Batman: 80 Greatest Ever Moments
48. Batman's Trademark Vanish - Detective Comics #424
Batman and James Gordon might be great friends (look no further than the image of them sharing a coffee during Holiday Knights for confirmation of that, or just the plethora of Batman stories where the pair are great allies), but there is one trick Bats loves to pull that would maybe intimate otherwise. Or maybe not - you can make up your mind on that.
Usually whenever the World's Greatest Detective reconvenes with Gordon to consult on a case, the pair exchange thoughts, Gordon ends up making a point, and then when he turns around Batman is nowhere to be found. He does it all the time, to Superman, his allies in the League and even his own Bat-family, but Gordon is by far the most frequent victim.
The first instance of Bats pulling this trick on the commish (per CBR), occurred in Detective Comics #424. What a wonderful trope it's become since.
[EP]
47. Death Of The Joker - Arkham City
Nobody expected them to actually do it, but Rocksteady had the stones to kill off the biggest Batman villain ever at the end of their second Arkham game. After spending the entire story searching for a cure to his terminal illness, The Clown Prince finally finds it, but there's an issue: Batman has the same disease, and there's only one vial of the antidote left.
As Batman drinks enough to cure himself, he contemplates what to do next, deciding whether he should save a man who's brought so much destruction to Gotham City. The Joker takes matters into his own hands and launches at him, smashing the vial in the process, before succumbing to his inevitable fate. In his dying moments, Batman lets his nemesis know that, despite everything he's done, he'd still have saved him, and that The Joker essentially doomed himself.
[JB]