We finally know when one of DC’s most highly-anticipated titles will be hitting the shelves. On Thursday, DC Comics confirmed that its upcoming Batman/Catwoman maxiseries will debut in stores beginning this December. Batman/Catwoman #1, which will hit shelves on December 1st, will kick off a twelve-issue run focusing on the relationship between Bruce Wayne/Batman and Selina Kyle/Catwoman, while also providing a proper conclusion to Tom King‘s Batman run. The DC Black Label series, comes from King, Clay Mann, Tomeu Morey, and Clayton Cowles, and is edited by Jamie S. Rich and Brittany Holzherr. It takes place across three separate timelines, will also pit the characters against the fan-favorite foe Andrea Beaumont/Phantasm.
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“There’s the past, when The Bat and The Cat first fell in love,” DC’s official description for the series reads. “Did they meet on the street? Or was it on a boat? Rooftops, ramparts and gargoyles, and over 80 years of fans that have read their comics, are their only witnesses. There’s the distant future, where after a long and happy marriage Bruce Wayne has passed away. Selina Kyle decides to settle an old score without having to worry about the Batman objecting. Catwoman is serving a very cold dish: Revenge. And in the present, Bruce and Selina’s union is threatened by the arrival of one of Batman’s past flings, Andrea Beaumont, a.k.a. Phantasm. Beaumont’s return calls into question how each character chooses to operate in their costumed, and personal, lives, and any move by Phantasm could change the fate of Bruce and Selina’s future.”
“The only other person besides Bruce and Selina to have been along for the whole ride has been the Joker, and what he did in the past is going to have direct consequences on today and tomorrow,” the description continues. “Batman’s greatest foe will intervene any time Batman and Catwoman try to take steps towards peace—he already robbed fans of a Bat/Cat wedding celebration! Any change in the Caped Crusader’s life will be matched with the chaos of the Clown Prince of Crime…and the Joker’s not leaving any witnesses. Not even a gargoyle. Will Selina make good on her final kill?”
The series was initially announced in March of 2019, but was subsequently delayed — for a pretty intriguing reason.
“So. We decided to go big,” King wrote on Twitter last October. “While working on the initial issues of Bat/Cat, [Clay Mann] and I started to realize that we might have something good here, a Mister Miracle or a Vision in the world of Batman, an attempt to do what Frank did with DKR (Dark Knight Rises), a defining of the characters.”
“But to accomplish something that ambitious requires a minimizing of compromises,” King continued. “DKR did not have fill-in artists. So Clay offered to do the whole thing, at 22 pages, but he’d of course need time. When the best artist in comics says ‘let’s do it right,’ you don’t say no. But all that means that Bat/Cat is pushed back a bit, which is why it’s not in the January solicits. The first scripts are in; Clay’s drawing them now; they look gorgeous; I, hopefully, like you, can’t wait for this one to be out. Thank you all for your patience.”
Keep scrolling to check out the covers for Batman/Catwoman #1, and share your thoughts with us in the comments below!
Cover by Travis Charest
Cover by Clay Mann and Tomeu Morey
Cover by Jim Lee, Scott Williams, and Alex Sinclair
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Image courtesy of DC Comics
