"The Black Mirror" is a Batman story arc written by Scott Snyder, and illustrated by Jock and Francesco Francavilla. The story was published in ten issues of Detective Comics in 2011 by DC Comics.^[1] It is known for being the final Batman storyline of the Post-Crisis DC Universe before the 2011 reboot initiative New 52. The storyline was released to critical acclaim from critics who praised Scott Snyder's writing, the art, the horror tone and the action, which managed to convince DC Comics to hire Scott Snyder as the main writer for Batman in the New 52.

Premise

The plot tells the continued adventures of Dick Grayson as Batman, as Bruce Wayne continues his work for Batman Incorporated. Dick must battle against several villains, one of whom is selling various super villain weapons and items in an underground black market. Also, Jim Gordon and his daughter Barbara Gordon must contend with the return of James Gordon Jr., whom they have ex-communicated due to his continued psychopathy.

Plot

Dick Grayson is staying in Gotham City while Bruce Wayne is busy with his work on Batman Incorporated and has partnered Wayne Enterprise with Gotham City Police Department. Alfred Pennyworth arrives to debrief on Dick on Commissioner Jim Gordon wanting to meet him, where Gordon tells Dick how a 12-year-old boy who was bullied was transformed into a monster similar to Killer Croc and ate a kid's arm due to him ingesting a potion. Dick runs tests on the tube and it is identical. Dick dresses up as Batman and goes to confront the child's butler Mr. Read, but Mr. Read is killed by the boy's mother, Mrs. Redford, who then commits suicide when Dick tries to confront her. Dick and Gordon talk to each other, and they find out Mrs. Redford had Mad Hatter's technology tattooed on her neck which caused her to be brainwashed and kill the butler. Gordon thinks a man named Cullen Buck was the one responsible for this, and Dick confronts Buck, who dies mysteriously before being able to answer.^[2]

Dick tracks down a man named William Rhodes because Barbara Gordon tracked him to an organization called the Mirror House, which auctions illegal material that belonged to Gotham's villains. During the chaos, William Rhodes accidentally drives himself into a wall, killing himself, but Barbara Gordon creates a fake identity and invitation for Dick to sneak in. Tim Drake and Lucius Fox create a mask that allows Dick to sneak in by giving him a mask that lets him impersonate William Rhodes. Dick meets up with Harvey Bullock to find out where the next auction is. Dick infiltrates the auction where the head of the auction Etienne Guiborg finds out Dick is spying on them and tells the rest of the people to kill him.^[3]

Dick manages to barely escape due to the toxin in the auction meeting and is found by Tim Drake in an alley. Dick learns that he has been out for 9 hours, and rushes to confront Etienne Guiborg before he can leave on a plane, but during the confrontation Etienne Guiborg transforms into a creature similar to Man-Bat. Dick manages to defeat Etienne Guiborg but has to escape when the plane explodes during the fight. Dick starts to move in back to Wayne Enterprise with Alfred, but is still shaken up by the toxin.^[4] Commissioner Gordon meets up with Harvey Bullock on a crime where the aviary cages from the Mayor unlocked, and the culprit is Gordon's son and Barbara Gordon's half-brother James Gordon Junior. Gordon meets with Barbara to discuss about James Gordon returning to Gotham. When Barbara Gordon leaves the diner, James Gordon Jr. appears to talk to Commissioner Gordon about wanting to redeem himself. James Gordon Junior explains that he checked himself into Houston General Psych center to find out that he is a psychopath due to the amygdala in his brain not working effectively, so the doctors prescribed him diaxamyne and wants James Gordon's blessing to apply for a job under Leslie Thompkins and convince Dicto put in a good word for him before leaving. Batman (Dick Grayson) and Red Robin (Tim Drake) go fight crime with Batman still feeling the toxin effects.^[5]

During winter, James Gordon tries to capture a serial killer dubbed the "Peter Pan killer" who abducts children and kills them by burning them alive. James Gordon manages to deduce the Peter Pan killer as Roy Blount because Roy had met the children because of his cleaning business and has burns on his arm and neck. James Gordon also remembers how James Gordon Junior was a troubled boy who needed to take a test for psychopathology, and how during one summer, James Gordon Junior made Barbara Gordon's friend Bess uncomfortable, which makes James Gordon and Barbara Gordon suspicious that James Gordon killed Bess when she was missing.^[6]

An abnormally large orca was found in Gotham Global Modern Bank, but Gotham City's police could not find out why due to someone tampering the cameras. Commissioner Gordon goes to meet with Dick about this, where Dick finds out the orca was forced to take a lot of growth hormones. Commissioner Gordon tells Dick the head of the Gotham Global Modern Bank's name is Sonia Zucco, but Dick notices Commissioner Gordon is distracted and asks him what's wrong. Commissioner Gordon tells Dick that his son came back, and asks Dick to meet him to make sure he's fine. Just then, a body is ripped out of the orca's body, and Dick deduces the body is a woman named Evelyn who is Sonia's worker. Dick goes out to meet Sonia Zucco, but she tells she does not know who did it and asks him to leave. Sonia calls a man named Bixty Rhodes to tell him what just happened, but Dick overhears it and goes out to confront him, but not before getting trapped by a car crusher machine.^[7]

Dick manages to escape and apprehend Bixty Rhodes, and attempts to interrogate him to no avail. Sonia Branch meets up with Dick and tells him that she has gotten account requests from Gotham City's criminals who wants her to help them invest their money. Sonia Branch declined, which angered the new criminals (Tiger Shark) to the point where they killed her worker. Sonia tells Dick that Tiger Shark is outside the Gotham City coast guard, and Dick goes out to investigate where he finds out Tiger Shark uses the old gas pipeline to move his material in and out of Gotham City, but is captured.^[8]

Dick manages to free himself and escape while Tiger Shark gets away, and goes to meet James Gordon Junior to catch up with him. Dick and James Gordon Jr. reminisce the old days, with Dick mentioning a boy named Ben Wolff was with them, but soon has to leave because of a notification. However, James Gordon Jr. reveals himself to still be a psychopath who is torturing and killing Ben Wolff. Dick suits ups as Batman and confronts Sonia Branch who is revealed to have deleted the video footage of Tiger Shark's men bringing the whale to the Gotham Global Modern Bank due to her having access to the building security system in order for Dick to take down Bixty Rhodes and confront Tiger Shark, and Sonia Branch tells Batman she did it because Tiger Shark and Bixty Rhodes were harassing her and killed her friend, which causes Batman to coldly leave her.^[9]

Joker is being shipped off to Arkham Asylum while Commissioner Gordon meets up with Leslie Thompkins to ask how is James Gordon Junior doing. Commissioner Gordon is unease with his son, so he sneaks in his desk and steals a pill call Diaxamyne and wants Barbara Gordon to test it to see if it actually does treat psychopathy. After a few hours, Barbara Gordon learns that James Gordon Junior inverted the formula so that it turns people into psychopaths, and Commissioner Gordon remembers that Leslie told him that James Gordon Junior volunteered to do nutrition runs for infants in order to poison Gotham's children. Joker manages to escape from custody, and Commissioner Gordon arrives at home to realize that James. Gordon Junior did kill Bess.^[10]

Commissioner Gordon tries calling his ex-wife again, but finds her mutilated due to the Joker Toxin and Dick has to save her by extracting the toxin. Dick manages to track down the Joker in the South Bowery Tunnels, but Joker tells him that he wasn't the one who mutilated Joker's ex-wife but James Gordon Junior.^[11] James Gordon Junior kidnaps Barbara Gordon and stabbed her in her femoral artery on her paralyzed legs, telling her that if she pulls one of them out, she will bleed to death in a matter of minutes. James Gordon Junior calls Dick to mock him and tell him that the reason why he's doing this is because he views human emotion as weakness and wants to get rid of it by turning people into psychopaths. James Gordon Junior also tells Dick he knew he was Batman when he saw Batman smiling in television due to Bruce Wayne not smiling. James Gordon Junior hangs up the phone to kill Barbara Gordon, but Dick saves her in the nick of time due to him putting a sub-dermal tracer on James Gordon Junior. Commissioner Gordon then captures James Gordon Junior before he can escape, and meets up with Dick to talk about the recent events and what they can hope for the future.^[12]

Critical reception

According to Comicbook Roundup, the entire story received an average rating of 8.7 out of 10 based on 126 reviews.^[13] Joey Espito from IGN wrote: "By all accounts, from writing to art, "Black Mirror" is a perfect 10 in storytelling, no doubt about it. While some unfortunate production issues on the hardcover keep the collection from being flawless, this is still a must-own piece of Dark Knight history".^[14]

Collected editions