It's good to be the king...
That’s right Gotham, it’s me! Your very own King Joker! That’s right, the clown wears the crown from now on! So sit back, relax! You’re getting a front row seat to the show of a lifetime! Free for all comers! You’ll laugh so hard you’ll probably die! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
- Joker
It’s the story we all know: Joker hatches a scheme, Batman swoops in, Joker gets carted to Arkham, repeat for decade after decade. Except what happens when Joker throws a party…
And Batman doesn’t show?
Arkham Kingdom is a fan-made world building exercise that looks at what would happen if Batman doesn’t stop the Joker. Where the Clown Prince of Crime finally decides to finally blow the doors off, literally and figuratively. Drawing from practically every medium and story Batman has appeared in, had a hand in, or even is tangentially mentioned during. Pulling from the Bat-Family, rogues, allies, and opposites, the setting is in a way a living encyclopedia of the entire Bat-Mythos, pre- and post-New 52. The only thing missing from this setting involving Batman…
Is Batman.
At present the project is very much in-progress, but can be found here
.
- Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Spacious enough to hold an entire "army" for Sewer King, the homeless protected by Killer Croc, and Solomon Grundy.
- All Bikers are Hells Angels: The Street Demonz, who have taken on a more protective role after seeing what Joker has done. They’re still a vicious biker gang, but they also aren’t going out of their way to attack civilians like other gangs and criminals.
- Ambiguous Situation: No one knows what has happened to Batman, only that his continued absence has led to a greater lunacy from Joker’s followers.
- Armies Are Evil: While there are certain decent elements, the leadership and named characters for the National Guard response are the likes of Gen. Wade Eiling.
- Bedlam House: Arkham, now under the control of Scarecrow himself. If it was bad before...
- Black-and-Gray Morality: Even with the Bat-Family and Justice League doing what they can, the situation in the Triangle has forced everyone present to take several steps to survive. Still, by comparison? Even the most anti-heroic characters are leagues better than the likes of Abattoir or the Alliance.
- Capepunk
- CIA Evil, FBI Good: Fulfilled by the depictions of CADMUS and the CBI. Ironic, considering that the CBI is written as involving the CIA in its operations.
- Dirty Cop: For once, that title is not firmly in the hands of Gotham City. While Gotham’s cops are noted as still facing their own corruption even in the middle of the Crime Wave, Bludhaven is a brutally militaristic department while Hub City’s cops are trying to keep their heads down thanks to endemic corruption leaving them twenty years behind the times.
- Energy Weapon: Vanishingly rare, unless you're the US government or Intergang.
- End of an Era: The writing makes it clear that the era of Batman is over, regardless of whatever happens next.
- Foil: The Alliance serves as this for the Bat-Family. Organized by Hush and composed of “anti-Batman” such as Prometheus, Killer Moth, and the Wrath, the Alliance is funded by a mysterious benefactor with no greater directive that to uphold the new Status Quo of lawlessness, in opposition to the Bat-Family’s mission to protect the peace.
- Fish out of Temporal Water: Lady Blackhawk, technically. In truth, the situation in the Triangle is so alike to occupied Europe during WWII that she feels right at home.
- Gang of Hats: A natural situation for the DC universe.
- Hate Sink: Several, given the long history of Batman.
- Prof. Pyg and his Circus of the strange, seeing as Pyg's obsession with perfection drives almost everyone to revile him.
- The Terrible Trio, being three trust fund kids who took to crime for fun, become massive targets for political or practical reasons.
- Sewer King, universally reviled by almost every other gang and criminal for his use of children as slaves.
- The Irish Mob: The Riley Clan in Gotham’s Cauldron neighborhood, led by Peyton Riley and uniting several other Irish criminals and even supercriminals under her banner.
- Joisey: The setting is firmly set on the southern peninsula of New Jersey. As well as taking liberal potshots at the fact that this is canonically where Batman is set.
- Legacy Character: Several, unsurprisingly. The Crimson Avenger, Black Spider, and Getaway Genius, for example.
- Legion of Doom: Joker’s mocking “administration” is composed of the most sadistic and unhinged of Gotham’s costumed scoundrels, such as Scarecrow, Mad Hatter, Firefly, and Professor Pyg.
- Lethal Joke Character: Several older or lesser Bat-rogues have been updated from their origins, either acting as subordinates in a larger gang or even leading their own factions.
- Mind Screw: The tactic de jure of Mad Hatter, Scarecrow, and Dr. Strange.
- Neighborhood-Friendly Gangsters: Almost entirely averted; even leaving out Joker's crews and "administration", the other criminal groups in the Triangle barely even bother to acknowledge that civilians exist.
- Orpheus plays this straight to a degree, given he's a member of the Bat-Family.
- New Old West: Stallion and the Trigger Twins, with the territory they control filled with roving cowboys and gunslingers. The fact that they're in the northern and urban state of New Jersey is a non-issue, apparently.
- Right-Wing Militia Fanatic: While he wasn’t trying to speak to their beliefs, Firebrand’s symbolism and messaging wound up drawing the attention of some very heavily armed and very “patriotic” individuals.
- Rule of Symbolism: Each region reflects different aspects of Batman’s stories through the years.
- Gotham is the sheer cartoonish insanity of the Bat-Mythos, containing the majority of gangs and comic book elements
- Bludhaven is the brutality of certain stories, reflected in the more direct and base natures of those fighting in it
- Hub City is the secretive struggle of Batman, the city attempting to maintain some level of quiet when everything around it is insane.
- The Triangle is the strangeness of certain periods of Batman stories, involving serial killers and non-comical lunatics.
- Stepford Suburbia: The suburbs under Baby Doll's control have become a twisted pastiche of classic TV, the people trapped with her twisting their minds to survive.
- Take That!: The project has several strong ones.
- The fact that Stallion always dreamed of playing for the Dallas Cowboys.
- Western Terrorists: Several of the characters involved are this, not simple “criminals”.
- Poison Ivy and Orca are eco-terrorists, focused on the damage done to the natural world; Orca, at least, is somewhat more grounded in how to pursue her ideals.
- Anarky's forces are modeled as modern Bomb-Throwing Anarchists
- The Red Fang are now firmly marked as accelerationists, believing that this is their chance to finally upend the existing world order.
- Why We're Bummed Communism Fell: Several members of the Hammer still hold to the ideals of the Soviet Union, and believe that if they succeed against the other criminals they might find new and fertile ground for Marxist ideas.
- Wretched Hive: The entirety of Southern New Jersey is depicted this way, as the area known as the “Triangle” contains three of the worst cities to live in for any DC comics civilian.
