Batman #433 – “Period of Mourning” – John Byrne/Jim Aparo/Mke DeCarlo
This is the first chapter of the Many Deaths of the Batman storyline and it’s done in an interesting way, with almost no dialogue. The art is great and really tells the story well, but the lack of dialogue makes for a very fast read. It starts with the cops being summoned to the scene of a crime, but when they arrive they’re shocked to see the victim is Batman, who’s been beaten and tied to a fence. He’s rushed to the hospital and taken to the emergency room. While the
doctors are working on him, one tries to remove his mask but another doctor stops him. After trying frantically to save him (including using defibrillator paddles), everyone is stunned when Batman dies. As the ER team try to process Batman’s death, a tabloid photographer gets wind of something big going on and bribes his way into the morgue, where he’s shocked to find Batman dead. He takes a photo and it’s the front page story the next morning. We get reactions from various people to the news: Penguin and Two-Face are thrilled (although Two-Face has to let his coin decide how he 
feels); Dick Grayson and Alfred are devastated (with Alfred frantically checking Bruce’s room and the Batcave to see if the story might be wrong); and Commissioner Gordon, who leaves a convention to come look at Batman’s body. After telling everyone to leave, he unmasks Batman, but it isn’t Bruce Wayne under the mask. Meanwhile, another Batman (looking as dead as the first one) is propped up on the roof of the Gotham Plaza hotel. A bomb explodes and pieces of his costume drift to the street below, confusing and frightening the civilians.
Detective #600 – “Blind Justice Chapter 5: Hidden Agendas” – Sam Hamm/Denys Cowan/Dick Giordano, Frank McLaughlin
This is the final part of the Blind Justice storyline. So far, Bruce Wayne has uncovered shady dealings at WayneTech, where one of his managers (Riordan) was working for a secret Cartel, developing questionable projects off the books. One of those projects was a way of transferring someone’s consciousness into a different body, but the head of the research team (Dr. Harbinger) decided to use the research to help himself get out of his own crippled body. When Bruce tried to shut things down, the Cartel
framed him as a Communist spy, but Harbinger (who’s also on the Cartel’s hit list for hijacking the project) went one step further, transferring his mind into the body of a derelict named T-Bone. Harbinger shot Bruce (putting him into a coma) and since the cops are looking for T-Bone, he cleaned up the wino’s body and gave himself a makeover with some embezzled money he’d set aside. As for being a Commie spy, Bruce’s past training as Batman made him look guilty because he was hanging around some shady people, including Henri Ducard, an international mercenary and assassin. Ducard arrives in the United States to 
testify against Bruce on the Cartel’s orders. He’s wondering if Bruce might have him killed, so he’s relieved to hear about Bruce’s shooting. Bruce comes out of his coma, but the doctors aren’t sure if he’ll walk again. Commissioner Gordon keeps using the Bat-Signal (which Batman obviously isn’t responding to) and even gives Batman credit for some of the police’s collars. He says it’s to prevent a crime wave if people knew Batman was missing, but in the two previous issues it’s strongly hinted that he knows Batman is Bruce Wayne, so he might be trying to protect his secret identity too. Riordan asks Ducard to finish Bruce off, promising to get him some clemency from various
countries where he’s wanted. Bruce leaves the hospital, knowing it was Harbinger who tried to kill him. Government agents are searching Wayne Manor for evidence of Bruce’s Communist ties, despite the protests of Jeannie and her brother Roy, who are still staying with Bruce and feel guilty because it was investigating Roy’s disappearance that kicked off this whole mess. (I’m not sure if these investigators actually work for the government, since they seem to be looking for Harbinger’s log book.) Their snooping accidentally opens the entrance to the Batcave and Roy goes down there just 
in time to run into Bruce and Alfred. Meanwhile, Ducard contemplates Batman’s role as a crimefighter, saying that his endless parade of rogues only exist to be foils to his brand of justice, while true evil works in the shadows, building power without any fanfare. (He likens Batman’s crimefighting efforts to using a Band-Aid on a cancer patient.) Roy promises to keep Bruce’s secret (even from Julie) and offers to be his proxy while Bruce recovers, hinting that Bruce could occupy his body with Harbinger’s mind-transfer device (since Roy was one of Harbinger’s guinea pigs and still has a biochip in his head). Speaking of Harbinger, he’s refined his research so that he can affect other people’s brains remotely. He tests it on a random guy and then uses it to paralyze one of Riordan’s thugs. Roy uses Alfred to test the mind-transfer device, putting Alfred’s mind inside Roy’s body, which doesn’t make Bruce happy (especially as he’s trying to find a nice way to dump Jeannie.
Chapter 6: Covert Operations
Bruce and Roy do a test run with Bruce inside Roy’s body dressed as Batman. They seem to fool Commissioner Gordon and manage to capture a hostage taker, but Roy’s body isn’t in nearly as good shape as Bruce’s. Riordan is still trying to duplicate Harbinger’s experiments, but without his log book, things aren’t going well. Ducard tells Riordan how he and Bruce once tracked an international terrorist, learning to think like him. Ducard killed the terrorist, which horrified Bruce, and they parted ways. Ducard says he thinks Bruce is Batman, but Batman’s appearance the previous night puts that into question (although
Ducard is smart enough to figure out Bruce may be using Harbinger’s research to be in two places at once). Harbinger goes to see Riordan and uses his brain-control device to render Riordan incapable of lying so he’ll tell Harbinger where all his equipment is. Bruce figures out that he can use the mind-transfer device to hop from person to person until he finds Harbinger. He ends up in the body of one of Riordan’s Bonecrushers, just in time to see Harbinger getting Riordan to return all his scientific equipment. Harbinger’s control over Riordan (who still can’t lie) and the other Bonecrushers (who are used like puppets) astonishes Bruce, but because he has remote control of the body he’s in, Harbinger can’t control 
it. Bruce plays along to get more info, but loses Harbinger when Alfred breaks the connection. Bruce realizes that he can’t get into Harbinger’s head now because he’s disabled the biochip in his new body, but at least he knows what that body looks like now. His search is interrupted when Ducard shows up to ask for money in exchange for betraying the Cartel … and keeping Bruce’s Batman identity secret. Bruce tries to use Roy’s body to discourage Jeannie, but it doesn’t work. The Cartel pounds Riordan to find out where Harbinger’s equipment went, but they don’t believe Harbinger is in another body now, so they assume Riordan is lying (and Harbinger wiped the Bonecrushers’ memories, so they can’t corroborate his story).
Chapter 7: Ulterior Motives
Bruce sends a photo of Harbinger’s new face to the cops so they can track him down and calls Riordan to gather info on the Cartel’s activity. In Roy’s body, Bruce tracks Riordan as he gathers the evidence and watches as Harbinger blows up T-Bone’s body, knowing he’ll transfer into one of the Bonecrushers permanently. He follows Riordan to a secret hideout, where Harbinger has already transferred his mind into the Bonecrusher just in time to get all of Riordan’s gathered evidence as insurance the Cartel won’t come after him. Bruce (in Roy’s body dressed as Batman) busts in and pounds the thugs, chasing Harbinger onto some elevated train tracks. He
catches his ankle and Harbinger is about to finish him when he gets Alfred to switch frequencies, so Bruce’s mind is in the Bonecrusher and Roy’s mind is back in his own body. But Roy thinks Bonecrusher works for Harbinger and tries to hold him on the tracks when the train arrives to kill him. Bruce wrenches both of them free, but they fall to their deaths. Bruce’s mind ends up back in his own body, but Roy is dead, still wearing the Batman costume. Jeannie is so pissed off that Bruce got her brother killed that she leaves (although she promises to keep his secret). Riordan (still under Harbinger’s 
“can’t lie” stricture) spills everything about the Cartel to the government, clearing Bruce’s name. Ducard kills Riordan for the Cartel and Gordon tells Bruce that he can let everyone think Batman is dead. Gordon again hints that he knows the truth and suggests that Batman’s time has come to an end and he might want a rest to think about his priorities. Ducard leaves the country, sending Bruce a letter congratulating him on his ruthlessness, but warning that in becoming the enemy, he has to be sure not to lose himself. (Apparently, everyone—Jeannie, Gordon, Ducard—thinks that Bruce let Roy die to preserve his secret identity, and Bruce isn’t really contradicting them.) Bruce contemplates why he can’t just let go of the anger over his parents’
murders and concludes that the world needs Batman to mete out justice, even if doing so means Bruce Wayne is lost forever. There are some more tributes to Batman’s 50th anniversary after the story, this time by Neal Adams, Walt Simonson, Will Eisner, Alan Brennert, Adam West, Dick Sprang, Eric Van Lustbader, Stan Lee, Mick Zeck, Samuel R. Delany, Julie Schwartz, Penn and Teller, Keith Giffen/Al Gordon, and Sergio Aragones.