?" Right? It's a gyroscope. And Bruce is just like, I know what it is.

[00:08:48]Hard no. And Alfred's like, I mean, the bat gyro. Let's call it that, right? And Bruce is just like, a harder no.

[00:08:53]Pennyorth. And then Harley Quinn is just like, I mean, that thing's nasty. Let's call it the bat nasty, right? Which I'll be honest with you guys, man. I kind of like that name. Like, to be honest, right, to be honest here. I know it's not going to be a popular opinion. I kind of dig the name the bat nasty. It's dope. But Batman is just like the hardest no in the history of nose. And so Alfred kind of continues on here, right? He says, "I can't say I'm not impressed by what he's become. I understand the need to shut others out, to go it alone, fast and hard so no one can follow, but it does scare me. That strategy can lead a man to dark places where he loses himself. Still, if anyone can figure a way through, it's this kid of that much, I am sure." Now, this is particularly interesting because one of the cool kind of relationships that you get here now is not simply just the transition of Bruce Wayne into Batman.

[00:09:47]You guys know this mythos, right? We don't kind of have to explain the philosophy of this, but it's a core element of Batman, right? has always been a core element of Batman that while he has been surrounded by the Bat family in a variety of ways, the reality here is that he's always kind of been an island among himself, it's always been less about, you know, Stephanie Brown and Dick Grayson and Tim Drake and Jason Todd and, you know, Duke Thomas and all these different guys, Batwing and so on.

[00:10:11]It's always been less about the fact that they're like a tight-knit family.

[00:10:15]And it's always been more that like he's an island and they're just kind of islands that exist around him. He's always kind of kept them at arms length.

[00:10:22]And while there have been stories like death of the family from the New 52, phenomenal story, it's absolutely amazing. Maybe we should remaster New 52 Batman at some point. While you have had stories like that that in some capacity have demonstrated the fact that when the Joker broke into the Batcave that it wasn't just him going after Batman, it was the Bat family saying now he knows all of our identities. Right? Whether you choose to believe that you exist by yourself or not, the reality is that we are connected to you in some capacity.

[00:10:49]Right? So what affects you affects us.

[00:10:51]And so it always kind of found a way to reel him back in. Sometimes it's a little more empathetic than that, right?

[00:10:56]Bruce, you don't have to do it alone. We love you. We care about you. Let us help. Right? But whatever the case is, Absolute Batman's very much going down that path. He's going down this road of becoming a guy who functions by himself.

[00:11:06]And there'll be a reason for that here in a second. But the other cool relationship here is with the Red Hood gang led by Harley Quinn. It's almost like a pit crew essentially, right? Like he literally comes racing into an alleyway and they're just like, "Break it down 30 seconds, right?" And they're literally counting down 20 seconds, 10 seconds, right? This thing gets broken down so quickly and one of them's like, "Hurry up, Batman. Out of the bat nasty." And he's like, "Stop calling it that." So apparently the Red Hood gang has just adopted the name that it's the Bat Nasty because they're all hearing the conversation between Batman and Alfred and Harley Quinn, right? And so at that point, they get everything loaded up into the van and they're like, "We're out. There's clothes in the shopping cart." Bruce Wayne grabs him, throws him on just as a couple cops roll up, and he just points in that direction over there. Now, he looks like a homeless guy. They're not going to ask any questions. Dude's got a shopping cart, and so they just end up going in the direction that he points them in. I got to be honest, man. I'm kind of loving this version of Batman in some ways a little more than the main DC universe. I love that he's so boots on the ground. That's what I love, right?

[00:12:03]Don't get me wrong, I do love Batman in the main DC universe. But there's something about a Bruce Wayne who feels like a common man, right? Doesn't look like a common man, but feels like a common man. I love that version of Bruce Wayne here. But the other point is he goes and talks to Whan Jones. Now, one of the things to keep in mind, right, we saw in the Absolute Batman, Absolute Wonder Woman crossover, that he had literally traveled to the realm of the gods in order to attain an artifact that could transform a man who was turned into a beast back into a man again. The hope behind all of that is that it could restore Whan Jones and it seems to be doing the job because when Bruce Wayne is walking along, right, in this kind of construction site, Whan Jones calls him over. He's just kind of standing in an alleyway. Now, he's not back to his normal human self. And if anything, he's kind of brought closer in line with the killer croc that we're the most familiar with in DC comics. But Bruce is glad to see that even on some level, he's returning to a state of normaly. And that's what he says, right? Thank god you're back. And Wayan just says, not completely, but this thing that you got, it's bringing me back. Now, this is kind of an important statement. We don't know if he's going to go back to a human form eventually or if this form that he has now is his permanent form, or at least the only form he can really take, and this is the closest he'll ever get to looking human. But it doesn't really matter, right? The reason why is because at this point he's Whan Jones in mind, right? And that's the important thing among all of this. And so at that point, he just asks, "What's the plan?" Right?

[00:13:28]And Bruce is like, "The plan? Like, what are you talking about?" And Wayan just says, "The plan, man, like the next move. How are we going after them? The ones doing all of this to our city." And Bruce just says, "We're not going after anything, Wayan. Like, I never should have brought you all into all of this.

[00:13:42]There is no we." And the funny thing about this is that Whan says, "Screw that." Right? There is only we, Bruce.

[00:13:49]Like, that's what I learned down there alone in the dark. We only get through this together. Whether you should or should have brought us in is irrelevant.

[00:13:58]You did bring us in. And now Batman is our choice to make. And Bruce just says, "No, it's not." And he says, "I love you, Wayey. Take care of yourself." And walks away from Whan Jones. Now, again, keep in mind, this is not Batman acting out of malice. It's Batman acting out of fear. It's Batman afraid of the fact that he brought them in, their lives were irrevocably changed, and he's afraid of what could happen next. And I think if anything, this represents Bruce Wayne understanding what he's stepping into now. Alfred was right when he told him there are forces at play out here that you can barely comprehend, and they will destroy your life and everyone that you know and love. Bruce has gotten a taste of that, but he doesn't know how far down this rabbit hole goes. He's Alice. He just stepped in chasing the white rabbit. And sure, he came across a jar of molasses, but he's still falling, right? He has not gotten to the long low hall with the lamps hanging from the roof. So, it's one of these crazy things when you see how his characters evolved and grown over the years. But at that point, you jump back to the aftermath of the fight between Whan Jones and Bibbo Babowski. Because one of the things to keep in mind here is that the fight was supposed to be fixed. But if you guys remember that whole segment and that whole conversation in Absolute Batman number 14 with Absolute Bane, one of the things that we learn is it was almost kind of a juxtaposition between the fight with Whan and Bibbo and the fight with Bruce Wayne and Absolute Bane that it was a David versus Goliath fight.

[00:15:20]Whan was supposed to go down. Instead, that didn't happen. And what Bruce had done is he had taken all the money from Falconee and he had bet it all on Whan Jones to win, which is exactly what happened. But the fact is, it pissed off Falconee. Not only that, right, Bruce is in prison and that's when you kind of find out the fix is in, right? Falconee is just too wellconed for everything because Bruce has just had the tar beat out of him. I mean, he's able to hold his own. The guy's 6 foot7 and like 400 lb. Like, I promise you, this man can hold his own in a prison, right? But Bruce tells Whan, right? You should just see the other guy, you know? And Wayan asks, "Was it because of Falconee?" And Bruce just says, "He's got a lot of friends in here, man." Right? And that's when Wayan tells him and out here too because your bail goes up every time we meet it. Right. The guys Harvey is looking into legal loopholes. Azie is backdooring things. Eddie's questioning it all. Me the fight money that you gave me is tied up in the gym purchase. I tried to resell the place, but Falconee has everyone scared to buy it. And so Bruce just says, "If you ever sell that gym, I will never talk to you again."

[00:16:23]And he says, "I took Falcone's money, but I didn't just bet it on you. I bet it on all of us. Understand? One of us wins, we all win. I save you, you save me. We all keep saving each other until we all make it out. Cry alley for life.

[00:16:38]And Whan just says no one can change that. Now, that's one of the most beautiful developments of the absolute universe. And that's why I say it's so awesome that the whole thing is inverted. You guys know Crime Alley is the alley where Thomas and Martha were shot and Bruce Wayne basically started on the path of becoming Batman. It's a place of tragedy. It's a place of sadness. And while it still very much is in the absolute universe, that instead of what came out of it being Batman with his dark and brooding ways and so on and so forth, what came out of it was a unification of what you and I would traditionally call Batman's rogues gallery, but instead they're all friends. So, something kind of beautiful came out of this. But you see the betrayal here for Whan Jones, right?

[00:17:16]That the agreement was that they all support each other no matter what until they all make it out of crime alley and find some better life. But then when it comes time to actually honor that agreement, Bruce is afraid to do it because he understands what can be lost.

[00:17:30]And so at that point, you switch over to Bruce Wayne and Alfred and Harley Quinn monitoring the return of Absolute Joker.

[00:17:38]Now remember, we know very little about this guy, right? We've got what a few appearances. We got one comic. Like there really isn't a whole lot going, but we know enough to know that there's a lot of theories out there. And one of the things that Alfred had theorized is that all these different iterations of the Jack Grim family who have done various things over the years that it's all been the same guy. In a lot of ways, it was Scott Snyder grabbing the Dionium storyline from his New 52 Batman run and the whole concept of the Joker being the Paleman, meaning he's been alive for hundreds of years. He's very, very old.

[00:18:10]It was one of the coolest plot threads that DC never did anything with. It was the comic book equivalent of like your voice trailing off. it just vanished one day and that was it. Right? But the cool thing about this is that when they're watching him, Bruce Wayne says him, right? He's everywhere all of a sudden.

[00:18:27]And that's when you get this kind of uh news segment, right? Where it says, "A warm welcome back to Gotham royalty.

[00:18:32]Jack Grim IV generous grants to multiple city programs." And he says, "Because I truly believe that Gotham is all of us together." So clearly he's shining people on. And that's exactly what Alfred says, right? The charm offensive continues. And Bruce just says for weeks now, right, the city loves him, right?

[00:18:49]And that's where they all kind of start to agree. It's how he operates. He's laying groundwork, but the questions for what, right? And it just says nothing good, right? We need to stay vigilant.

[00:18:58]That's an important thing to understand here. Batman and Absolute Joker haven't really fought, right? They are aware of each other, right? Batman is aware of Absolute Joker and Absolute Joker is aware of Batman, but we have not gotten the, you know, New 52 Batman Endgameesque storyline yet where like the two of them fight to the death type of thing, right? But still, that is going to happen. I have no doubt. What's cool about this though is that in the middle of it all, this signal ends up coming up on the screen and Bruce is like, "What is all of this about?"

[00:19:28]Right? And Harley's just like, "Us being vigilant." And he's just like, "Harly, right?" And she says, "What?" Right?

[00:19:33]It's just a little something that I whipped up. I'm still testing it, right?

[00:19:36]But people can send a distress beacon to your cowl when they need help. I call it the bat signal. It's all untraceable.

[00:19:44]It's encrypted. It's not like folks out there can just be calling you on the phone. Now, this is dope, right? A 21st century Batman in a lot of ways. Cuz let's be honest with ourselves, as iconic as it is, the bat signal flying out in the sky that's unique to the main DC universe Batman. I don't know that I would have been a fan of seeing that rolled over into the absolute Batman universe when this is a universe that changes so much about the mythos. There is something to be said about the more things change, the more they stay the same. And the bat signal certainly does more than just have Commissioner Gordon say, "Batman, I need your help." Right?

[00:20:17]It's a warning to criminals out there, right? Batman's out there. While he won't kill you, you know, he'll have you drinking your food through a straw for the rest of your life. Right? So, right, don't commit crimes. And so it's one of these things where I love the updated idea within this universe, but that's when he gets a call from Jim Gordon and he's like, "I'll be right there." And so Harley asks like, "We're all going to go to jail, aren't we?" And Alfred's like, "I mean, probably, but I don't think it's today." And so when Batman gets to the rooftop where Jim Gordon's at, Jim seems a little overly paranoid, right?

[00:20:47]He immediately turns a gun on Batman.

[00:20:49]It's like, "Who's there?" Right? And Bruce is just like, "I am." And he just says, "Man, like you move fast for a big guy. Like I guess I'm going to have to get used to that, aren't I? if we're going to make meeting like this a thing.

[00:20:58]Now, one of the things to keep in mind about Jim Gordon, and it's very easy to forget here, right? It was kind of this small little moment that happened over the course of the Absolute Batman line, for those of you guys who don't remember, number one, Jim Gordon is in a relationship with Bruce Wayne's mom, which Bruce didn't really take too kindly to. He didn't, it wasn't one of these things where he hated it, but it was almost kind of like the teenage response, right? You know, dad's no longer a part of the picture for obviously tragic reasons. Mom's found a new guy, and I don't know how I feel about that, right? I think it's important to frame it that way as opposed to like Bruce is young and angsty and pissed because his mom's meeting somebody else. His dad died in a very tragic circumstance and so you can understand why he would respond to it the way that he did. But the other thing is that Jim Gordon being as capable of a cop as he is. He figured out very early on that Bruce Wayne was Batman, right?

[00:21:45]He was like, I mean, look, if nothing else, it was just looking at the build of both of you guys, right? The reality here is that you just put on a costume and go out there as absolute Batman. You don't change your size, right? You don't have the ability to alter the size of your body. So, it's only a matter of time before I was able to figure it out.

[00:22:02]Which really begs the question, how long would it take for other people to figure it out besides those who already have?

[00:22:07]But Bruce says, right, Mr. Gordon, on the phone, you sounded upset. You sounded scared. And Jim just says, I suppose I did, right? How do I say this?

[00:22:15]Over the past few weeks since your mother left, I've been doing some digging. It started with questions about the past. But what I found, it changes everything. Because that's the other thing that we learned. Bruce Wayne's mom was at one point a part of the absolute court of owls. They were seemingly not villains. They were people trying to affect positive change in the city of Gotham by weeding out all the corruption. But basically, absolute Joker got to them, obliterated their ranks, and what was left fled, right?

[00:22:49]And it seemed like Martha was one of them, and then just settled down and built a life with Thomas Wayne. But Jim Gordon continues on, right? It does change everything, but not just about the past, but the present, too. And it all leads right here, son, to this moment and to you directly. And Bruce asks, right, what leads to me? And Jim just says, all of it, right? Everything.

[00:23:10]For days now, I've been wrestling with whether to call you or not and to give these files to you." He says, "The truth is, I don't know what the right thing is anymore, but the deeper I dig, the more frightening it gets." And so, what you're seeing here is a very unsettled Commissioner Gordon. This guy's all over the place. His behavior is erratic in some way. And Bruce is just like, "Mr. Gordon," right? But the response to Jim, he says, "The more loss in it I feel.

[00:23:36]It's like one of those corn mazes, right, where it's too tall to see over the stocks to the exit." And so Bruce just says, "Right, maybe you should just show me." And Jim's like, "Show you what?" And then that's when he realizes what he's talking about, right? All right. The files, right? And he says, "Just prepare yourself." Okay. And then when he goes to take him out, he asked the question, "Did you hear that?"

[00:23:54]Right? So clear paranoia here, right?

[00:23:56]There's a crow that's sitting out there, but the file contains what's called Project Batman. So, seemingly this is a great big huge plan that's been laid out for quite some time. It looks like Bruce becoming Batman was not a mistake. That it was all part of the plan. But Jim Gordon just says, "This was a mistake. I never should have come here." And he takes a cigarette and starts burning the files. And in that moment, Jim Gordon's arm catches on fire, right? He's like, "Clumsy me." Right? He just says, "Mr. Gordon, just tell me what's going on.

[00:24:25]We'll get you some help. Okay. And the crows start calling, right? And he says, "I'm afraid it's too late for that. Just promise me you will burn those files.

[00:24:34]Burn them, son, please." And Batman just says, "It's okay, Mr. Gordon." And Jim just says, "No, right? If you won't burn them, I'll do it myself." But then the crows literally start buzzing all around him, and he's like trying to stop me.

[00:24:46]Right? The birds. His birds. And Bruce grabs the files, looks down, and it's like, "What in the hell is this?" And Jim just says, "I'm sorry, Bruce, for everything, but most of all for what you're about to find out." And he goes to jump off the edge. Right now, Bruce grabs him. Like, literally, the talent from the cape comes out and grabs his coat. He's like, "I have you, Mr. Gordon. Hang on." And then as soon as he gets to the edge, Jim Gordon has already fallen. Hits the ground. And everybody just starts pointing up, right? They're like, "Oh my god, is that Mayor Gordon?"

[00:25:14]Right? Look up there. Batman, did he kill him? So, it literally looks like Batman has killed Jim Gordon. And as he's standing on this rooftop, he looks over and what does he see? Absolute scarecrow who lights a cigarette and just waves at him. Doesn't take any of this seriously. And so at that point, you jump over to a huge moment here. And I'm going to be honest with you guys, this is going to blow your mind, right?

[00:25:38]And so when Bruce Wayne gets back to what you and I would call the batcave essentially, right? It's base of operations. He's traumatized by it all.

[00:25:45]Literally absolute scarecrow traumatized Bruce Wayne. He traumatized the hell out of this guy, right? And he just says, "I had him." Right? And Alfred's like, "It's not your fault, kid." And he says, "For that one second, I had him." Right?

[00:25:56]I did. He lost basically a father figure. I wouldn't say that it's like losing a second father, but it's losing a guy who would have been and who could have been. Right? Bruce was on his way to viewing Jim that way. And that's when you find out that it's real, right? Jim Gordon hitting the ground. He's dead, right? The news comes on. We bring you a special message from Mayor Hill, right?

[00:26:16]and he says, "Thank you, fellow Gothammites, I come to you with tragic news. Former mayor Jim Gordon is dead, killed by the Batman." And this is where he goes into that political nonsense and kind of framing the entire situation about himself, right? Jim and I were close friends, more family than friends.

[00:26:31]In fact, no one was happier for me when I won the mayorship than him. Harold, he told me, "To be honest, I'm relieved you won instead of me. You are the best man to keep this city safe." Obviously, that's a croc, right? like obviously it's full of nonsense. And that's when he gets cut off, but not by anybody who's acting with empathetic intent. He gets cut off by a very nefarious man.

[00:26:54]This guy walks up and just says, "That's enough." Right? And that's where the mayor just says, "All right, uh yeah, and here and now to help explain how we will keep Gotham City safe." And that's where this guy steps up and says, "Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Slade Wilson. Now, you don't know me, but what I know about you, about the people of this city, is that you are tough. You are unafraid because Gotham, it tests you. It tests you more than perhaps any other city on Earth. Still, every single day, you pick yourselves up. You put yourselves together, one step at a time, and you go out there, and you face Gotham head on. For too long, though, you have not had real help. Today that changes. No more darkness. No more creatures of the night terrorizing your streets. From now on, let Gotham symbol be a messenger of mourning. With that, I present to you the Robin program. I told you guys, right? The ending of this is nuts. Funded by one of Gotham's own founding sons, Jack Grim. Mr. Grim's sustained and extraordinary support for Gotham's youth, especially its least fortunate children, is well known. He has sheltered, mentored, and guided countless numbers of challenged young men and women over the years. He takes the misunderstood, the wards of the state, or fallen through the city's many cracks, and helps them find their way.

[00:28:25]the ones who've turned to criminality, guided by an exceptional leader, orphaned at an early age, and raised by Mr. Grim. This team will be Gotham's new totem. And there's names here that you should recognize. Tim Drake, Stephanie Brown, Jason Todd, Duke Thomas, Dick Grayson. Right? These are the traditional Robins of Batman, right? and he says, "I have had the honor of training them and they are more than ready." And so at that point when they approach Slate, right, they say, "We don't understand, General Wilson. The order said to suit up for duty, but we already did." And he says, "That's because those are not your suits, Captain Grayson. These are." And he presents them with their outfits. We don't get to see what their suits look like, but he presents them. And he says, "Together, we will end this long, dark night of fear and terror. We will bring back the light. But make no mistake, it will be a fight, ladies and gentlemen.

[00:29:28]Maybe the biggest fight in the history of this city. And it starts right now.

[00:29:34]With that being said, guys, we're going to bring this video to an end. I'm going back to my break, and I will catch you guys later. Peace.