Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Batman: The Long Halloween, Issue #4 – “Chapter Four: New Year’s Eve”! In the previous installment, the Joker gets involved now! All like “THERE’S ONLY ROOM FOR ONE WEIRD ASSHOLE IN THIS TOWN” and looking to put a stop to all these holiday serial killings.

Christmas brings another death: Salvatore Maroni’s righthand man. How many more people have to die before justice is served?

My guess is *counts issues* nine more people.

Batman: The Long Halloween, Issue #4 [March, 1997]
Written by: Jeph Loeb
“Chapter Four: New Year’s Eve”

“New Year’s Eve in Gotham City. Time to ring in the new year!” Joker exclaims, brandishing his 10,000 teeth. He has killed a co-pilot, a navigator, and a stewardess for no reason, since he steals a bi-plane that only holds one. He flies off to do some more lovely damage!

Batman rides up in his Batmobile (car with “BATMAN” decals) to try to catch up with Joker before he does any more harm to the “fine” people of Gotham City. “He is bent on using his deadly Joker gas on the crowd that gathers in Gotham Square at midnight. Something in his deranged mind can’t handle what Holiday is doing to this city. The Joker has proclaimed: ‘The town isn’t big enough for two homicidal maniacs.’”

Batman spots the plane and aims his grappling hook! Sounds dangerous! Don’t try this one at home kids, leave those bi-planes be. He has his car on autopilot and he’s riding the roof like a goddamned surfboard. Gotta stop the Joker before the clock strikes midnight, Marty! We’ve got to get you back to the future!

In the office of Harvey Dent, our favorite District Attorney is burning the candle at both ends. His assistant Vernon, who looks like Michael Douglas in Falling Down, or perhaps Milo from Descendents, knocks on his door. Dent tells Vernon that he’ll never get ahead burning the candle at both ends! “It’s New Year’s Eve, son. Time to go home and kiss the wife and hope that next year is better than this one’s been.”

But sir! *pushes glasses up* Sir! I have all these damning McDonald’s receipts! Sir! The Roman is bribing Wayne with Big Macs! Siiiiiirrrrr…!

Dent stops in his tracks once Vernon tells him about the Roman/Bruce Wayne connection. “Unfortunately,” Dent says, rifling through the file, “Bruce Wayne seems to have known about this for some time…”

Oh noes, my friends. Dent’s going to have some harsh words with America’s Favorite Lazy Millionaire Playboy Slugabout Beef Injection. Meanwhile, Batman is flipping around town following the plane. Joker is slamming his console, complaining that the plane isn’t flying right. It’s going right into the Twin Towers, actually. This wasn’t supposed to be the trajectory at all! Booo!

Ah, that’s why. Batman is on top of the plane adding an extra four million pounds of weight to the ballast. Batman gets right in the Joker’s face: “Put this plane down. Now.”

Joker ain’t scared. “Maybe later. Right now I’ve got work to do.”

Well, that was fun everyone! But now I– hey, wait a minute! Arrrgh, that Joker doesn’t have real work to do! It’s just a ruse to poison people with laughing gas. I’m onto your tricks, you maniacal ol’ so-and-so.

Joker dips the plane down and causes Batman to almost roll off completely. He grabs a wing, yelling and screaming like a chimp in heat.

It’s almost midnight in Gotham Harbor where Salvatore Maroni and Carmine Falcone are sharing a celebration of another fine year down the fucking tubes. “Carmine, we’ve been rivals a long time. And you always came out on top. But if we don’t find a way to put a stop to this ‘Holiday’ business – this new year is gonna be our last year.”

Falcone does seem concerned. Always coming out on top, you know, but the rub here is that Holiday seems to only be going after Falcone’s family. Falcone’s men. Falcone’s harem of Thai ladyboys. “There doesn’t seem to be any blood on your side of the table,” he says to Maroni, narrowing his beady little Italian eyeballs. Maroni is getting this gist of Falone’s insinuations, because Maroni ain’t a dumb guy. Not really, I guess. Seems dumb to me; maybe that’s why he always comes out on the bottom!

I’M SO WASTED. BLAHHAUHABABHAB.

Carmine wonders where his shitty, do-gooder son Alberto ran off to. This makes Carla look pissy for a second for reasons I don’t know, possibly because Carmine still has a son and Carla doesn’t have a son anymore. “I saw him on deck earlier,” she says, walking away saltily.

Mr. Falcone looks around at the room full of backstabbers and yes-men all around him. “If it weren’t for Alberto there’d be nobody I could trust…” he thinks.

Alberto’s gonna stab his dad in the neck with a lobster fork.

Uh oh. Uh oh. Uh oh. Carla goes out for a smoke and sees something… unclear… happening to Alberto. Alberto… I think… plummets off the side of the ship… maybe. Carla looks at… what sorta looks like… blood in the water… I guess?

I think the point is that Alberto is dead, so yet another Falcone loss. Maroni’s gonna get his dick twisted into a pretzel for sure now.

Harvey Dent returns home to his smiling, kind wife. There’s a surprise in the othe room. Oh boy! You’re going to love this, Harvey! No, it’s not a new car or a Nintendo Switch. It’s Jim Gordon and his frustrated wife!

Happy New Year, bitches! Wooooo!!!

Harvey Dent miserably walks into the kitchen. Jim Gordon excuses himself and follows our favorite District Attorney while Barbara talks about having their niece babysit their kid. Gilda is like “it… it must be nice… having kids… and all.” Gilda complains that Harvey’s been pulling long hours at work, infringing on their quality fucking time. Anyway, the two of them clink glasses to a better new year.

Harvey stands in front of his open refrigerator. Gordon comes into the kitchen looking like someone murdered his dog in front of his other dog. “What’s happened, Harvey?” he asks. Even his mustache is frowning. “We need to talk, Jim. We need to talk about Bruce Wayne.”

Ugh, not that guy. Not America’s Favorite Lazy Millionaire Playboy Slugabout Meat Punk.

Batman and Joker are fighting on the plane. The plane which hasn’t crashed into a single building yet against all odds. Joker doesn’t know why Batman is so mad at him! He’s trying to Holiday too, after all. By killing loads of people, of course. One of them has bound to be Holiday, right? Batman’s cape gets caught in the propellor, shredding it to… well… shreds.

I thought you’d never ask, handsome!

Batman starts wringing Joker’s neck out of, I’m guessing, extreme sexual frustration. Midnight strikes. Batman pulls Joker along the rope of his grappling hook and the plane plunges into the ocean. He stands on the clock tower frowning triumphantly while Joker dangles unconsciously.

“The New Year. One where the promise I made to my parents… the promise to rid this city of the evil that took their lives… might finally be within reach.”

Final Thoughts

Wowzers! That Joker is plumb evil! Killing an entire square of people! That’s so mean!

This issue was anticlimactic. We didn’t even get to see the square of people, like it never existed. We didn’t even know for sure that Joker was packin’ gas. This was a let down! I wanted to see more blood!

Oh well.