10 Best Batman Analogues
5. Citizen Pain
In Violent Messiahs, William O'Neil asks the simple question, "what would happen if Batman was real?". How would the world respond to a man with seemingly limitless resources taking the law into his own hands?
While the story features many supernatural, science-fiction and religious elements, at its core, the story is very much about the consequences of one man's violent actions.
Rankor Island is a fictional city just off the coast of New York. It is drowning in corruption, drugs, prostitution and violence. A masked vigilante called Citizen Pain begins a war against the criminal element. Rankor's rotten to the core police commissioner is pressured into calling in Lt. Cheri Major to head the Violent Messiahs task force and bring in Citizen Pain.
What follows is an action-packed and blood-soaked tale of Jim Gordon tracking down the Batman. The book even introduces its version of the Joker, a serial killer called the Family-Man whose actions are a direct result of the existence of Citizen Pain.
The story delves into the lives of the ordinary citizens of Rankor Island and asks how they feel about Citizen Pain and how his quest for justice affects them.