Batwoman returned from a lengthy hiatus last night, and it wasted no time in making a huge revelation about the Arrowverse’s Batman. Bruce Wayne is nowhere to be found in present-day Gotham City, but we’ve got glimpses and references to Kate Kane’s cousin over the course of the season. And in episode 17, “A Narrow Escape,” we learned something groundbreaking about him: Earth-Prime’s Batman is a killer.
When we last saw her, Kate murdered Dr. August Cartwright, the man responsible for tearing her family apart, in a fit of rage. In this episode, she’s struggling to come to terms with her actions, feeling that’s she’s betrayed everything that her cousin stood for by breaking his number one rule. When opening up to her friend Luke Fox, however, the truth was revealed: Bruce did the exact same thing as her. In the Arrowverse, Batman killed the Joker.
Luke explains that the Clown Prince of Crime isn’t really locked up in Arkham Asylum, but was murdered by the Dark Knight at some point in the past. We don’t know exactly what drove Batman to take the life of his arch-nemesis, but now that that bombshell’s out there, we’ll hopefully find out some more details in the future.
It’s possible that this is the real reason Batman disappeared from Gotham in the first place, as he was so ashamed at having become a murderer. As for why he did it, could the “Death in the Family” event have occurred, with Joker killing Robin, leading an angry, vengeful Batman to kill Mr. J in turn? Maybe.
What this does mean is that we likely won’t see the Joker in the Arrowverse anytime soon. That was a long shot anyway, but the fact that he’s canonically dead kind of blows all hopes of it happening out of the water. Having said that, if The CW ever gets the rights to the character, they can always reveal that he actually survived.
In any case, Batwoman continues this Sunday with episode 1×18 “If You Believe In Me, I’ll Believe In You.”