WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Detective Comics #1035 by Mariko Tamaki, Dan Mora, Jordie Bellaire, and Aditya Bidikar, on sale now.
Something ominous is happening in Gotham City, and it has some striking similarities to the plot of Ghostbusters II. In Detective Comics #1035, the disappearance and murder of one of Gotham's social elite has lead to a rise in anger that doesn't seem possible naturally, even with grief as a fuel for it and in the wake of an increasingly anti-vigilante police force.
But now it seems that the recently deceased are coming back to life as Gotham's citizens descend into a frenzy. Something similar occurred in Ghostbusters II, with the mysterious ill will tying back to the sewers, much like Gotham's current plight. Most concerningly, this increase in anger and fear is pushing the city ever closer to authorizing the use of the Future State's Magistrate.
The disappearance of Sarah Worth, one of Bruce Wayne's new neighbors was quickly followed up by Batman. Tragically, he found Sarah's corpse strung up in the sewers below, but the who, how, and why were left unanswered. But the aftermath has certainly riled Gotham up even more than before. Sarah's father and partner are both grief-stricken, but it seems to have manifested as barely controlled rage. But the clincher is that Sarah's father seems to be fueled by the anger of losing his child, while her partner, Sam Tern, seems to be experiencing something more artificial.
While he is understandably aggrieved at the loss of the woman he loved, even Batman could note that the level of anger Sam was feeling was unnatural. Something was aggravating the anger to an extreme level, making him act irrationally as he attempted to shoot Batman. Things would only get stranger from there as it would seem that Sarah's corpse has been reanimated, shambling onto the streets of her old neighborhood. So all in all, more questions have arisen than answers, but the plot is still similar to the faced by the Ghostbusters in their second movie.
After being forced to retire, the Ghostbusters were brought back into the supernatural business when slime from the sewers began causing supernatural chaos. As they investigated, it became obvious that anyone exposed to the slime was automatically overwhelmed by negative emotions, making them violently turn on the people nearest to them. The slime itself being a physical manifestation of the city's negativity. And in conjunction with this, more and more ghosts were beginning to appear, mostly having some angry connection to someone whose negativity summoned them.
Now, Gotham is facing a similar issue, artificially enhanced cases of anger are on the rise and the dead are coming back. But there are some missing elements. The slime for example is not present. However, the supernatural aspect of it is still a possible explanation. Even though Batman has no powers of his own, Gotham City has a long history with the supernatural. And Batman is rarely prepared to deal with such things on his own. If this is truly something supernatural, it will take all of his skill and resources to save the city from itself.
Thanks to the vigilante-hating Mayor Nakano in the main Batman comic, the city is already reaching a boiling point. The city may be able to keep itself relatively calm in the face of a possible Scarecrow attack, but if the dead start popping up en masse, then the residents of Gotham might just lose their collective minds. This could be the final key to pushing the city into the arms of the peacekeepers and throwing away Gotham's freedom for the sake of security.