The infamous Arkham Asylum is famous for its colorful cast of inmates and supervillains, but with the institution's doors blown wide open like never before, a wave of unleashed criminals calls for its very own miniseries. Arkham City: The Order of the World begins the hunt for the missing inmates this October 5.
The catastrophic attack on Arkham dubbed A-Day in Batman comics saw most of the asylum's residents (both the incarcerated and the staff administering their treatment) murdered, missing, or at large. The strike led to its own fallout for the Batman Family in Infinite Frontier #0, but now the hunt for the missing inmates is taking a spotlight all its own, with Arkham City: The Order of the World. The six issue miniseries is written by Dan Waters (Lucifer) who is reuniting with his Coffin Bound collaborator Dani, and Eisner Award-winning colorist Dave Stewart. After witnessing just what kind of skin-crawling nightmares are about to unfold when The Order of the World begins, Screen Rant got the chance to ask the creators for an explanation. Readers can find the entire interview embedded below.
Screen Rant: Arkham City: The Order of the World is set in the fallout of the A-Day attack on Arkham that DC fans witnessed in Batman comics earlier this year. But this story feels like its own thing. How did you each come on board to tell it, and what opportunity did you see in getting to tell this story?
Dan Watters: Honestly, the reason I was asked to do this series specifically was that I'd actually pitched something else which had some reinvention of villains that hadn't been around for a really long time. They're side characters in that, and that wouldn't quite get off the ground, but my editor came back to me and said, "Hey, we're looking to actually do something with that, and with what happened to some of the patients from Arkham who escaped and weren't on the list of the dead."
That was really my way in, and I thought it was a really interesting opportunity to look at Arkham as an entity that loomed over Gotham. There's this asylum, but in quite an old fashioned way that's never been updated; it's just been somewhere to put people that are inconvenient.
SR: Dani, was the opportunity to depict some unforgettable characters the selling point for this? Other than working with Dan, of course.
Dani: Yeah, the first one was working with Dan. Because I always expect a really interesting collaboration with him, and I think this one is exactly that. It's really interesting, and I feel like we bring something from our world to this world. I just feel like we're bringing something of our own experiences, either story-wise or art-wise. It's just a weird collaboration.
Dan Watters: The two of us have worked together and made stuff that's been - I don't want to use the word Avant Garde, but - strange. We've just done whatever we wanted. Being asked or invited to do this together definitely felt like we were being given that rope to make something that was a little bit strange and a little bit unusual.
SR: When you take your collaboration short hand into something as established as the world of Batman villains, and Gotham City, and Arkham, is that a different creative challenge? Or does that understanding of each other's work help you telling a new story (that is still very Batman)?
Dani: Is it very Batman? I don't know. For me, personally, I didn't see as much of a Batman challenge - like we're taking these characters and have to prove something, or keep up with something big. We didn't think about it a lot, and just did our thing freely, with some direction. At least, that's how I saw the creative process.
Dan Watters: I think the bottom line is that the stuff I like about Batman and superheroes, particularly in the DC universe, is that they've been around for so long and are so malleable. Because there's been so many iterations that are tweaks or foibles, they fit in just as well as anything else.
The whole idea that we're taking Ten-Eyed Man - who is this very strange, very Silver Age character - and just putting our twist and ideas into that feels quite seamless. Because the strangeness is all intrinsic; it's all right there in Gotham.
SR: It seems an extra twisted detail that the lead character of the story is 'Dr. Joy.' But what immediately distinguishes this story as different is contained in her character, and her view of Arkham. Can you give readers a tease of who this character is?
Dan Watters: She's someone who came to Gotham and came to Arkham to genuinely try and help people. She's a psychologist; she's not a prison warden. She genuinely wanted to help her patients, and she understood that it's not a case of "fixing people," quote-unquote. She wanted to help them reassimilate into society, and was making slow progress with different patients. And then all of her work was destroyed, and her life blew up when Joker did what he did to Arkham Asylum on A-day.
She's been left in the wake of that, where almost all of her patients died. She feels this overwhelming sense of failure. Then she's being asked by the GCPD to help round out the ones that have escaped, because most of them are confused and are lost, so they are a liability to themselves and are a danger to the people of Gotham. But she doesn't want to lock these people up, so that's the thing we open on her struggling with.
SR: The horror of this story isn't in violence or gore, but it has one of the most "I want to close this book" opening pages ever--in the best way possible. Do you need to push Dani into that direction, or are you writing this with a sense of what she's going to deliver?
Dan Watters: I fully know what Dani's capable of, so I'm definitely writing because I know that if she draws something like that, it's gonna have that effect. Those are the weapons I know we have - or tools rather weapons; that's a less aggressive word.
We know how each other work, and we know what each other are interested in. The overlap of that is what ends up on the page.
SR: You have Professor Pyg in this story, one of the most famous, all-time grossest Batman villains. But he might be one of the least upsetting in this issue. Are you even aware of how creepy this is as you are drawing it?
Dani: No. Well, I hope it's quite creepy. I'm happy you have these feelings while reading As Dan said, I think our combination on this book comes out this way. For me, it happens really organically with no effort. We've reached the level that I will read something in his script, and - I hope - I guess right what he has in his mind. And it comes out really naturally.
Maybe we are creepy people - I don't know - if this comes out so naturally.
SR: These characters don't come off evil or criminals, but as sick. Maybe that's part of why it is so unsettling. Is that a distinction that you wanted to make?
Dani: For me, drawing them - now that you're saying this with really good words - I'm drawing them in their natural way. They're not trying to do something. They're just there.
Dan Watters: They're in their natural state. At least, when we meet them, they're close to their natural state and to what makes them comfortable.
The book's about Arkham, but it's also about Gotham. And the way I think about Gotham is that it's this really desperate place. And unless you're - I was gonna say Bruce Wayne, but he's not even that rich anymore. But without being part of the proper Gotham elite, I think most people in Gotham City are clinging on by their fingernails to what makes them feel safe and what makes them feel comfortable.
This is the city where the Joker lives, and all of these colorful characters who will rip your face off as soon as say hello. Everyone in the city is clinging on by their fingernails to what make them feel normal or safe or sane, and I don't think these characters are any different. They're characters who need more help, and the city is failing them.
SR: There's a single line in the first issue that gets at what you're talking about. Someone notes that if everyone finds out these Arkham inmates are running amok in the city, then no one will be safe--including from the citizens.
Dan Watters: Yeah, I think that's fair to say. In the real world, we encounter people all the time who seem strange or unusual and don't react to things in the same way we do. But in Gotham City, that has a different context, and there's a different level of paranoia there.
SR: There are also some very overt suggestions that fans of the Arkham Asylum history and lore and mythology are also going to be served here. Is there a supernatural element to the story in addition to the psychiatric?
Dan Watters: I think that's also one of the things that's very interesting. In a place like Arkham Asylum, if someone says they see a ghost or they see a monster, it's not so easy to dismiss. This is a world of monsters and ghosts, so if someone thinks they see a beastie out there? It could be Killer Croc, or it could be Solomon Grundy.
SR: The details of this story may not mention him by name yet, but we know it involves Gotham's avenging angel. What did it mean to bring Azrael into this story and the world that you built here?
Dani: It's a good thing he’s in this story. Right, Dan?
Dan Watters: It's funny, because when we pitched this book, I had just written the Azrael story for Urban Legend. I think it comes out the same month.
I spent a bit of time with Jean-Paul Valley as a character, and he just seemed like the perfect fit. We knew we wanted some something that would dog our protagonists through the story. He seemed like the perfect person, because he is someone who has been mentally programmed with something against his will that makes him believe something which is pretty delusional. He thinks he's an avenging angel.
He also throws up interesting questions about where the line is. Is it okay for someone to behave in this kind of way if it's sanctioned by Batman? Or if they're wearing the right color costume?
Dani: And he's really interesting to draw. I'm so happy he's in there.
SR: Did you try to put your own spin on him or your own rendition of him? He's such a famous silhouette and character.
Dani: I don't have this purpose, but it happened. Because of the style I have, somehow I take out a lot of details. Sorry, but it works.
But I didn't feel like I had to change him. specially with Azrael, I felt like there wasn't anything I would like to change. I just went with it, and it's just in my style. But I'm really thankful for Dan's splash pages. There's some really good pages with Azrael.
Dan Watters: There are some pages, particularly coming up in issue 2. When I saw both the line art and Dave's colors, I thought, "Oh, my goodness!"
Dani: Oh, yeah. I'm so happy to be working with Dave on this.
SR: My last question is a selfish one, because I spent the first issue tortured over what you two were forcing me to behold, though I enjoyed every minute of it. Will this story get easier for me, or am I just going to have to accept this experience?
Dani: Say yes! [laughs]
Dan Watters: Yes. It's all sunshine and puppies from then on. [laughs]
Arkham City: The Order of The World arrives in comic book shops and digitally on October 5, 2021.