15 Most Inappropriate Batman Comics Storylines Of All Time
1. Homeless Meth Addict Bruce Wayne
How do you get worse than The Killing Joke? Look no further than feted writer Grant Morrison's experimental, much-beloved Batman run, which returned a lot of mostly-forgotten concepts and characters to the book which hadn't been used for decades. One of those was the Batman Of Zur-En-Arrh, a Dark Knight from an alien planet.
At least, he was in his original Silver Age appearance. In Morrison's hands, he's a back-up personality Batman meditated for months to install in the back of his brain should anybody ever cause a complete mental collapse in him. Which a criminal syndicate called the Black Glove does manage to do in a story appropriately called “Batman RIP.”
Somewhat less appropriate is the broken Bruce Wayne becoming a hobo who regularly huffs a super-powered crystal meth to bring on his Zur-En-Arrh delusions, cobbling together a brightly-coloured costume from literal trash and hallucinating Bat-Mite, an alternate-reality being who comments on the action. And on how wrecked Batman is.
The Dark Knight is a symbol, of justice, and of fear struck in the hearts of criminals. Doesn't really have the same effect when he's addicted to class As and has a bindle in place of a utility belt...