Batman: Reptilian is a Batman comic by Garth Ennis, featuring artwork by Liam Sharp. A decidedly more cynical and grim take on the character, it also takes Batman back to his roots as "The World's Greatest Detective", with more of an emphasis on mystery and suspense than on super-heroics. In true Ennis fashion, however, it doesn't miss out on the chance to mock several aspects of Batman.
There's a crime wave in Gotham, and several of the city's most notorious criminals have been turning up. . . in pieces. Something much bigger and more dangerous is making its way through the Gotham criminal underworld, and apparently wiping out its villainous competition. After interrogating the Penguin and Mr. Freeze— both of whom have barely survived the mystery assailant's attacks— Batman sets out in search of the culprit. As he gathers clues, his trail eventually leads him to Killer Croc, and to a discovery that will change everything he thought he knew about his reptilian foe.
Reptilian was published under DC's Black Label imprint for mature readers, and is a mini-series with six issues in total.
This comic has the following tropes:
- Adaptational Jerkass: While one can possibly justify Batman's behavior towards Killer Croc as Croc himself potentially being a far worse person than his mainstream counterpart, the way Batman used a minor goon like Konstantine, stalking him to get what he wants and even using him as bait for the monster is a little less defensible, considering Batman in the mainstream comics and most other incarnations typically doesn't treat the lives of low level criminals so callously.
- Animalistic Abomination: The monster. No one who sees it can really describe what it is, beyond the fact that it's huge, vicious, and reptilian. According to Mr. Freeze, "it makes Croc look like someone's pet turtle." Ironically, it turns out it's actually Killer Croc's offspring.
- Asshole Victim: Killer Croc's offspring seeks out and attacks Gotham's criminals.
- Butt-Monkey: Konstantine, a goon that Batman stalks, threatens and uses throughout the story to get what he wants. In the final issue, after Batman tries to use him as bait for Killer Croc's offspring, he tries to get back at him for all the fear and troubles Batman put him in... only to be killed by the creature.
- Waylon Jones... Dear lord. He might be one of the only villains Ennis likes, but that doesn't mean he gets to leave the story with dignity. He discovers that he's not born with a bizarre skin condition, but that he's an hermaphrodite cross between alien and human. He gets pregnant with a horrible creature that makes him seem cuddly by comparision. Needs Batman to cut off the excess of skin left after giving birth, as Batman makes a fat joke at the expense of his current situation. Then the creature bends over and genderbends to have sex with him, Batman tells him that he should do it to call him down since he can't breastfeed it. As expected, Waylon is confused and disgusted by all this, even wishing his alcoholic aunt drowned him to death as a child. Later, he screams like a little girl as he and Batman run away from the creature. With the latter making a sarcastic quip at the expense of his cowardice. Then finally, Batman tasers him and leaves him to the goverment to be studied as a guinea pig. It's worth keeping in mind that before the events of this story, he was the same misanthropic cannibal he is in other incarnations.
Batman: Look at it this way Waylon, you had a damn good run. This is the price you pay for all the fun and games. - The Cameo: Most of Batman's Rouges Gallery become this, as they don't actively participate in the story and are mutilated after a villain meeting, some of them off-screen. Including The Phantasm, who at the time of publication had recently turned into a Canon Immigrant in the comics.
- Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: Liam Sharp used Christopher Plummer as the visual basis for Alfred.
- Deadpan Snarker: Alfred is portrayed as this.
- Deranged Animation: If there's a comic book equivalent to this trope, Liam Sharp's bizarre artwork is definitely it. It's like if Dave Mckean's Artwork in Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth took it's pills.
- The End... Or Is It?: The monster is killed, and Killer Croc is arrested, but Batman remarks that Croc is still mutating, and could become something even worse in the future.
- Enemy Mine: Batman teams up with Killer Croc to defeat his own offspring
- Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: Played With. The creature's streak of mutilations are not done out of malice, but out of confusion and frustration. Killer Croc secreted a pheromone similar to reptile estrogen during a villain meeting, causing it to mistake them for it's mother. All the creature wants is to reunite with it's progenitor. However, the feeling is not mutual, as Waylon is disgusted over having given birth to an alien. When he can't breastfeed it and refuses to have sex with it, the creature turns on him.
- Eviler than Thou: Subverted. Batman initially thinks this trope is in play, with a bigger, badder villain taking out all the other criminals in Gotham, but it soon becomes clear something else is going on.
- Gene Hunting: The monster's real motive. When Killer Croc became pregnant, he exuded a pheromone at a meeting of all of Gotham's villains. Then, when the baby was born, it hunted down everyone who was "marked" by the pheromone, attacking them when it turned out they weren't its real parent.
- Giant Flyer: The monster turns out to have wings, among its many other features.
- Good Is Not Nice: This is one of the more brutal and cold portrayals of Batman in recent history. He takes the no killing rule that the ideal version of his character has, and uses it as a scare tactic. He feels complete apathy towards the villain's mutilated suffering, if not that, a sadistic glee.Killer Croc: "I knew it! You're enjoying this aren't you?!"Batman: "After all the grief you've given me, can you blame me?"
- Goo Goo Getup: Killer Croc wears a diaper in the cover of Issue #5 while his offspring holds him in their arms like a baby.
- Luke, You Are My Father: Killer Croc is informed the monster is his child by Batman.
- Mister Seahorse: Killer Croc.
- Monster Is a Mommy: Not the monster itself, but Killer Croc, who became a hermaphrodite and gave birth to it.
- No Name Given: We never learn what the monster's name is, or even if it has one.
- Non-Malicious Monster: The monster that's been terrorizing Gotham is only looking for its real parent.
- Reptiles Are Abhorrent: Right there in the title, natch. Subverted by Killer Croc, who actually gets a more sympathetic portrayal than normal.
- Self-Deprecation: There are a number of snarky remarks about Batman being nothing but a rich guy with too much time on his hands, most of them courtesy of Alfred.
- Thou Shalt Not Kill: A rather dark version. This version of Batman doesn't kill, but he has no problem stopping barely short of doing so.Batman: "I'm worse than that multi-colored rabble, I will not let you die."
- Killer Croc's child may count too— its victims, though horribly injured, survive its attacks, because it loses interest and doesn't finish the job.
- Wham Episode: The fourth issue. It's revealed that Killer Croc was the child of a woman who was exposed to an alien mutagen after a UFO crashed in a Florida swamp, and he's been mutating more and more over his life. The monster "pregnancy" was simply the latest stage of that.
- The Worf Effect: Several of Gotham's most formidable villains get taken out by the monster, including The Penguin, Mr. Freeze, and even the Joker.
- Writer on Board: It's a Garth Ennis comic, so this is to be expected. Batman is depicted as cruel and harsh in his manner of dealing out justice, while conversely Killer Croc (one of the few Batman villains Ennis likes) gets a tragic backstory and helps defeat the monster.
