This article contains spoilers.

Writer Tom King is having a hell of a year.

Of course Im talking aboutScott Snyder and Greg Capullo.

But theres no doubt in my mind that King is the man for the job.

For one thing, Batmans about to spend the next two months fighting kaiju in Gotham.

Seriously, go look at Janins art in theBatman: Rebirthissue.

His drawings of Calendar Man are absolutely haunting.

Finch, of course, is already a Batman legend.

But Gotham and Gotham Girl, with their Superman-like abilities, have inspired Batman.

We even talked about Condiment King!

Tom King: Thats a really good observation!

I went back and did a lot of reading of first issues ofBatman.

It seemed like the general pattern was to introduce a villain as your huge contribution to the Bat universe.

I didnt want to do that, so I went the opposite way and I introduced a hero.

Im sort of exploring what makes Batman the hero Gotham deserves.

Why dont they have a Superman?

Why dont they have a Green Lantern?

I wanted to introduce a character as good and as powerful as them into Gotham.

Do you ever see a day when Batman could leave the protection of Gotham City to another hero?

I can see that day.

But I think a better way to put it is I think Batman sees that day.

I think Batman thinks that his vow is attainable from inside his psyche.

Hes like, I will fix Gotham.

Whether I have to do it or someone else has to do it, its going to get done.

But I dont think Batman believes that.

(Duke Thomas seems pretty well put together by comparison, actually.)

So do you see Gotham Girl as an analog for this eras new Robin?

I dont think so.

I mean, when I think of a Robin, I think of someone without powers.

Gotham Girl has a significant power set.

But I didnt set out to write another Robin story.

What do you love so much about these baddies?

I love different things about each of them.

I loved that idea.

Psycho-Pirate was a revelation to me as a child.

But the weapon the Anti-Monitor used to accomplish his tasks was this weeny little guy with a mask.

As a kid, I was like, What?

And that always fascinated me.

When I had a chance to put in a big bad, I went with Psycho-Pirate.

Sometimes we play games.

One of the games we play is What would be an amazing Batman image?

What would Batman do?

And I was already using Hugo Strange and we had this idea to have huge monsters.

Hugo Stranges Monster Men just clicked together.

And the Monster Men have gone through a kaiju redesign.

Was that in place from the start?

In fact, it really comes from the imagination of Steve Orlando.

The Monster Men crossover is so awesome.

What can fans expect from theNight of the Monster Mencrossover?

Tim Seeley is doing my second favorite book, which is this huge story about Nightwing.

Why are these all separate?

All of these people know each other.

This is our first chance to say, Look, were all living in the same universe.

Were all playing in the same sandbox.

And all of these stories are going to merge.

And when they merge, its going to be chaos and sparks are going to fly.

Its our chance to show that each of our series impacts the other.

People expect Batman to punch a robber in the face.

Thats a wonderful image to think about.

Im doing some deep diving for all this stuff.

Youll see in issue #6 that Kite Man makes an appearance.

I guarrantee its the best Kite Man youve ever seen.

Ivan Reis is a brilliant artist.

And Colonel Blimp appears.

I have some deep cuts in #6.

Condiment King is in #9…

Did you just say Condiment King?

Thats right…

Thats amazing!

Is Condiment King in his Suicide Squad?!

Anything else you could say about your next Batman story?

Im a huge [John] OstranderSuicide Squadfan.

My one ask was Ive always wanted to tell a Suicide Squad story.

Can we do Batman and the Suicide Squad?

And he was like, Yes, lets do that.

Before I had any idea what my Batman was going to be, I wanted to tell this part.

The story is called I Am Suicide because this is mission impossible.

This is a mission Batman cant win, and he knows it going in.

Thats what makes this fun.

Everyone in the world is going to be buying Mikel Janin Batman statues and toys.

The guy is setting a new standard.

Does this mean were going to see shirtless Bruce again?

If Mikel and I are together, shirts will be removed!

Tom King, thanks so much!

Batman #6 is out now.

John Saavedra is an associate editor at Den of Geek.

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Or check out all his work athis website.