Batman and Spider-Man are inarguably the crown jewels of DC and Marvel Comics, so a crossover or two between them was an inevitability. In 1995, J.M. DeMatteis wrote 'Disordered Minds', which teamed the two heroes against The Joker and Carnage. Pencilled by Mark Bagley (Ultimate Spider-Man), the story has a brilliant moment in which Spider-Man fights Joker, someone so evil at a base level that it disturbs the Wallcrawler. Spidey says that Joker spits on everything decent in the world, murders hope and tramples goodness, and that the only way to stop an animal like him is to kill him. The Clown Prince Of Crime giddily agrees with him and then dares the goody-two shoes hero to murder him, because it would be hilarious. Heavy. The second story, from 1997, entitled 'New Age Dawning', was also written by DeMatteis but pencilled by Graham Nolan, who was the regular Batman artist at the time. Going up against the united front of Ras Al Ghul and The KIngpin, this is the story we were alluding to earlier when we said Batman/Daredevil: King Of New York referenced that Batman had met Kingpin before. This is a lovely touch, as it suggests to the reader that the DC/Marvel crossovers weren't always existing in their own little vacuums completely outside of any sort of continuity. It is also easy to see a pattern forming when these crossovers are examined, and a formula reveals itself. Take two heroes from different publishers and pit them against two of their respective worst enemies. Tell a story where the heroes initially don't get along and maybe fight each other but then realise they need to combine to achieve a common goal, and ideally feature moments where each hero ends up in an encounter with the other heroes villain. Hey presto, instant comic book crossover!
