Batman (Arkhamverse)

"Alfred, who do you see when you look at me? The boy whose shoes you used to tie every morning, the teenager you drove to his first date? While you are here every night, I am out there. The only thing between the innocent and the predatory."

- -Batman

Batman serves as the main protagonist of the Arkhamverse trilogy, based off his original comic book incarnation. After witnessing the murder of his billionaire parents during a mugging when he was only eight, Bruce Wayne trained to be physically and mentally perfect, able to run at great speeds, lift the heaviest of objects, solve only the most unsolvable of crimes, and beat the toughest of opponents. He then donned a batsuit and became the loyal protector of Gotham City, under the vigilante name of the Batman.

Batman: Arkham Origins
Heading into the second Christmas Eve of his vigilante career, Batman made his way to Blackgate Prison to cease a riot caused by Black Mask and save a kidnapped Commissioner Loeb. Loeb was executed and Black Mask escaped, as Batman was too late to save the corrupt cop, but he did get information from a now imprisoned Killer Croc that he was being hunt down by a group of eight assassins hired by Black Mask himself, them being Killer Croc, Deathstroke, Lady Shiva, Deadshot, Electrocutioner, Firefly, Copperhead, Bane. He found out more info on the bounty by a memory card of a broken drone he discovered in the prison and assumed the drone was sent by the Penguin.

After saving a group of hostages in a radio tower, meeting the Riddler (who, at the time, was self-entitled "Enigma), and interrogating a Penguin thug to find his boss' location, the Caped Crusader headed to the Penguin's ship, The Final Offer, where he defeated the Electrocutioner and Deathstroke and squeezed a bit of information out of Penguin before he escaped. The info was that, according to both Cobblepot and the cops, Black Mask was murdered at Lacy Towers. This was, of course, impossible, as Black Mask was seen just a few hours ago. So, the Dark Knight studied the crime scene and found nothing more than that someone present during the murder was an anon named the "Joker".

Bruce needed more data on the crime, so he infiltrated the GCPD building where he met Commissioner Gordon (who was just Lieutenant at the time) and saw how a corrupt SWAT unit was trying to collect the Black Mask bounty. He also met Gordon's daughter, Barbara (who later became Batgirl and Oracle) and befriended the young female. The data of the crime was finally discovered and Batman pieced together that whoever the Joker was kidnapped Black Mask, forced Black Mask to murder his wife, and the Joker and/or Black Mask was currently at the Gotham Merchant Bank.

Following a run in with the Mad Hatter, it was revealed the Joker, who seemed to be an insane clown, dressed up as Black Mask, constructed the entire operation of executing Loeb, hiring the assassins, and had the real Black Mask tied up, barely alive from his several beatings. Batman followed his new enemy to Sionis' Steel Mill, accidentally let the real Black Mask escape, and defeated a beautiful yet dangerous Copperhead. The final location traced to the Joker was the Royal Hotel. Once he finally encountered the Joker, the mental clown saw a spark between the two and knew that it was destiny for them to meet.

Though Wayne locked up the Joker, he escaped almost immediately after, where he forced the Bat to fight Bane (who knows that Batman and Bruce Wayne are one of the same and nearly killed Alfred when he discovered the Batcave). The Joker devised a plan where he had a mobile heartbeat monitor hooked to Bane and every beat powered an electric chair the Joker was strapped to, so Batman was forced to either kill Bane to stop his heart or let the Joker die to test Batman's one rule to not kill nor let anyone be killed.

Batman used the pair of electrical gauntlets he stole from a deceased Electrocutioner to stop Bane's heart, trick the Joker into leaving and thinking the superpowered beast was dead, and performed CPR on him to bring him back to life. Bane wasn't too happy to see the first thing after his resurrection was his arch-enemy looming over him, so he used the most powerful drug of all (which fortunately wiped his memory of the knight's true identity) and was defeated for a final time. The Dark Knight befriended the police force and finally confronted the clown, face to face. Batman brutally beat him to near death and locked him back up into Blackgate, right after the dawn of December 25th.

Batman: Arkham Asylum
About five years later, half of a decade of battling the scum of Gotham, Batman was escorting the Joker to Arkham Asylum, suspicious on how easily he surrendered. His plan was later revealed after he broke out literally seconds before he was put into his personal cell. He needed to take over Arkham Asylum so he can find Dr. Young's, one of the many doctors employed by the institution, notes involving the making of a powerful steroid much like the kind Bane uses, planning to make an army of mindless monsters to trample over Gotham. In the process of the chaos spawned by the escaping inmates, Frank Boles kidnapped Commissioner Gordon and was delivering him to the Joker.

Boles was killed when the Joker found out he was what was leading the crusader to them, so Harley Quinn took over Gordon's kidnapping and took him to the Medical Facility. Following the saving a few guards, doctors, and beating the Scarecrow, Batman saved Gordon and sent him to Gotham after running over an escaping Bane into the asylum's docks. Dr. Young and her notes were being hunted down by Joker's men, so Batman went over to the island's mansion to assure her safety.

Young was killed and the Joker was already trying to recreate the drug, however, so Batman apprehended Harley and tracked the clown down to his secret hideout in the gardens. Of course, the Joker escaped, but a nonchalant Poison Ivy informed the knight that the only cure for the drug was a spore in Killer Croc's lair. Both the Scarecrow and Croc was defeated yet again in the deepest undergrounds of the sewer, and a small amount of the cure was formed, which the drug was just given to Ivy's plants, making them extremely hostile and dangerous.

Yet again following the defeating of Ivy and her plants, the Batman was invited to a final party hosted by the Joker, which he "spoiled". The Joker pumped himself and Batman with the drug and they had a fight to the death. Batman injected the rest of the cure into him to stop him from turning into the insane monster Joker was, and took down the beastly clown down to his normal size once and for all, saving Gotham City and the remaining residents of Arkham Island.

Batman: Arkham City
Arkham Asylum, obviously too damaged beyond repairs and too unstable to hold any other mentally deranged criminals, was tore down and was replaced with a chunk of Gotham gated off, having the criminals thrown into the isolated area to mindlessly roam in the now entitled Arkham City. The Penguin, Two Face, and Joker already got into a major gang war, so Bruce Wayne, during a political debate, attempted to have the prison shut down by showing the public how bad of an idea it was. Though the idea  of the prison seemed to have been the mayor's, who was the former warden of Arkham, it was really Hugo Strange pulling the strings to start construct the prison.

He had his TYGER soldiers sent out and had Wayne thrown into the prison so there would be no distractions to activate Protocol Ten, as Strange knew that Batman was really the billionaire Bruce Wayne. Bruce escaped the clutches of the guards and had his gear sent to him via the Batwing. Batman knew he had to find out what Protocol Ten was, cease Arkham City's opening, and stop Strange. But first, he was led over to the Joker's Steel Mill after a sniper shot meant for Catwoman caught the vigilante's attention. The Joker's plan was then revealed, as the drug that he injected himself in Arkham Asylum poisoned his blood and was slowly killing him. Not only that, but the clown shipped his blood all over Gotham hospitals and injected it into Batman, poisoning the entire city.

The only one who knew a cure was Mr. Freeze, who was imprisoned by the Penguin. After fighting his way through Penguin's ranks and through Cobblepot himself, Batman was informed by Freeze the only cure was a compound in Ra's Al Ghul's blood. The Bat followed one of Ra's assassins back to his headquarters where he met up with his former love and Ra's daughter, Talia. He got a sample of Ghul's blood before forcing Freeze to make a cure only for it to be secretly taken out of the clutches of Batman by Harley Quinn. Back to the Steel Mill for the knight, seeing how the Joker was cured from the drug's disease. Protocol Ten was then put into action. TYGER choppers violently bombed all of Arkham City, destroying several buildings and killing many inmates.

The clown then escaped the mill with a tied up Talia and told Batman to come to the Monarch Theater. Batman forcefully obeyed, almost dead from the poison, but Talia stabbed and killed the Joker with her sword the moment he arrived. Putting the pieces together with his master detective skills, Batman realized at the last moment that the cured Joker and the one who was just killed was not the real Clown Prince of Crime. Batman was correct, as the real Joker was still sick and barely alive as well as right behind them with a loaded pistol aimed at Talia's heart. A shot echoed throughout the room, and Talia was dead after choking up her last words.

The false Joker was really an acting Clayface hired by the Joker to play him because it was the "role of a lifetime." With the very sword his fallen lover wielded, Batman "killed" the immortal Clayface and had the thwarted Joker to his knees. Batman then realized how saving the Joker with the cure, after the vigilante drank it and restored his life, would only repeat the cycle, as if the Joker continued to live, he would just break out and cause this chaos all over again. The Joker just called it a running gag and stabbed the Bat right in his shoulder.

As the cure vile was dropped and destroyed when it fell onto the ground, the Joker only a few seconds from death. Batman then tells the Joker that, despite the fact this would all happen again if the Joker's heart continued to beat, he still would have given him the cure, meaning technically, the Joker killed himself. The Joker, finding that funny, begins the hysterically laugh seconds before the drug reaches his heart and stops it. Batman carries the Joker's lifeless body out of the theater, his henchmen and the police in utter shock. Wayne placed the corpse on the hood of Gordon's car and walked away, all without speaking a single word.