Batman: Arkham Unhinged #41

Uninvited Guests

Up until a couple days ago, I had no idea that there was an ongoing comic series based in the Arkham Asylum universe. I have played both of the main games in the Arkham Asylum series though I have not played through any of the DLC campaigns. I enjoyed both of the games, but I was a little cynical about a comic adaptation since the plot of Arkham City was pretty ridiculous. My cynicism rose when I discovered that Arkham Unhinged was not just set in the same universe as Arkham Asylum, but also told a story set during Arkham City. How can a comic mine for a worthwhile tale in a game where you literally follow Batman's movement every second he spends in the city? Sure, creative liberties and all that, but still, it seem like a difficult task to pull off.

In this installment of Arkham Unhinged, we follow Hugo Strange as he sets his endgame for Arkham City in motion.

A 99 Cent Adventure?

The first thing that struck me about this issue was the price. Only 99 cents for a comic? How long would this thing be? Considering this comic comes out weekly, I expected that perhaps I would only get about eight pages or so. In reality, there are many more pages than that, but each page is about half the length of a comic page, so in the end, you probably end up with about half the size of a regular comic. The price tag fits the story length.

Boooooring!

Sadly, there is no worthwhile story in these pages. All the comic manages to do is show events from the game from Dr. Strange's perspective, but there are no worthwhile insights into either his head or how he set up the operation. More links are established between Ra's Al Ghul and Strange, but the main problem I had with the game's plot was never addressed. Specifically, I would like to know how Ra's had the political capital to have people imprisoned in Gotham. Batman never even makes an appearance in this story, and there is no action. It really adds nothing to the universe.

Conclusion

If you methodically tracked down every trophy in Arkham City and read every file on every character, then you would probably enjoy this comic, but for anybody looking to spend their money carefully, do not bother with this one.