Warning! Spoilers ahead for Batman #93
Batman fans are eagerly awaiting the coming Joker War headed for the streets of Gotham City, where the Dark Knight will battle the Clown Prince of Crime in a high stakes conflict that might just conclude with one or both of their deaths. Before the war begins, Batman has been bombarded from all sides by some of his greatest foes -- armed with plans that were made with help from The Designer.
The mysterious new villain from an older generation was thought to be long dead, before he sought to use Batman's rogues to create a final chapter for his legacy. Batman #93 reveals the full details of the grand design, and what The Designer had hoped to achieve: total criminal underworld control over Gotham and the end of the Batman. Read on to learn how it would have been done, and the piece that didn't fall into place which got in the way of its' success.
The rogues used in the Designer's initial plan were arguably the biggest foes Batman had back in his early career when the new villain first came to Gotham: Penguin, Riddler, Catwoman, and the Joker. Meeting with all of them in turn, The Designer helped each of them craft a scheme of epic proportions, the combining of which would be his masterpiece, the high note he'd end on before retiring his criminal career. For Penguin, the hiring of the best assassins on the market to simultaneously take out key members of Gotham's political leadership, which would then be replaced by men under Penguin's influence, thereby effectively making him the mayor of Gotham.
For Riddler, Edward Nygma would use the city as a giant crossword puzzle, using the streets and intersections as boxes, creating a massive gridlock to keep the individual police precincts from mobilizing, meant to humiliate Commissioner Gordon. The cops that would agree to work for Nygma would be allowed to move and save the city, and a new commissioner would be put in place by Penguin, thus giving Riddler control of the police. Catwoman, for her part, would rob from the richest man in Gotham: Bruce Wayne. She would be able to use the funds as she saw fit, as the Wayne Foundation is funded by offshore accounts, allowing her to become the city's bank, with any suspicions of fraud being cleared by Penguin. The Joker's role was simple: he's supposed to kill Batman and Robin, leaving the city with no defenders as it transforms into a massive unified criminal underworld empire. However, therein lies that drawback to the design.
The Designer's entire plan was flawless, provided all the players play their roles. However, Batman #93 from James Tynion IV and Guillem March reveals that that did not happen. Joker was unwilling to kill Batman as he thrived on their relationship, despite The Designer's urging. To his detriment and demise, The Designer simply thought of Joke as a serial killer, when fans know that Joker is terrifyingly so much more than that. Had Joker agreed, the plan would have most likely worked. The younger and less experienced Batman at that time of the grand design's conception would not have been prepared for such an onslaught. In contrast, the Batman whose facing the design now in the present is a lot more capable and better equipped to handle the schemes, though they do still succeed in distracting him from the designs' augmented true purpose, which is for Joker to steal the Wayne Fortune himself to fund his imminent war.
Though the Designer had a masterpiece of a plan, its' truly fatal flaw was in his underestimation of the Joker. While the older and more experienced Batman of the present is able to better handle the bulk of the schemes from truly succeeding than he would have in the past, elements of the plan still achieve their endgames in Joker's favor, who enacted the old design in the first place. What could have been a showstopper simply became the opener to the bigger performance that will be his Joker War. Hopefully Batman will have what it takes.