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Franchise/TheDCU's Azrael first debuted with the 4-issue ''Batman: Sword of Azrael'' miniseries (October, 1992-January, 1993), created by writer Denny O'Neil and artist Creator/JoeQuesada. The reason Azrael was created was to introduce a replacement for Franchise/{{Batman}} during the ComicBook/{{Knightfall}} arc. For more information on [[LegacyCharacter the characters that have been Azrael]], click [[Characters/{{Azrael}} here]].

The original ''Azrael'' series was started in February 1995, which featured Jean-Paul Valley trekking around the world as Azrael following his stint as Batman, funded by Bruce Wayne, trying to discover his origins with the Sacred Order of St. Dumas. After that, his series kind of flattened out thanks to Jean-Paul being ExiledFromContinuity ''and'' being turned into a StaticCharacter. After being heavily involved in the Comicbook/BatmanNoMansLand arc, the series (now renamed ''Azrael: Agent of the Bat'') mainly showed Azrael's random adventures. The series eventually fizzled out in an anti-climatic ending at issue #100 (May, 2003) with the death of Jean-Paul. {{Iron|y}}ically, Jean-Paul just so happened to die at the same time that the ''[[ComicBook/BatmanHush Hush]]'' arc over in Batman's corner of the DC Universe was about half-way through, which concerned Batman re-evaluating how he interacted with most of his allies and enemies. [[MyFriendsAndZoidberg Except for Jean-Paul Valley, Azrael]].

A new Azrael showed up in a three-issue ''Battle for the Cowl'' miniseries titled ''Battle for the Cowl: Azrael: [[ColonCancer Death's Dark Knight]]'' (May-July, 2009). Written by Fabian Nicieza and later David Hine, drawn by Frazier Irving. It starred [[Characters/BatmanSupportingCast Michael Lane]], formerly the "Bat-Devil" from ''[[ComicBook/BatmanGrantMorrison Three Ghosts of Batman]]''). Then ''he'' got his own series, starting in December, 2009, and ending in May 2011 after 18 issues. This was followed by Lane's Azrael appearing in a sort of mini-BatFamilyCrossover called ''Judgement on Gotham''.

For a while, there was no word on the future of Azrael in the wake of the ComicBook/New52 ContinuityReboot in 2011. However, Michael Lane appeared in ''Batman Incorporated'' #10, where he loaned Batman the Suit of Sorrows.

In the 2015-16 limited series ''ComicBook/BatmanAndRobinEternal'', Jean-Paul Valley finally makes his return in the new continuity, once more as Azrael and as a member of the Order. He's also one of a number of children connected to the mysterious BigBad, Mother. In the subsequent ''ComicBook/DCRebirth'' relaunch, Azrael is one of the many characters featured in ''ComicBook/DetectiveComicsRebirth''. He even gets a temporary costume that is a ShoutOut to the one he wore as Batman. After that run ended, Azrael went into outer space as a team member in ''Justice League Odyssey''.

Returned to Earth, Jean-Paul stars in three features of the AnthologyComic ''Batman: Urban Legends'' followed by the six-issue miniseries ''Sword of Azrael''.

In other continuities, Jean-Paul Valley shows up in ''Batman: The Adventures Continue'', a digital-first comic series set in the Franchise/DCAnimatedUniverse, even donning the [=AzBats=] armor there. An older, eviler Jean-Paul Valley also appears in ''ComicBook/BatmanCurseOfTheWhiteKnight'', but inspired to become a villainous Azrael by ComicBook/TheJoker in a bid to destroy Gotham, and eventually dons the [=AzBats=] suit; in a surprising twist, it's revealed ''he'', not Bruce, is the true heir to the Wayne Family (due to a secret from their ancestors, where Bruce's anscestor murdered Valley's and stole his identity, meaning all family members after him, including Thomas, Martha, and Bruce, aren't actually members of the actual Wayne line).

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!!''Azrael'' provides examples of:

* AdventureTowns: Ossaville (Population [[spoiler:56]] less than 28. Have a Nice Day), the new homebase for Jean-Paul Valley after the ''Losses'' arc (73-75), became one of these after ol' Az settled down there.
* TheAlcoholic: Brian Bryan. [[spoiler: Temporarily, anyway]]
* ArtisticLicenseReligion: The second series is filled with this.
** According to this book, ''faith'' is the eighth deadly sin. Which makes no sense at all when you take a look at Hebrews Chapter 11, in Literature/TheBible. Yeah, you'd think they'd want to take a look at that thing before going around bashing Christianity. (While the Russian Orthodox Church has an eighth deadly sin, it's despair, not faith.)
** And the Apocrypha is real; they're defined as the parts of the Bible that existed in the Septuagint (the Greek version of the Tanakh as used by Hellenistic Jews) but not in the Masoretic (standard Hebrew text used by Rabbinical Judaism). However, a traditionalist Catholic wouldn't use the term "Apocrypha"; since they're considered inspired scripture in the Catholic and Orthodox traditions, the proper term is "deuterocanon" (secondary canon). (If you're interested in that sort of thing, an inexpensive copy of the NRSV + Apocrypha should hold the full set.) Needless to say, DC takes liberties...
* CharacterDevelopment: Sister Lilhy turned evil and allied with [[CostumeCopycat Faux-Azrael]] in order to [[OhCrap re-found the Sacred Order of St. Dumas]].
* ChristianityIsCatholic: Justified in that the Order of St. Dumas was an offshoot of Catholicism and was extremely obscure for centuries. There were only about half a dozen members of '''the entire religion''' in the first miniseries.
* ChurchMilitant: With the Sacred Order of St. Dumas and Michael Lane's Azrael.
* DarkerAndEdgier: The second series is ''made'' of this.
* DecoyProtagonist: The very first Azrael we see is killed off in the second page for the first miniseries. He son, Jean-Paul Valley, takes up the mantle.
* {{Deprogram}}: The System is some form of this.
* DirtyOldMan: Subverted for [[TheShrink Brian Bryan]], though he has stated concerning Lilhy, "If I were twenty years younger..."
* HeelFaceRevolvingDoor: Sister Lilhy.
* InnocentFanServiceGirl: Sister Lilhy, oh so much.
* KnightTemplar: The Sacred Order of St. Dumas was actually a splinter group of the ''original'' Knights Templar.
* LegacyCharacter:
** This whole Azrael thing has been going on since the 15th century, apparently, passing from father to son, and ending with Jean-Paul Valley. The same applies for Michael Lane's Azrael, who's is only the most recent incarnation of a line of Azraels who work for Sacred Order of St. Dumas splinter group the Order of Purity. All they need is the Suit of Sorrows and a volunteer. All of the people who wore the Suit of Sorrows were eventually driven insane by it. Heck, it only took six weeks to do the trick for Michael Lane's predecessor.
** Whether there was a legacy post-''Flashpoint'' is open.
* MookFaceTurn: Sister Lilhy used to work for the Order of St. Dumas before deciding to help out Jean-Paul.
* NaughtyNuns: Sister Lilhy is implied to have turned into this.
* ObliviousToLove: Sister Lilhy just can't take any of Jean-Paul's hints, so the poor guy just gave up.
* OutdatedOutfit: After a fashion. Ludovic Valley's decidedly more crusader-esque costume was one of the factors that contributed to his death.
* PingPongNaivete: Sister Lilhy, who went from TheChessmaster to DamselInDistress and back again throughout the course of the series. This applied to Jean Paul to.
* PowerTrio: Jean-Paul Valley, Brian Bryan, and Sister Lilhy.
* RepetitiveName: Jean-Paul Valley's closest confident was an alcoholic ex-psychiatrist named Brian Bryan.
* TheShrink: Jean-Paul's friend Brian Bryan initially proclaims himself the "worst psychiatrist to ever practice the healing arts", but he becomes more competent as he helps Jean-Paul deal with the System ([[spoiler: and loses his addiction]]).
* SleepLearning: How "the System" works. Or, to be accurate, [[OverlyLongName Subliminal Messages Played While You Are Sleeping Throughout Your Childhood Learning.]]
* ThemeSerialKiller: The Crusader (Michael Lane's archenemy) murdered members of the Order of Purity in manners based on the martyrdoms of various Christian saints.
* TwoGuysAndAGirl: Jean-Paul Valley, Brian Bryan, and Sister Lilhy, again.
* UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom: Brian Bryan ''nearly'' becomes this right at the start of the first series. When Jean-Paul tells him he is experiencing hallucinations, Bryan advises him to ignore things that are obviously not real. This soon bites him in the ass when Jean-Paul wakes up with the room around him on fire, which he mistakes for a vision of Hell, and makes no move to save himself.
* WillTheyOrWontThey: Jean-Paul Valley got this with Sister Lilhy a lot.
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