'Banned' Batman story being released almost twenty years later

[cyberghostface]

A while back DC had an event in 2001 called "This issue: Batman dies" across the Bat-titles which basically amounted to villains fantasizing about killing the Dark Knight. The issue of Gotham Knights was told from the perspective of Victor Zsasz but the issue was pulled at the last minute because it was too gory. The artist posted some of the pages on his Facebook here which I am sharing below but the whole issue was never released... until now.

The DC solicitations for December 2019 show that the 'Arkham: Victor Zsasz' trade will be presenting the complete planned story that DC didn't want you to see. Looking back on it the controversy is kind of funny because I can think of a few moments from the big two that are more graphic than anything we see here. Heck even 'Carnage: Mind Bomb' came out in 1996 and that was considerably more horrific than this.

NSFW for gore





















In case you are wondering what is going on, I asked the artist on Facebook a few years ago and he told me (highlight below for spoilers):

Batman hit Zsasz with a blood thinner. So Zsasz is losing a lot of blood when he cuts himself and he's hallucinating. The 'woman' he killed is just a mannequin. Presumably at the end of the issue he 'kills' Batman but it's in his mind.