Comic Title: Batman #426
Publisher: DC
Cover Date: December 1988
On Sale Date: August 23, 1988 Shipping Date August 23, 1988
Source: Direct Currents, #7

Shipping Date August 25, 1988
Source: Amazing Heroes, #147

Newsstand Date September 17, 1988
Source: Amazing Heroes, #147

Copyright Date August 23, 1988
Source: Library of Congress, Copyright Office 1988

Cover Price: $1.50
Page Count: 48
Editor: Dennis J. O'Neil

Title: "A Death in the Family"
Pages: 44

Feature(s):
Batman (Post-Crisis)

Writer: Jim Starlin
Penciller: Jim Aparo
Inker: Mike DeCarlo
Letterer: John Costanza
Colorist: Adrienne Roy

Reprinted In:
Batman:A Death in the Family TPB (1989)
Batman:A Death in the Family TPB (1989)
Batman:A Death in the Family HC (2009)
Batman:A Death in the Family:The Deluxe Edition HC (2021)

Feature Character(s)

• Batman (last appearance in Detective Comics #593; next appearance in Batman #427)

Supporting Character(s)

• Robin (middle name Peter revealed; last appearance in Batman #425; next appearance in Batman #427)
• Alfred Pennyworth (last appearance in Cosmic Odyssey #2; next appearance in Batman #428)
• Commissioner Gordon (last appearance in Cosmic Odyssey #1; next appearance in Batman #428)

Villain(s)

• Joker (last appearance in Batman:The Killing Joke #1; next appearance in Batman #427)
• A group of pornographers (no further appearances)
• Rupert (Joker's henchman; no further appearances)
• Gaspar Taylor (an associate of the Joker; no further appearances)
• Peter Brando (an arms buyer; no further appearances)
• Jamal and a group of terrorists (no further appearances)

Other Character(s)

• Mrs. Walker (Jason's former neighbor; no further appearances)
• Sharmin Rosen (an Israeli Secret Service agent; no further appearances)
• A navy pilot and a group of commandos (no further appearances)

Cameo Appearance(s)

• Two-Face (in flashback to the death of Willis Todd)
• Catherine Todd (in Jason's thoughts)
• Willis Todd (in Jason's thoughts)
• Lady Shiva (on a computer monitor; last name Woosan revealed)
• Sheila Haywood (a famine relief worker; on a computer monitor)

Comments:
Book One of Four

This story is told in two separate chapters which were originally intended to appear in separate issues. Instead, they were combined into a single double-length issue.

Chapter 1 (pgs 1-22)
Chapter 2 (pgs 23-44)

This story continues in Batman #427.

Synopsis:
Batman and Robin take out a group of pornographers in Gotham City. After Robin acts recklessly, Batman temporarily benches him. Jason begins looking through his late father's things. He finds a copy of his own birth certificate. His mother's name on the certificate has been smudged, but it does not match the name Catherine Todd. Jason now believes Catherine was not his birth mother and sets out to find his biological mom.

Meanwhile, the Joker escapes from Arkham Asylum. Police have seized most of his hidden assets, leaving him broke. One asset, the police did not find was a stolen cruise missile. The Joker heads to Lebanon to sell it. Batman pursues.

Batman tracks the Joker to Beruit. On the streets outside the hotel of an arms buyer, Bruce Wayne finds Jason Todd. Jason has identified three women who could potentially be his mother. One is a Israeli Secret Service woman Sharmin Rosen, who is staying at the hotel and has been seen in the company of the arms buyer.

Batman and Robin join forces to follow them to the desert where the Joker is selling the missile to a terrorist leader. The Dynamic Duo interrupt the sale. Sharmin joins their cause, as she was working undercover to stop the terrorists. The terrorist leader attempts to fire the missile, but it explodes on the launcher. The Joker failed to assemble it correctly.

The Joker escapes into the desert. Robin questions Sharmin who tells him that she never gave birth to a child in Gotham City.