DC Round-Up: ABSOLUTE BATMAN #15 delivers that muscley Joker dinosaur thing you’ve seen all over

This week: The new Absolute Joker design went comics Internet viral a while back, and now we get the full story behind it in Absolute Batman #15. Plus, a look at three teen-skewing adventure comics out this week.

Note: the review below may contain spoilers. If you want a quick, spoiler-free buy/pass recommendation on the comics in question, check out the bottom of the article for our final verdict.

Absolute Batman #15

Writer: Scott Snyder
Artist: Jock
Colorist: Frank Martin
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Publisher: DC Comics

A while back, someone revealed the new design for the Absolute Universe version of The Joker (see the cover above), and it went semi-viral, at least within comics Internet circles that I frequent. People were sharing it widely, and in some instances even making original art depicting other monstrous, muscled characters in faux Absolute Batman style. All of which, I think, speaks to the sky high continuing popularity of Absolute Batman and the rest of the Absolute titles, as well as to how Absolute Batman has tapped into something essential in the zeitgeist, delivering a working class Batman with a fantastical set of muscles and a set of villains so cartoonishly over-the-top that they feel like a (barely) exaggerated reflection of 2025.

But we didn’t really have the story behind lizard-man/dinosaur muscly Joker, not until Absolute Batman #15 hit this week. And I think there are two things to note in discussing this new take on Batman’s greatest foe (some say). The first is that Absolute Batman writer Scott Snyder has often said he sees The Joker as an embodiment of the worst things Batman can imagine, making him essentially the hero’s walking nightmare. 

Consider this, from a conversation Scott and I had all the way back in 2020:

“For me, he’s literally The Joker card to Batman, where he takes on any kind of value he can given Batman’s worse fears. He makes himself [that] to be able to win or fight Batman, always making him as strong as possible.

It’s almost that he’s making it his duty to challenge Batman with the greatest nightmares of his soul, and through that trial by fire makes Batman better or kills him — one or the other.”

The second thing to consider is that part of what has made Absolute Batman such a smash hit comic is that the book has a steady pace of upping the outrageousness. It started all the way back with the first Absolute Batman designs, which made Bruce Wayne impossibly muscled, to a silly extent. And it hasn’t really let up.

Each new arc and every new design in Absolute Batman continues to escalate this outrageousness, exaggerating the well-known characters core in ways we’ve never seen before. And it’s those two bits — Scott’s deep and consistent feeling that Joker is a personification of Batman’s worst fears, with an established tone that permits any and all over-the-top atrocity — that gives us this week’s one-shot, illustrated by Jock, who has collaborated often with Snyder on Batman stories, including the much-loved Black Mirror. 

And here’s where we get into spoiler territory: in Absolute Batman #15, we get a new version of Joker who is outwardly not what he seems. He’s an old-monied socialite known to the general public, not unlike Bruce Wayne in the main DC Universe. This is in stark opposition to Absolute Batman, the anonymous working class son of a teacher. And as is revealed through the course of this issue, this Joker is also a seemingly immortal humanoid beast who owns a number of remote islands for the purpose of literally feeding on any that oppose him and also sometimes kids (I think).

Now, your mileage may vary on whether you find that to be too much. I think in a vacuum, it seems like an edgelordy escalation of previous takes on The Joker. But in the context of Absolute Batman, it works much differently and is in keeping with the rest of the book to date. And besides, it will succeed more on how the creators tell the story, much like the Bane arc before it, which also had moments of is this too much dotted throughout, before landing with an absurd and fun finale.

And so far so good on the storytelling front. I thought Absolute Batman #15 was a really-well executed horror comic on its own merits, even (or maybe especially) if you take the Batman of it all out of it. Jock — who is colored here by great regular series colorist Frank Martin — makes the viral character design fit into this extant world. And he also does fantastic work keeping the narrative clear as it jumps through time and presumed reality on a series of killer double-page spreads. Part of the credit to that clarity is, of course, also owed to letterer Clayton Cowles, who has to guide the reader through a back-and-forth between Batman and Pennyworth that is laid atop those spreads, without us ever seeing the speakers. That’s no easy feat, and Cowles nails it.

There’s also a pacing to this script that serves the comic well. Pennyworth is cautiously trying to explain The Joker (who he is personally obsessed with) to Bruce Wayne. Bruce can tell that he is holding back because it’s all so hard to believe, but he keeps goading him into telling him what he really thinks. This felt like a clever way to establish both the outward perception of this new Joker as well as the horror beneath. If the book had started with Joker devouring a child in media res or something, the entire character concept may have collapsed under its own weight, taking the story and the book’s momentum with it.

One thing I think does not work in this issue’s favor is that it comes immediately after the Bane arc, in which Batman battled a manga-styled kaiju-esque Bane who looked like a cross between a monster and giant muscle, with a lizard/dinosaur-y take on Killer Croc (even more than usual) involved too. It’s probably owed to the schedule of main series artist Nick Dragotta — who returns next month with Absolute Batman #16, a team-up arc with Absolute Wonder Woman — but Absolute Bane to Absolute Joker felt like it could have used a breather in between, even if this issue is functionally just a prologue one-shot.

The other thing I’ve become aware of after these new Bane and Joker takes is that there’s a sub-section of Batman fans who are very much not into this book. But that’s probably always going to be the case. Batman fans are to some extent always a group divided, with some preferring darker Batman takes, others liking the character to be campier, and still more wanting the adventures of Batman and Robin. In general, I think DC’s line right now is doing a really great job delivering all those versions of the character (none of which feel perfunctory), while almost siloing them off from each other. Having this exciting new continuity helps, but whatever the case, it’s been a long time since we’ve had so much variety within the Batman titles.

For a reader like me, who doesn’t really have a strong personal connection to Batman or a preferred version of this character, Absolute Batman continues to be a fascinating exercise in making a high-selling, mainstream comic book that features a valuable corporate character a vessel for total outrageousness. It reminds me a bit of the late 90s/early 00s Marvel post bankruptcy period, where no idea was off limits (and we got Marvel Knights, Punisher Max, and the initial Ultimate Universe, which is itself a spiritual predecessor to these Absolutes).

I know Snyder has also said that he and Dragotta have plotted many more arcs of this book, and I can’t help but wonder if there’s a ceiling to how exaggerated things here can get. Either way, it will be fun to find out.

Verdict: BUY

DC Round-Up

• I don’t have a lot for this section this week, but I did want to note that DC is also doing more teen adventure comics (and doing them well) than it has in a good long while. Supergirl #8 this week is another great issue in this run. It comes to use from writer Sophie Campbell, artist Haining, colorist Alex Guimaraes, and letterer Becca Carey. Like the rest of this run, it’s got a fun veneer atop a really moving emotional core. I love it.
• I’m also having fun with C.O.R.T.: Children of the Round Table by writer Tom Taylor, artist Daniele Di Nicuolo, colorist Rain Beredo, and letterer Wes Abbott. I suppose I can google whether these are known characters getting an update, but I also don’t think it really matters. This story is just working so well on its own, and the script in this issue finds places to be pretty funny, which is always nice in funny books.
• Finally, the new run on Action Comics by writer Mark Waid, artist Skyler Patridge, colorist Ivan Plascencia, and letterer Steve Wands, continues to look backward at Clark Kent’s Superboy days in Smallville to give us fun teen stories — usually driven by a lesson in superheroing — that illustrate how Clark Kent became the (super) man we know today. This book looks great, and is a joy to follow month to month, may it run for many many more issues.

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