Batman, Inc. features various global locales as Bruce Wayne searches the globe for "Batmen" to recruit in his new endeavor.
Characters Because of the global nature of this series, Grant Morrison has gone on record saying that many of the characters used will be both new and old, and will include previously seen characters such as
Knight and
Squire, that will contribute to the cause of Batman, Inc. Morrison also said that there will be a different primary representative from England: "There's another Batman of England, who is not the
Knight. I discovered there was another character called
The Hood used more recently in
Batman: Shadow of the Bat. Once I discovered that character, a new idea kind of spun off and it gave me a whole bunch of villains and new stuff to bring in. So yeah, doing the research for it [led to] discovering some obscure characters, including some quite recently from the nineties even. No one looks at the nineties but there's some interesting stuff there". Morrison also stated that they will revisit
El Gaucho in a trip that the Dark Knight takes to recruit a representative from
Argentina.
Nightrunner, the controversial French Muslim vigilante introduced in
Detective Comics Annual #12, appeared in
Batman Inc. #6, acting as the representative of Paris, France. In the same issue,
Cassandra Cain, the former
Batgirl prior to the mantle being passed to
Stephanie Brown, was introduced as Hong Kong's Batman Inc. representative under the new moniker of Black Bat.
Volume 1 (2010–2011) Morrison employed tight, three-issue story arcs in
Batman and Robin, and when asked if this is a trend they would be continuing, they said: "Yeah, but it's going to be even different again. It's going to be even more stripped back and pulpy and fast-moving. So the first one's only two. It's really tight. It's like reading about six issues in two. I'm very pleased with the way we've been able to cut this...we want to do very short, punchy stories in it. We may do some that are only one issue, and some that are three issues. And that will be the first year of the book. I call it the first season. It will be 12 issues of one- or two-part stories". ;Scorpion Tango (issues #3–5) Batman then travels to Argentina in an attempt to recruit El Gaucho into Batman Incorporated. Gaucho refuses, wanting to be his own man. Gaucho informs Batman of a case involving three missing children and a link to a mysterious manipulative figure called Doctor Dedalus. On the trail of the three children Batman and El Gaucho are led into a death trap by El Sombrero and Scorpiana in which they must fight to the death to save the missing children. Batman and El Gaucho escape the trap but both learn of Gaucho's link to
Kathy Kane, the original Batwoman. Batwoman was hired by the 'unrepentant Nazi war criminal' and former superspy Doctor Dedalus to learn Batman's secret identity. Kane fell in love with Bruce Wayne after becoming Batwoman and left him. The new Batwoman
Kate Kane learns of Dedalus's location in the
Falkland Islands where he was imprisoned by a team of British heroes claiming to have made a 'ring around the world' in the form of an unknown master plan. Batman, Batwoman and El Gaucho converge on Dedalus's location and meet a British superspy known as The Hood (having been sent in secret to infiltrate Batman Inc) where they discover Dedalus had discovered an unknown fifth element known as
Ouroboros and had set a 'meta bomb' to destroy the island. Batman uses the batplane to blow up the bomb and then deduces that Dedalus is suffering from
Alzheimer's disease and has escaped the island to finish his master plan using the supervillain group known as Leviathan. Batwing is then seen working with Batman to track
Leviathan's activities in Africa.
The Leviathan Strikes The Leviathan Strikes one-shot's story was split between two chapters, with the first focusing on Stephanie Brown's infiltration of an all-girls school that doubles as a training ground for the Leviathan organization. Due to The New 52, this would be Stephanie's final appearance as
Batgirl. The second half focused on Bruce, Dick,
Tim Drake, and Damian going up against a Leviathan operative named Doctor Dedalus. In the closing moments of the story, it is revealed that the mastermind behind Leviathan's operation is none other than
Talia al Ghul, Damian's mother and daughter of
Ra's al Ghul.
Volume 2 (2012–2013) Demon Star The second volume of the series began with a flash forward of Bruce Wayne being arrested by the Gotham City Police Department, with Batman ordering Alfred to shut down Batman Incorporated after a series of events yet to be seen. It then cuts to the present, as Bruce and Damian struggle to deal with Talia's plot to take over Gotham through the vast network of Leviathan agents throughout the city. To protect Damian (who has a bounty on his head), Batman allows Talia to think that Damian has been killed by a taxi driver/amateur assassin Goatboy, who is then given membership into the League of Assassins, alongside the
Sportsmaster and
Merlyn. When he is tasked with killing
Matches Malone (Batman's undercover identity) he draws the wrath of the entire Batman Incorporated group upon the League. Afterwards, Batman declares that he needs Damian to return to his mother in order to infiltrate Leviathan, citing the bounty on his son's head and that the only place he would be safe from it, would be alongside his mother.
Gotham's Most Wanted Leviathan invades Gotham City, using indoctrinated children to attack it from the inside out. Damian goes up against Talia's bodyguard known as the
Heretic. The Heretic reveals himself to be Damian's artificially-modified clone and kills Damian. As Bruce tries to deal with the loss of his son, Gotham demands that Wayne Enterprises cease funding Batman Incorporated to avoid being targeted by further international threats. Bruce salvages the remaining resources from Batman Inc. and uses them to launch a one-man war on Leviathan. He defeats the Heretic, who is later killed by Talia before confronting Talia herself. Meanwhile, Nightwing, Red Robin, the new Wingman (a redeemed Jason Todd) and the new Knight (formerly the Squire) encounter the head of the mysterious organization known as
Spyral. Talia and Batman cross swords in the Batcave, but before Batman can defeat her, Talia is shot by Kathy Kane: the former Batwoman and current head of Spyral. Kathy vanishes immediately afterwards and Bruce is called in for questioning by the police. He tells Gordon his reasons for joining with Batman, who has vanished after the Leviathan army was dispelled. The story concludes with Gordon musing on his suspicions of Bruce and Batman being the same person, while Batman comes out of hiding and goes back to fighting crime some time later. Meanwhile, Ra's al Ghul has taken the bodies of Talia and Damian and has prepared an army of Damian clones, potentially succeeding where Darkseid failed in
Final Crisis by using Batman as a progenitor for an unstoppable army.
Volume 3 (2022–2023) A new ongoing
Batman Incorporated series, written by
Ed Brisson and illustrated by John Timms, was released in 2022, spinning out of the
Batman run by
James Tynion IV. Aside from returning members of Batman Inc., Batman appointed Ghost-Maker, a vigilante and his old friend/rival introduced in Tynion IV's run, as the new leader of the team. The first arc centers around the serial murder of Batman and Ghost-Maker's old mentors. ==Collected editions==