'Batman: White Knight': Sean Murphy Wants DC to Release R-Rated Version

Batman: The White Knight creator Sean Gordon Murphy will reportedly attempt to persuade DC to [...]

Batman: The White Knight creator Sean Gordon Murphy will reportedly attempt to persuade DC to release a special collected edition of the book for mature readers, restoring some of the adult language and nudity that had to be cut in order to match Batman's PG-13 brand.

Murphy, who has shared process sketches on The White Knight for months including some of the salacious material, went to fans on Twitter to ask about interest, and was blown away by the response.

"I would LOVE if I could get DC to publish the trade of White Knight with an R rating," Murphy tweeted. "So I can put the swears and nudity back in. But would you readers be OK with that?"

After the expected follow-up comments from readers, Murphy continued, saying that his concern with pursuing it was that readers who bought the individual issues of the comic book might feel slighted by the "uncut" version being available only in trade, and could wish that they had waited for the collected edition.

Not long after that, though, with over 250 positive responses to his original tweet, Murphy told fans, "I heard you all, and I'm on it."

In October, Murphy's long-rumored Batman project finally debuted in stores. Batman: White Knight, a seven-issue miniseries, reinvents "the tragic story of a hero and a villain, The Batman and The Joker. The question is, which one is the hero and which one is the villain…?"

Told in a stand-alone continuity, the characters' usual roles are reversed in the story, with a reformed Joker trying to act as the voice of reason and use the system against Batman -- but is he doing so for the public good or for the same reasons he alwys has?

"We know Joker's a genius, we know he's relentless, and we know he can play the crowd, so why not make him a politician?" said Murphy when the series launched. "Why not strip away the psychosis (the thing that's holding him back) and let him challenge Batman unimpeded? And to make it even scarier, what if he did it legally and without breaking any rules, so that Batman couldn't stop him?"

Set in a world where the Joker is cured of his insanity and homicidal tendencies, The Joker, going by the name of Jack Napier, sets about trying to right his wrongs. First by reconciling with Harley Quinn and then by trying to save Gotham city from the one person who he thinks is truly Gotham's greatest villain: the Batman.

"Seeing Gotham for the first time with clear eyes, his psychosis now cured, he starts to understand the absurdity of vigilantism and how Batman's actions are only contributing to Gotham's endless crime cycle," said Murphy. "Joker sets out to beat Batman by becoming the White Knight that Gotham really needs."

The next issue hits the stands on February 7.

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