Azrael has killed the inmates of Arkham Asylum and proceeds on his warpath to the GTO. Will Batman even be able to stop him? Spoilers for Batman: Curse of the White Knight #6 follow.
I’ve really been loving Sean Murphy’s Batman universe since it began in 2017 and Curse of the White Knight is no exception. Every single issue has had something to love about it and have played around with the Batman mythos in really fun ways. There really has been a dud of the issue in the entire series. That really gets close to changing here though as Curse of the White Knight #6 is the weakest of the series. It’s still great in parts, but falters a bit in execution.
Where this issue does some great work is when it deals with its characters. Just like every other issue of the series, the story is often served best when we are able to see these characters as people. Not simply Batman or Harley Quinn or the Joker, but as human beings. Specifically, in this issue, there’s some great work done with Harley. It’s a side of the character that hasn’t ever really been seen before and it’s honestly a wonderful incarnation of the character. The smaller moments that she has with Batman and Joker in this issue are absolutely phenomenal. My personal favorite moment of the issue comes when Joker kidnaps Harley’s babies and she refuses to not go alongside Batman to get them back. This leads to Batman getting Harley’s suit out of a bad and telling her to “Suit up.” It’s a wonderful moment that really solidifies the relationship these two now have.
As for what didn’t really work about the issue is, for one, the pacing. The issue moves at a breakneck speed, never really allowing time to breathe or adjust to what has happened. The issue is pretty much “Ok, this happened! Onto the next scene!” with only a few moments of downtime in the issue. The other aspect that didn’t work was the over-reliance on exposition. There are at least two different exposition dumps in this issue that re-contextualize the same event, making said event incredibly convoluted. The ideas themselves are great, but it’s the execution of the exposition, combined with the pacing that leaves you wanting.
But even for the stumbles of the story in this issue, Sean Murphy’s art continues to be absolutely fantastic. He is genuinely one of the best artists in the comics industry right now. He effortlessly combines the gothic settings of Arkham Asylum to the urban rubble setting of the destroyed GTO, making them flow incredibly well. And, even though the exposition can create a bit of confusion, his art still manages to tell the story incredibly well.