The acclaimed crossover event Dark Nights: Death Metal reimagined the DC Universe as a hellish vision of itself, conquered and reshaped by the Batman Who Laughs to suit his twisted desires.
Many of the DCU's iconic characters took on radically different roles in this new hellscape, from Wonder Woman placed in charge of the underworld in the ruins of Themyscira to Superman growing a flowing mane like a heavy metal rock god while imprisoned on Apokolips. One of the biggest surprises was the revelation of Batman as an undead figure commanding armies from the netherworld with his Black Lantern Ring. For writer Scott Snyder, this character arc was planned since the original Dark Nights: Metal at the start of DC Rebirth.
"I've always wanted to do that! I had that image in my head all the way back when we were on Batman. Batman riding a badass motorcycle armed with an army of the dead behind him and he's wearing a Black Lantern ring? What?!" Snyder told CBR. "Death Metal was the culmination of a lot of fantasies, like 'How am I going to be able to make Wonder Woman Queen of Hell? How am I ever going to be able to make Superman with rocked out hair?' And then I was like 'Oh my god, I can totally do it if I ever do a second Metal! That would be even more awesome!' back when we were planning the first one."
Snyder and the creative team have been thrilled by the enthusiastic fan response to the creative risks and redesigns of the characters over the course of the story. For Snyder, Death Metal was always about a meditation on comics and embracing the aspirational and fun possibilities inherent to the superhero genre, themes that are poised to continue in Infinite Frontier this March.
"There's a lot of fun that comes with the aesthetic and I'm so happy fans have shown us the love they've shown the event and all of it; I'm grateful. You don't get to do this kind of stuff with your favorite characters very often the way we made them look and try to make a story about comics and it really is about comics, I hope that last issue makes it quite clear," Snyder observed. "It's always been the mission statement of an event for us, whether or not the statement had an impact in the line that followed it, or whether it was just saying what we thought. Luckily now, I think the line is even bigger and better than we were saying it should be."
Written by Scott Snyder, pencilled by Greg Capullo, Yanick Paquette and Bryan Hitch, inked by Jonathan Glapion, colored by FCO Plascencia, Nathan Fairbairn and Alex Sinclair and lettered by Tom Napolitano, Dark Nights: Death Metal #7 is on sale now from DC.