Batman can’t get the grimoire away from her because Talia’s companion is a very chthonic semblance of Killer Croc. Its current owner Professor Manfurd dies just as Batman arrives, and a woman named Talia takes it away. Hot on the mystery of the dead guy found in his living room, a Batman in a costume well-designed in late 20s fashion, and without any costumed Robin, learns from Langstrom that the key to “opening the gate” is a book called The Testament of Ghul.

Yeah, the Lovecraft in-jokes come thick in this one. The bats speak to me… They tell me of a growing horror, a thing crouching at the doorstep of our reality. Oliver points the way to Kirk Langstrom, the scientist, whom he refers to as the “bat-man”. Jim Gordon has just become Chief of Police and coin-flipping Harvey Dent is running for Mayor.

We are introduced to an alternate reality Gotham City when big game hunter Oliver Queen invites Bruce to dinner. The demon Etrigan makes an appearance, (in the form of a visit from Jason Blood,) a harbinger of prophecy guiding Bruce in his quest with simple clues: The events about to unfold are his own father’s doing, Bruce Wayne will die, beware dust come alive once more, and that to save Gotham, he must cut out its heart. Jason Todd guards the ship in Gotham Harbor while Alfred drives Bruce, Dick Grayson and Tim Drake back to stately Wayne Manor where they find a man tied up. He is put in the freezer unit because… well, he kind of smells. Grendon is actually dead, too, or so it seems. Him is He, who bays and slavers forever outside time and space, who shambled down out of the stars when Earth was new and spawned abominations in the seas and blights upon the land. Bruce blows the thing up and returns to Gotham. The rest of his crew is found dead, except for August Grendon who is busy chipping away at the ice far below, trying to free some great tentacled entity (later named Yib-Nogeroth) who has been buried there for aeons. Professor Cobblepot himself has “returned home” and gone native, joining the local penguins.

In the cold wastes of Antarctica, we join Bruce Wayne on an ocean adventure to find the lost Cobblepot expedition.

Batman mignola