Batman’s Epic Space Opera Challenges the Movies to Take Him Beyond Gotham

Warning: Contains Spoilers for Batman: Off-World #5!It’s been a while since Batmanhas been a street-level hero, solving crimes and putting the Riddler behind bars in Arkham Asylum. Month after month, Batman stops world-shattering crises and saves the planet. Any comic fan knows that Batman’s influence spreads far and wide outside just Gotham – so it’s frustrating that DC movies insist on making him a simple man in a cape devoted to one city.

Batman is far from Gotham in Batman: Off-World #5 by Jason Aaron and Doug Mahnke. There’s a genocidal pair of alien twins that are wreaking havoc across space, and it’s up to Batman to protect much more than Gotham. In fact, Batman has become a full sci-fi hero.

Batman’s newest space opera adventure truly cements the fact that he is more than just an Earth-bound hero but a beacon of justice no matter where he goes, and the new DC Cinematic Universe needs to give fans this version of Batman.

Batman Is Ready for an Epic Space Opera – in the Movies

Batman: Off-World #5 Variant Cover by Alan Quah

Batman movies have shown it time and again: Bruce Wayne losing his parents in an alleyway. While the movies feature origin take after origin take, the comics steamroll ahead with fantastic space wars and new universes – like the Absolute Universe – with the gnarliest versions of the Dark Knight ever seen. There are so many versions of Batman in the comics – but only one version of Batman in the movies. DC fans deserve better.

This repetitive storytelling is the very reason why Batman should be taken out of Gotham. Batman fans have seen Gotham a number of times onscreen, but Batman has far outgrown just Gotham City in the comics. For long-time fans, shackling Batman to the streets after witnessing all the death-defying stunts he can do would be a disservice to the Batman that fans know and love. But this high-stakes, alien-fighting version of Batman won’t lose the essence of the Dark Knight that remains with him always.

The Dark Knight Fights for Orphans in Space and on Earth

Batman Fans Deserve to See a Batman This Epic on the Big Screen

At his core, Batman will always be an orphan from Gotham. In Batman: Off-World #5, as he battles a Thanagarian bounty hunter to the death, he shows how, even with absurd stakes like his latest space mission, Batman is the voice of all the orphans of Earth fighting for justice.No matter where Batman goes, he takes this orphanhood with him. Whether he’s fighting aliens or or saving citizens on the ground, Batman fights for those who cannot fight for themselves.

As Batman and the rest of his Bat-Family become practically superhuman, fans are eager to see what version of Batman they will receive in James Gunn’s new DC Universe. No matter what, Batman and his backstory will be the psychological theme of whatever adventure he undertakes. But the Batman fighting criminals of Gotham is long past; it’s time for the movies to show fans a Batman that saves the world.

Batman: Off-World #5 is available now from DC Comics!