The Batman Who Laughs has long been criticized for being "overexposed," but a recent review argues that this villain's major appearances between 2018 and 2020 were actually limited. What truly reinforced the impression of ubiquity was DC's concentrated push of the character across multiple major storylines, making the resulting backlash almost inevitable.
The Batman Who Laughs was born in the 2017 event Dark Nights: Metal. Hailing from the Dark Multiverse, he was originally a Batman who, after killing the Joker, was affected by a special toxin, eventually losing his sanity and destroying his own world. He was later recruited by Barbatos to become a villain threatening the DC Multiverse.
This character combines the traits of Batman and the Joker, excelling not only at planning but also at turning the tide during confrontations. The reviewer notes that The Batman Who Laughs quickly rose to fame after his debut, subsequently appearing in works such as Justice League, Batman/Superman, his own miniseries, and Year of the Villain: Hell Arisen.
However, critics argue that The Batman Who Laughs did not appear in DC comics as ubiquitously as some readers remember. As a work driving the main storyline of this phase, Justice League rarely featured him, and he never became a member of the Legion of Doom. Readers who jumped directly from Justice League to Dark Nights: Death Metal might even fail to understand why he replaced Lex Luthor as Perpetua's right-hand man.
The author attributes the negative reception of the character to two factors: The Batman Who Laughs' design and concept are undeniably appealing, and DC quickly positioned him as a major villain; meanwhile, Batman himself is a widely popular character prone to causing aesthetic fatigue. As The Batman Who Laughs gained popularity, the backlash against him also intensified.
The review ultimately concludes that readers' liking or disliking of The Batman Who Laughs is a matter of personal choice, but describing him as a character who appeared in every comic that year, constantly defeating all heroes and villains, does not align with his actual appearances. He held an important position in stories from 2018 to 2020, but was not truly "everywhere."