20 of the weirdest Batman stories ever

4. Batman briefly becomes a god

It’s bound to happen eventually. If you’re a major character in a superhero franchise with lots of crossover potential, you will eventually go into space. That’s all well and good, but the powers that be (i.e., editors and writers) won’t let you stop there. Why not go further? Why not have increasingly crazy adventures that culminate in your own ascension into godhood?

While Marvel comics has its Guardians of the Galaxy and various god-like Asgardians, DC’s spacefaring god-folk are rather unimaginatively called the New Gods. Despite the title, however, the story of the New Gods is plenty strange in its own right.

Basically, the New Gods live on two opposing planets: New Genesis and Apokolips. New Genesis is a kind of technological Eden, ruled by the definitely-not-Odin figure of the Highfather. Meanwhile, Apokolips is a flaming garbage planet controlled by the tyrannical Darkseid.

The Darkseid War

After a crossover event known as The Darkseid War pitched Darkseid against another supervillain, Anti-Monitor, the members of Earth’s Justice League were deeply changed. The Flash gets bonded with another being and becomes the God of Death, Superman becomes the God of Strength, and even Lex Luthor gets to try out being a New God.

Batman, meanwhile, sits down in the Mobius Chair used by Metron, one of the most intelligent of the New Gods. Batman, therefore, becomes the God of Knowledge. Besides access to all the knowledge in the universe, Bat-god is also immortal, can read minds, and is free to teleport practically wherever he pleases. He also doesn’t need to eat or sleep, which is probably very pleasing to the perpetually busy Bruce Wayne.

He flies the chair back to Gotham and starts creeping everybody out with his glowing blue eyes. Also, he goes full Minority Report and starts sending criminals to the police before they’ve committed any crime.