The Justice League are stronger as a team than they are when they become separated, and that’s exactly what the Batman Who Laughs has done.
WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Dark Nights: Death Metal Guidebook by Joshua Williamson, Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, Doug Mahnke, Jaime Mendoza, David Baron and Tom Napolitano, on sale now.
Dark Nights: Death Metal shows what has become of the world since the Batman Who Laughs and his Dark Knights conquered Earth and transformed it in their twisted dark version. This series also follows a small band of heroes as they fight back against these dark forces. Death Metal Guidebook provides some background and fills in the details of how the world was taken over, and it becomes clear that the Justice League made a fatal strategic mistake in their defense of the world.
In the story, “The Fall of Earth,” Lex Luthor narrates how easy the world was overcome by the forces of evil. When The Batman Who Laughs gathered his Dark Knights, which are evil versions of Batman from the Dark Multiverse, the Justice League came together to protect the world. The Justice League had just returned to earth after battling Perpetua, but instead of staying together, they split up and tried to take on the Dark Knights alone. As Luthor points out, this was the team’s “fatal mistake” and was exactly what the evil Batman expected them to do.
Members of the Justice League must have forgotten the time Batman used a similar “divide and conquer” technique in the Mark Waid and Howard Porter JLA story, “Tower of Babel.” It’s revealed in this story that Batman had contingency plans to take down each member of the Justice League in case they ever went rogue and became evil. Batman’s plan was simple: he used each Justice Leaguer’s weakness against them. For example, Batman’s plan to defeat Plastic Man was to freeze him in liquid nitrogen and shatter him to pieces. Also pivotal to Batman’s plan was to separate each hero from the others so he could fight them individually.
This is the same strategy the Batman Who Laughs used to take over the world. Each Dark Knight mirrored “the intellect and drive” of this world’s Batman, but they have none of the same moral code. The Batman Who Laughs, for example, is a combination of Batman and the Joker. He has all the strengths, intelligence, and money of Batman as well as the insanity, cunningness, and total lack of morality of the Joker. As each Dark Knight identified their earth hero target, they systematically took out the DC Universe’s heroes through targeted traps.
If the Justice League, who were already weakened from their off-world battle with Perpetua, had stuck together and taken on the Dark Knights as a unified team, things may have gone differently. As the true villain, Ra’s al Ghul, revealed himself in “Tower of Babel,” it was only because the Justice League fought together that they were able to defeat him.
The Justice League is always at its strongest when unified as a team. When the various superpowers of the Leaguer’s are united, there isn’t an enemy that can defeat the superhero team. When the heroes divide themselves, each of their weaknesses become more prominent. When dealing with an enemy like The Batman Who Laughs, any weakness will be exploited and used against them, and this is precisely the plan The Batman Who Laughs used.
When the Justice League returned to earth, they all decided to split up and “face the chaos from each of their own home fronts.” The Batman Who Laughs carefully paired certain Dark Knights with particular heroes because he knew the Dark Knights had studied the weaknesses of our world’s heroes. His strategy worked and three Leaguers were defeated almost immediately.
The Justice League should have learned their lesson from Batman, that the strength of the League lies in their unity. The League’s refusal to fight as a team led to an easy victory for The Batman Who Laughs and the complete defeat of the world.
