Green Arrow #32 -- the finale of the mini “Gotham Resistance” crossover and part of the larger Dark Nights: Metal event current playing out across select DC Comics titles -- may prove to be a potentially critical moment in the battle against the forces of the Dark Multiverse. So far, the heroes of the DC Universe have played defense against Barbatos and his army of Dark Knights — twisted versions of Batman mashed up with members of the Justice League — but now, the good guys have a fighting chance thanks to the Gotham Resistance, who have discovered a way to take on and defeat the seemingly indestructible beings from beyond the Dark Multiverse.

The Danger

Following a last minute rescue by Mister Terrific at the end of the previous week’s issue of Suicide Squad, the Gotham Resistance were given somewhat of a breather. However, they still had to contend with a city overrun by nightmarishly powerful versions of Batman’s most dangerous foes, amped up to eleven and given their hearts’ desires by the deadly Batman Who Laughs. Thanks to his dark metal playing cards, he was able to give rogues like Mister Freeze, The Riddler and Poison Ivy a way to rewrite the very nature of Gotham’s laws of physics, not only enhancing themselves and their abilities, but the very way in which they interact with the very city itself.

RELATED: DC Announces Dark Nights: Metal Official Soundtrack

Unfortunately, Mister Terrific has even worse news for the Gotham Resistance: The Batman Who Laughs has abducted the members of the Suicide Squad and the Teen Titans, and strapped them in to a giant machine keyed into the vibrational frequency of the DC Universe. Every person in the world vibrates at the same frequency as the world itself, but if the Dark Knights are able to alter that individual frequency of enough people then Earth-0 (read: Earth Negative Zero) will become unstuck from the cosmic order and fall into the black depths of the Dark Multiverse.

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It’s an interesting inversion of one of the most classic plot points used in DC crossover events; a throwback to the multiversal tuning fork from Crisis on Infinite Earths and Infinite Crisis. In the pages of Infinite Crisis, Alexander Luthor attempts to strip the unified Earth back into a multiverse to return home to Earth-3 and does so by strapping heroes such as Jay Garrick, Black Adam and The Ray — who all should have existed on other worlds if the multiverse was still around at the time — and using their frequencies to bring back their worlds. As the inverse of that, The Batman Who Laughs wants to use people native to Earth-0 to unlodge the world from its place on the Multiversal map; a one way trip into the Dark Multiverse.

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The Rescue

While the rest of the rag-tag team feels hopeless in the face of such insurmountable evil, it falls to Robin to step up and lead them, reminding them in spirit of what his father’s mission is and how he goes about them. Green Arrow notices in narration that while Batman is often seen as a loner, he’s someone that doesn’t just seek out teams, he works with them. Now, Damian is learning to do the same whether it’s with the larger Bat-Family, his role on the Teen Titans or the makeshift group of heroes trapped in Gotham. It’s a callback to “The First Truth of Batman” from Grant Morrison’s time with the character, which pointed out that the first thing Bruce Wayne did after deciding to be Batman was to call for help. In Batman: Year One, the bat crashes through the window, Bruce Wayne realizes what he has to do to save Gotham and then he picks up the bell and rings for Alfred to come patch him up. The First Truth of Batman is that he was never alone, and now that Damian understands that too, he’s better equipped to live up to his father’s legacy.

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The Gotham Resistance attempted to save their friends by entering Bain’s House of Pain, a fight club erected in what is now known as The Sixth Ring of Gotham, but discovered that they couldn’t unhook their friends and allies from the machine without killing them. Worst of all, Killer Croc begged Harley to have Amanda Waller blow them all up and destroy the machine but before he could say any more, a series of haunting notes signalled the arrival of The Batman Who Laughs in his tricked-out ride — which like the man himself, is somewhere between a Batmobile and a Jokermobile. While The Batman Who Laughs tried to seduce Harley Quinn into switching sides, Robin and Nightwing fought the Dark Robin inside Ban’s fight-pit. Out of arrows, Green Arrow was forced to rely on the Nth Metal arrow he discovered in the secret armory, but the Dark Robin was too fast for him, and it instead pierced Damian right through the shoulder.

The Victory

However, Damian is a stronger and more resiliant thirteen year old than people give him credit for, and while the Dark Robin gloated about the joys of joining The Batman Who Laughs, he was able to get him into position to shove the arrow through the back of his shoulder and into the Dark Robin’s heart. What’s interesting is that contact with the Nth Metal seemed to disrupt the dark energy sustaining the evil Robin, and he exploded in a shower of electricity. Unfortunately, the heroes didn’t have too long to celebrate as The Batman Who Laughs summoned the rest of the Dark Knights — using Cyborg as a Boom Tube — but the heroes were quickly saved by Doctor Fate, who has been rescuing anyone he can from the clutches of the doppelgänger Batmen. Safe in the Tower of Fate, the Gotham Resistance failed their mission to save the city and save their friends, but now they know that Nth Metal is the key to defeating the denizens of the Dark Multiverse -- they just need a whole lot more of it.

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Which is a shame, because Nth Metal is a limited resource in the DC Universe right now. The recent Death of Hawkman miniseries was all about Despero attempting to acquire what little Nth Metal was left and it resulted in there being even less reserves than there was to begin with. In order to defeat the Dark Knights, the heroes of the DC Universe are going to have to explore every nook and cranny in search of the mysterious metal. Interestingly, one of the upcoming Dark Nights: Metal one-shots is named Hawkman: Found, so it seems that Carter Hall’s role in the event is going to have an impact towards its conclusion, because if anyone knows Nth Metal, it’s Hawkman.