History ComicBook / BatmanEndgame

* BrickJoke: A ''very'' Black Comedy example. [[spoiler:Back in ''Death of the Family', Joker told Gordon that he'd spent part of the year he'd been MIA hiding under the Commissioner's bed. Guess where Joker ends up popping out of midway through this story?]]

* AmbiguousEnding: [[spoiler:The backstory at the end of Issue 39.]]
* AmbiguouslyHuman: [[spoiler:The Joker]] is played up as this. [[spoiler:Throughout both the main story and some of the backup plots he is heavily implied to be a [[Literature/{{It}} Pennywise]]-esque [[HumanoidAbomination recurring menace]] who has been active since Gotham was founded. Turns out it was all part of his mind-fucking plot.]]

* AxCrazy: [[spoiler:The Joker. He even grabs an ax in Issue 37 when he's going out of his way to give Gordon nightmares. His plague does this to everyone else.]]
* BadassBoast: [[spoiler:Joker gets one in the [[MultipleChoicePast first possible backstory presented.]]]]

** Another from Uriah, [[spoiler:one of the first Talons]] in issue 39;

* BatmanGambit: [[spoiler: Joker keeps pulling these on both Dr. Zaheer and Batman himself. In the end though, nobody beats the TropeNamer.]]
* BattleAmongstTheFlames: [[spoiler: Batman vs Joker.]] Technically also [[spoiler:Jim Gordon vs. Joker]], but that one's less of a "battle".
* BigBad: [[spoiler:ComicBook/TheJoker.]]
* BigNo: From [[spoiler: Joker when the dionesium pit is destroyed.]]
* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler: The Joker is finally stopped and his Joker Venom is cured. But both he and Batman are left trapped in the cave with the dionesium pit, presumably dead.]]
* BodyHorror: What [[spoiler:The Joker's serum/poison]] does to Dekker.
* BrainwashedAndCrazy: [[spoiler:The Joker]] does this to the Justice League via [[spoiler:specially-made strands of Joker Venom.]]
* ButForMeItWasTuesday: Scott Snyder directly name-drops this trope with an aversion.

* CallBack: To Annual 2, when it's revealed that [[spoiler:Eric Border is a disguise for the Joker.]]
** In Issue 37, Duke Thomas appears as a CallBack to ''Zero Year''. Also, [[spoiler:to ''Death of the Family'', when Joker [[NightmareFuel comes out from under Jim Gordon's bed.]]]]

* CombatBreakdown: [[spoiler:The final battle between Batman and the Joker (In this story arc, that is) ends up this way, where Batman was shown biting off the Joker's ear and physically restraining him from reaching the Dionesium pool to heal.]]

** [[spoiler: Joker gets this for his extremely intricate plans on how to infect each of the Justice League with Joker Venom. Each is specially built.]]
** In a meta sense, the authors get one for [[spoiler:introducing Eric Border in Batman Annual 2, over a year beforehand in real-world time, and revealing that he was always intended to be a disguise for the Joker.]]
* DarkerAndEdgier: [[spoiler:The Joker; he's decided to finish Gotham once and for all, and he's even wearing the sort of suit you'd see at a funeral.]]
* DarkMessiah: [[spoiler: The Joker]] claims to have been this along, and in fact, [[spoiler: as his alter ego of Eric Border, outright says "I wanted to help Gotham."]] He plays the role of a StrawNihilist, asserting that life is miserable and meaningless, and the only true joy comes with death. His ''Dia de los Muertos''-like parade hammers the point home. [[SubvertedTrope (Eventually, however, he's revealed to be a hypocrite: he indeed values life, and just wants to murder everyone else out of spite.)]]

* DidntSeeThatComing: Everyone, in-universe and out, when [[spoiler:Joker came back, nailed the League with Joker Venom, and revealed that he was Eric Border.]]
* EnemyMine: In issue 38, Batman is forced to turn to [[spoiler:the Court of Owls]] for help, as they are the ones most knowledgable about [[spoiler:[[AncientConspiracy Gotham's history]]]].
** Later, he enlists the help of [[spoiler:various members of his rogues gallery (Bane, Scarecrow, Penguin, Poison Ivy, Clayface, Killer Croc, and Mr. Freeze) to cover him while he takes down the Joker. They help him because as he points out, Gotham is their city too.]]
* EvenEvilHasStandards: [[spoiler:Joe Chill doesn't seem to be very interested in killing anyone else's parents.]]
* EyeScream: [[spoiler: Batman gets hit in the eye (and arms) with Joker's metal joker cards.]]

* FacialHorror: [[spoiler:The Joker, while his face was restored before the events of his story, it still ends up badly burned in the climax.]]

* HauntedHouse: The Willowwood Children's Hospital and Gotham Pres both have this reputation.

* HealingFactor: [[spoiler:The story revealed the Joker had one, revealing how he got his face back. Though it's later subverted as it's revealed he merely came into contact with Dionesium, the chemical responsible for the restorative properties of the Lazarus Pits and in the meteor that made ComicBook/VandalSavage immortal.]]

* HiddenDepths: Turns out Batman has more of a sense of humor than previously thought. "Ha."

* HowMuchMoreCanHeTake: The FinalBattle is a case of this. [[spoiler:Batman, who has no healing to speak of [[HonorBeforeReason through conscious choice]], gets multiple knife wounds, [[FacialHorror an explosive going off directly next to his face]], a razor-sharp playing card [[EyeScream stabbed into his eye socket]], and many other wounds before finally going down. Joker has similar injuries, but is able to shrug them off until Batman doses him with a cure for his Dionesium-powered healing. That quickly leads to the below.]]

* IDontWantToDie: Shown in Issue 40, in stark contrast to the FaceDeathWithDignity example. [[spoiler:As shown by Joker's panicked expression and demeanor after the reservoir of [[ImmortalityInducer dionesium]] is lost to him due to a cave-in, this is his perspective on life in spite of all of his StrawNihilist behavior.]]

* {{Immortality}}: Issue 37, as well as the backstories, all suggest that [[spoiler:the Joker]] has [[ResurrectiveImmortality some]] [[CompleteImmortality form]] of this. [[spoiler:As it turns out, he has ''none'' of this. He fell into a deep hole in Gotham that had a reservoir of dionesium after ''ComicBook/DeathOfTheFamily'', which allowed him to develop a HealingFactor, but once that amount in his body is neutralized, he needs to get more in order to get that healing back.]]

* ImmortalitySeeker: Paul Dekker/Crazy Quilt is revealed to be this. [[spoiler:It gets him killed when the Joker tricks him into poisoning himself.]]
* InternalMonologue: Batman has this at the start of issues 36-39.
* JokerImmunity: This trope becomes a major thread of the plot, with Batman scrambling to figure out if [[spoiler:The Joker]] truly is immortal or if he's just a mortal (albeit inhumanly evil) man. [[spoiler:Ultimately, it appears to have been an AvertedTrope, as not only is he a mortal man with a temporary ImmortalityInducer, but it seems that he and Batman had a MutualKill.]]
* LaughingMad: Batman says that [[spoiler:Joker]] is actually an aversion, in his opinion.

** [[spoiler:This is what happens to anyone hit by his plague.]]

* {{Lockdown}}: The military intends to do this if [[spoiler:a cure isn't found for the infection very quickly in Issue 37.]]
* MadDoctor: Paul Dekker, a.k.a. Crazy Quilt, is this, with his work on a HealingFactor for soft tissue (compared to Hugo Strange for neurological tissue, and [[ComicBook/BatmanZeroYear Karl "Doctor Death" Helfern]] for hard bone tissue) and apparent insanity.
* [[ZombieApocalypse Madness Apocalypse]]: [[spoiler:The Joker's plague is spreading very quickly through Gotham.]]
* MasterOfDisguise: [[spoiler:Joker as Eric Border.]]

* MeaningfulName: Just read...

** The compound Dionesium, [[spoiler:which gives Vandal Savage, Lazarus Pit users, and (apparently) the Joker their HealingFactor and is at the core of the SyntheticPlague]] is named after the Greek god Dionysus, who though best-known as the god of wine, is also the god of resurrection/rebirth.
*** Dionysus is also famous as having the Maenads as followers - humans so infused with revelry/insanity that they would literally rip people apart in an attempt to achieve "pleasure". Sounds right up [[spoiler:The Joker's]] alley.

* MindControl[=/=]MoreThanMindControl: [[spoiler:The Joker]] does this to the ''Justice League'' through [[spoiler:Joker Venom specifically designed to overtake each of them.]]
* MultipleChoicePast: [[spoiler:The Joker gains several new possible backstories: which, if any of them, are actually true, is unknown at this point.]]

* MutualKill: [[spoiler:In the ending, this appears to be the case between Batman and the Joker.]]

* NotQuiteDead: Implied to be the case in the epilogue to the final issue. [[spoiler:While Bruce Wayne's Batman and the Joker are presumed dead, there is a man on crutches with many bandages including one over an eye (the same eye that was seriously wounded by a razor sharp card on Bruce) with [[ComicBook/{{Robin}} a young child with an R on his shirt]] with him, and the garbage man who throws out the trash behind the theater looks suspiciously similar to the Joker's disguise in this storyline as Eric Border. The implication appears to be that while their physical bodies are probably not dead, their identities as Batman and the Joker are, for the time being, gone.]]

** Batman has this reaction when he sees Superman [[spoiler:[[WhamShot getting a Joker-grin on his face.]]]]
** Again when [[spoiler:Eric Border drops the bars and reveals he's the Joker.]]
** A subdued reaction from Dick, [[spoiler:when Bruce tells him that the Joker knows Batman's identity.]]
** [[spoiler: Joker when he realizes the Batman at the parade is actually [[ComicBook/{{Nightwing}} Dick Grayson]] (meaning Bruce isn't as clueless as he thought) and again when the dionesum pool is plugged by cave debris.]]

* PatientZero: [[spoiler:''[[DeathByOriginStory Joe Chill]]'' is this, causing Batman to realize that '''''[[OhCrap Joker knows who he is.]]]]'''''

* PsychoPsychologist: [[spoiler:Eric Border was the Joker all along.]]

* SelfPlagiarism: [[spoiler:Something that gets criticism is that the plot is just a rehash of the early ''ComicBook/DeathOfTheFamily'' with the only few differences being the Justice League instead of the Batfamily the Joker uses against Batman and the BittersweetEnding being the seeming death of Bruce himself instead of a group disbanding.]]

** The origin where [[spoiler:the Joker]] is [[spoiler:a robotic intelligence existing in microchips secretly planted inside people waiting to activate and turn them into the Joker]] is refers to WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyondReturnOfTheJoker, where he uses that exact method to come back to life, though only once.

* SlasherSmile: [[spoiler:The Joker, and everyone affected by his [[ThePlague newest toxin.]]]]

* SssssnakeTalk: [[spoiler:The Joker's]] picked up this habit.
* StrawNihilist: [[spoiler:The Joker, depending on how you perceive his speech in Issue 39.]]
--> [[spoiler:People of Gotham! I have '''one''' question for you... Who's in the mood to party?! I mean, why not?! Hell, in lots of places around the world death is followed by '''celebration!''' It makes sensssse, am i right? We struggle and struggle in life... trying not to look at the end, to look at the now and find meaning, to find purpose... all for naught. Nothing. Zzzzip. But ahhhh! The dirt nap. To rest your feet! Sweet relief! So let's do it! Let's look together! Look it in the face... and '''smile!''']]
* SyntheticPlague: [[spoiler:Joker has engineered one of these, which appears to affect its victims in a way similar to the Justice League, and is airborne to make things worse.]]

* SupermanStaysOutOfGotham: [[spoiler:[[SubvertedTrope Because he and the other members of the Justice League were Jokerized and compelled to fight Batman]], [[JustifiedTrope resulting in each of them being put out of commission for the duration of the storyline]].]]

* TearsOfJoy: [[spoiler:Jim gets these when he shoots and kills the Joker in Issue 37, proving that he's just a human like him. It doesn't last.]]

* TrailersAlwaysSpoil: Averted; the writing team overseeing the story did such a good job hushing the project up and what they were doing in it, nobody had any clue [[spoiler:that the Joker]] was involved till it came out. Up until that point, not even the covers had been revealed, and all solicits just said that it was an important story.

* VillainTeleportation: A rather blatant example in Issue 40. [[spoiler:After finding out that Dick Grayson was the Batman who attacked his parade, and not Bruce Wayne, Joker seems shocked that Bruce made it down to the dionesium supply, which likely would destroy his plan. Seemingly minutes or seconds later, he's down there, far ''far'' below Gotham, and attacks Bruce.]]

* WhamLine:

** In Batman 36, TheReveal above also counts as a WhamShot.

* ZombieApocalypse: But the zombies are also [[spoiler: Jokerized]].

Who's responsible? An old enemy, crawling out of the shadows and [[HealingFactor more powerful]] [[Really700YearsOld than ever before,]] with a new purity of purpose. Who wants nothing else apart from Gotham destroyed once and for all and Batman dead, [[TheUnfettered no matter what it takes.]] As Gotham tears itself apart, Batman is forced to rely on his wits, his strength, every ally he's made so far and more than a few of his demons to stop this final threat.

[[GrandFinale This is going to be the big one.]]