Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Detective Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #654 – “God of Battle”! In the previous installment of the Prelude to Knightfall story, Batman fought a hitman named Headhunter who always kills on his first shot. He was hired to snipe Jim Gordon and he failed to kill him on the first shot. He also wasted his second shot on knocking the gun out of Gordon’s hand. He was about to waste his third shot on a root beer can on a fence, but then Batman swooped him and curb-stomped the teeth right out of his head.

The theme of the last few issues has been “Batman is tired and sore, waaahh”, so I’m wondering now if this will carry over into the next few Detective Comics. Or maybe Robin will massage Bruce’s oily pecs in a very restorative fashion? Because that would be the Detective Comics #654 that none of us asked for.

Detective Comics (Vol. 1), Issue #654 [December, 1992]
Written by: Chuck Dixon
“God of Battle”

“I’ve heard of him. Who hasn’t? I thought he was an urban myth like albino alligators and the choking Doberman. The kind of thing you read about in tabloids.”

Batman is beating up a whole slew of what look to me like gang members with red headbands and scary-looking guns! The narration continues to describe Batman some more: he works alone, he is often outnumbered, he skulks the night streets, he plays in the sewer, he looks like a bat, he looks like a man, he looks like a penis, etc.

And the unknown narrator will find it glorious once he finally defeats the Batman!

The narrator’s story begins in the Valley Pines Military Academy. His name is Ulysses Hadrian Armstrong, and he was a student there about 756 years ago. He was sent away because, frankly, his parents found him to be an inconvenience. I don’t blame them, the kid is mucking up my Batman story! Get that punk out of here!

Armstrong gets bullied and forced to eat dirt and shit at military school, but at least the academy’s library is an awesome place where a young boy can get lost for hours in books about war and Clifford the Big Red Dog. “It is here I find my only joy at Valley Pines.”

Eventually, after reading countless books about buff men fighting battles, Armstrong decides that he’s going to murder his bullies with a Swiss army knife. And not even with the sharp tools. He’s going to gut them with the tweezers.

Ulysses Hadrian Armstrong burns down the academy, but he doesn’t have time to stay and “salt the earth”. He needs to go to Gotham immediately. For “conquering”. It is not implied that he has any ties to Gotham at all. He just wants to conquer some shit, and this Batman guy sounds fun to burn down too. So he hops a train and heads over there tout suite.

Please, sirs, I’m looking for a McDonald’s with a playplace. Please, I’m begging you.

“I will need an army. It will take time to build,” he narrates. “I begin with the Bengal Street Raiders, a gang of punks who run a two-block turf along East Harbor.”

He approaches these very frightening, very intimidating individuals and says “WHAAASSSUUUUUUPP?!” They’re less than keen on listening on what this little nerd has to say. He’s still wearing his dorky-ass academy uniform with the hat and everything! He looks like I could even beat him up, and I can’t even beat an egg. Feel free to write that one down, that was very clever of me.

Armstrong begins by telling the gang everything he knows about them. As in, they’re weak. They’re a joke. No one else wants their turf, which is why they have it. And they smell like a combination of farts and poop. Well, this all makes the gang so mad that they threaten our hero with 2x4s to the noggin! He’s ready for that, of course. “Kill me,” he says, “and you’ve thrown away the only opportunity of your empty lives. Automatic weapons. Crates of them.”

This piques the gang’s beady-eyed interest! “Let the kid talk,” says the leader of the bunch. He’s got hair like Robert Smith of the Cure and he probably can’t write a song half as good!

Obviously, the gang joins Armstrong in his pursuit of “conquering Gotham”. The mission is simple: slam the car into a fucking fire hydrant in front of the National Guard Armory, get the guards out to run to help, miraculously be ok enough to do the ol’ stick-’em-up, threaten to shoot if they don’t let them in the armory right now and give them free access to any and all guns that they want, and then coordinate the Biggest Heist Since That Movie About the Heist.

The kid orders Chango, the gang leader, to carry ammo out to one of the trucks. “No way, Slick. This is my gang, remember?” Oh, Armstrong remembers all right, but Chango has been an ineffectual leader and deserves to resign from his post via ten gunshots to the heart, baby. BAM BAM BOOM etc. Coup d’etat. Eat it, son.

On their way out, Armstrong shoots and kills all of the guards. The perfect, victimless crime!

I’ve had a Kid Cuisine that made me feel this good once!

Enough of Ulysses Hard-On Armstrong. Back to the hero at hand. Batman, in the flesh, meets Commissioner Gordon on the Police HQ rooftop. It’s about the armory robbery. I know that happened ages ago in this comic book, but try and remember. Gordon thinks it’s either a terrorist group or a power struggle among Gotham’s various gangs. “Maybe this Black Mask character is responsible, we’re working to identify the thug they left behind.”

Batman poses dramatically as a response.

Oh great, back to the little wiener Armstrong. He takes his gang to the food distribution center, way way way off their turf. “Right now the police are all over your hideout,” Armstrong explains. The gang asks what they’re supposed to do now, and Armstrong suggests trading in gang colors for military fatigues. “We stop being a gang and become an army.”

Nice idea, nerd. A literal army of five people. What are you going to do, get the Grand Slam Breakfast at Denny’s?

Or, rather, they’ll take on rival gangs and either destroy them or sway them to join up. The gang likes this idea! Armstrong sleeps well, comfortable with the loyalty of the gang he met 25 minutes ago.

Harvey Bullock is shoving donuts in his craw in the unmarked car with an unnamed partner who will probably get killed in seven panels. They’re going to pay a visit to the Eight Avenue OGs who may have been involved with the Raiders last night and their big gunny guns.

The Eight Avenue OGs wear jackets with an 8-ball on the back like David Puddy. While they’re just hanging out minding their own business, Armstrong and his gang barrel through in an armored car and gun these motherfuckers down. “What’s needed is a show of force,” Armstrong thinks. “No cowardly drive-by shooting. Something to show that we are a power in this down.”

It means “I came, I saw, then I came again.”

Shortly after literally every 8-baller is dead, Batman swoops down in front of the armored car and kicks some Raiders in the face, knocking them off. Bullock sees this and starts rolling up in his unmarked car. “Batman’s on the scene,” he says. “That freak’s always where the trouble is.”

Armstrong watches speechlessly as all his buddies get kicked around one by one. Majestic, this guy’s moves. Cunning, this guy’s actions. Sexy, this guy’s freshly-massaged oily pecs.

Bullock runs his car right in front of the Raiders and gets fucking t-boned like a dumbass dingus. Bullets rain down upon the scene, it’s chaos and pandemonium! Bullock and Sidekick run out of the car, miraculously uninjured, and start shooting at the armored car like it’s even going to make a dent. The car gets away, and it’s a big “oh well.” And where did The Batman go? He disappeared too! Maybe he went batty, heh heh.

No chloroform this time, Alfred. I don’t want you taking advantage of me again.

Here’s what happened: Batman took a bullet to the shoulder, so he floundered home to cry for Alfred. Tim “Robin” Robbins isn’t there, which is great because Bruce doesn’t want to look like a punk-ass bitch in front of the kid. Plus, these whole shenanigans is a good opportunity to kick the kid to the curb for a while and work solo. Sew Bruce up, Alfred, and don’t spare the denatured alcohol!

Armstrong pats himself on the back for a successful job well done against the Eight Avenue OGs. The survivors come for a parley. Their leader is a guy named Shades, who looks Ray Charles’ less cool cousin. So what’s the deal, hombre? You want them to join up? Sounds good! Catch ya on the flippity-flop.

It won’t stop here. Armstrong will have all of them. ALL OF THEM! Ha ha haaaaa!! *slips on banana peel*

“Once we have joined a few together into an army we will have the power to pay the others to join our ranks,” Armstrong says, fist balled up in determination. Shades smiles like he’s moving on in to be Armstrong’s sweet-ass sidekick.

Gangs must acquiesce. Black Mask must respect them. Police must fear them.

And Batman? He who can’t be bought, or scared? He must DIE!

Final Thoughts

Oh no, how will Batman possibly stop the noodle-armed asthmatic nerd and his unruly army of glue-sniffers?? He’ll really need to bring out the big guns now (Alfred in a submarine is a good start, but we need to think BIGGER).