The superhero genre has been on a pretty wild ride over the last 80 or so years. During their first few decades of existence, superhero comics became one of the most popular forms of entertainment, but just a little while later, sales started to decline rapidly, and the comic book industry was plunged into uncertainty. After declaring bankruptcy in the mid-1990s, Marvel auctioned off some of its most popular characters to the highest bidders, all while DC was doing fairly well with its handful of successful Batman movies. But thanks to the advent of the MCU and prestige movies like Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy, the superhero genre is more popular than ever, and that extends to the video game ecosphere, where games series like Batman: Arkham exist.
Debuting in 2009 with Batman: Arkham Asylum, Rocksteady's Caped Crusader series revolutionized the superhero video game genre, and its sequels only continued to impress. But with the Arkham series now done and dusted, and DC failing to live up to its legacy in the subsequent years, the Batman: Arkham series has essentially become DC's Avengers: Endgame.
How The Batman Arkham Series is the Avengers: Endgame of DC Video Games
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is in troubled waters right now. Debuting with Iron Man all the way back in 2008, the MCU has always had its fair share of disappointing entries, but those have usually been few and far between. Over the course of a decade, the MCU gradually built up a healthy roster of characters, and gave them all an overarching thread that connected all of their stories. When it was time to pull that thread, the world was ready, and Avengers: Infinity War was a cultural moment like no other. That palpable force only got stronger when Avengers: Endgame rolled around, and though it wasn't perfect, it delivered the fan-service and payoff that fans had been waiting over a decade for, a feat that was thought impossible.
But in the aftermath of Avengers: Endgame, the MCU seems a little lost. Phase 4 of the MCU has severely lacked an overall sense of direction. Though Shang Chi, Wandavision, Loki, and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever were all pretty great, they all lack the same overarching plot thread like the one that held the MCU together before Endgame. And with the start of Phase 5 of the MCU, this issue has only gotten worse, with Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania having an extremely disappointing reception. For many fans, it feels as though the MCU will never be able to capture the same feeling that Avengers: Endgame delivered.
In many ways, the Batman: Arkham series follows a very similar pattern. The first game in the series, Batman: Arkham Asylum, was like the Iron Man and Avengers of superhero gaming world, proving that big-budget superhero games can stand right alongside the best in the industry. Batman: Arkham City cemented the series' quality, just as the MCU's Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy did. And though Arkham Knight received a bit of a mixed reception on launch, fans still love it today and embrace its ambition, with the game trying to tie up all the series' loose threads while making everything bigger than ever before, just like Avengers: Endgame.
Since Rocksteady's Batman: Arkham series wrapped up in 2015, DC's video game output has been fairly disappointing, failing to live up to the legacy of that original acclaimed series. Gotham Knights, and even Rocksteady's upcoming Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, both fail to live up to Arkham's legacy. So in many ways, Batman: Arkham is just like the Avengers: Endgame of DC video games.