Gotham City Has Fallen In This First Look Preview Of Batman #76

Even if you haven't picked up a Batman comic in a while, you probably won't be surprised to learn that things haven't exactly been easy on Bruce Wayne for these past few months. Not only was he left at the alter and then subjected to a series of horrible Scarecrow-induced hallucinations, he also recently uncovered a secret cabal of villains lead by his archnemesis Bane who has secretly engineered just about every misfortune Batman has faced for the last year or so. It was all, it turned out, part of Bane's master plan to conquer the unconquerable--to crush Batman so completely that Gotham City itself would belong to him.

And now, it seems, Bane has succeeded. Gotham as we know it is no more, and in its place is a hellscape ruled by villains, puppeteered by Bane himself while Bruce is nowhere to be found.

How are things going? Well, take a quick look at this exclusive preview of issue #76 to get some idea. The short answer is: about as well as you might expect.

Gallery

Issue #76 is part two of the appropriately named City Of Bane story arc, which kicked off in the last issue and will bring us through the grand finale of writer Tom King's work on the series. Can Bane be dethroned? And even if Bruce does somehow manage to take him on and win, can Gotham ever recover from the damage? It's been a long, long time since the city-destroying stories of epic events like Batman: No Man's Land or Batman: Zero Year, so here's hoping the city's infrastructure and population learned some valuable lessons--otherwise, taking Bane out of the picture may actually be the least of Batman's problems.

Batman #76 hits shelves this Wednesday, everywhere comics are sold.