Batman, Joker engage in fatal 'Endgame'

Spoiler alert!The following report contains important plot points from the new issue of 'Batman.'

Writers are told to "kill their darlings," and Batman writer Scott Snyder has buried a couple of his under tons of rubble beneath Gotham City, leaving them for dead.

In DC Comics' Batman No. 40 (out today), Batman and his psychotic arch enemy Joker engage in a brutal fight under Gotham that leaves them bloodied and bludgeoned. The Caped Crusader ultimately sacrifices himself to keep his nemesis at bay while gigantic rocks come crashing down, seemingly killing them both.

Don't fret too much, Bat-fans: You won't have to wait long for the debut of Gotham's next protector. DC's Divergence special issue, which will be given out in comic-book stores Saturday as part of Free Comic Book Day, finds the city's citizens holding out for a hero and getting a new armored Batman as their champion.

How long he has the gig is a whole other question. Comic-book deaths never seem to stick: Captain America, Spider-Man, Wolverine and other superheroes have "perished" in recent years only to come back later, and this isn't even Bruce Wayne's first rodeo with the Grim Reaper.

Plus, DC might want two of its legendary rivals back by next year, when Ben Affleck stars as the Dark Knight in the much-awaited movie Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Jared Leto plays the Joker in Suicide Squad.

In terms of these icons' future on the comic page, all Snyder will say is that he doesn't intend to write Joker fighting Batman again. But he also wouldn't take either of them off the table in the first place without a grander scheme at work.

"No one kills Wolverine without the plan of how to bring Wolverine back, and in a better way than you killed him," the writer says. "That's the whole fun of it: You only do it if you have a way of bringing the character back that gives you a new story that hasn't been done before with him."

Batman and Joker have been dueling for 75 years of comics, movies and pop culture, so it's sometimes "scary" to make really big changes, Snyder says. "But the only way to write them is as though you made them up. Otherwise, they're intimidating because you grew up with them as a kid and you're terrified of doing anything to them at all."

Bruce Wayne knows deep down that he will always have a bad ending as Batman, the writer says. "Saving the city and taking down probably the biggest threat in its history — and his worst enemy — that's a good way to go."

So who's this new Batman readers will meet Saturday clad in a robotic suit and rabbit-eared antennas? Batman artist Greg Capullo, who designed the fresh Bat-armor, won't reveal but teases it's "a guy who's more fallible and more dependent on technology than Bruce. Just by those two things, it's a radical departure."

The tone of the book will change, too, as the Batman comic taps into the current zeitgeist of comics being more fun than dark, Snyder adds. "There's going to be death and destruction and murder," but it will also "show how joyous and how zany and how crazy a character can be while still staying true to core."