Grant Morrison and Andy Kubert were made for each other.
Although I wasn’t particularly thrilled with some of the story developments, I’m now over the whole “Batman has a kid” shock, and have moved past Bruce Wayne’s adoption of Tim.
Issue #665, The Black Casebook, is setting up for what seems to be a very interesting story. Bruce Wayne explains to Alfred that one night he met three versions of himself in what he had thought to be a vision:
“A killer Batman with a gun, a bestial Batman on strength-enhancing drugs and the third sold his soul to the Devil and destroyed Gotham.”
There was a long period of time when I had stopped reading comic books. I have no idea if Batman faced these three versions of himself in a past story. At any rate, it really does not affect this story. Batman ends up going after the “bestial” version of himself, but is stopped by some dirty cops just as he is about to discover the brute’s identity.
This is a story worth checking out, it’s reminiscent of the 80’s, but in a good way.
By the way, Damian isn’t dead (are you surprised?) and it seems he will be making a somewhat fitting return in issue #666… of course!