Written by Grant Morrison; Art and covers by J.G. Jones and Carlos Pacheco and Jesus Merino

We start out this issue with Brainiac 5 and Superman in the bleed between universes. Brainiac tells Superman about a weapon that was developed that could turn thought into reality and that it was locked away to prevent disaster. He is about to show it to Superman when Superman starts to fade away into nothingness.

Superman says that he can’t reach it in time, since he is fading and Brainiac tells him just to look at it. We then move to the JLA satellite where the Ray is getting ready to go back to Earth with the chip that the Tattooed Man gave him. As he gets ready to leave the satellite comes under attack. We are then brought back to the Supergirl/JSA versus Mary Marvel fight. They brawl for several pages with Mary Marvel getting in shots at Black Adam and Captain Marvel. As Supergirl is about to win, a crowd gathers controlled by Darkseid and starts to attack her. Captain Marvel swoops in and grabs Mary and is able to transform her back to human form with his magic lightning. At this time, Tawky Tawny kills Kalibak. Mary states that she will never be able to say the magic words again, as Kalibak’s followers bow down to Tawny. We then cut back to Checkmate where there shields have fallen and the final countdown has begun. Mr. Terrific enacts Checkmate’s’ End Game scenario and we see some up close and personal moments with the Super Young Team. We then go back to the JLA satellite and find Black Lightning, Green Arrow and more trying to convert the remaining free heroes to Darkseid followers. The Tattooed Man’s powers disrupt the helmet and Black Canary fight Green Arrow as the satellite spins out of control. We then are back to Checkmate where the Castle has been breached. We find out that the Black Gambit End Game is a search for a parallel world led by both Atom’s and Lord Eye the new contoller of OMAC. They want Renee Montoya to lead the global peace force on the alternate Earth. We then are shown Lex Luthor and Dr. Sivana plotting against Libra. At the right moment Sivana blocks the helmets and Luthor blasts a hole right through Libra as he dissipates. Sivana then hands Luthor a device that he says will make Luthor sound like Darkseid to the followers. We then find the Flashes getting ready to race the Black Racer in order to get to Darkseid , who they say is beyond light. Then a quick scene change finds Batman and Darkseid face to face. Batman states that for once he will make an exception about bullets and guns and is prepared to use the Radion bullet that killed Orion to kill Darkseid. Darkseid then unleashes the Omega Beams against him, but gets shot before the beams hit Batman and kill him, apparently leaving both of them dead. We then cut to scenes of random heroes preparing for battle and trying to save the Earth. Then Superman comes crashing down with his laser beams destroying everything in his path. When he stops we see that he is carrying the dead body of Batman as the red sky envelops the entire Earth. Overall a really solid issue both storyline and artwork wise. It will be interesting to see if it all can be wrapped up in one more issue but this earns 4 out of 5 Batmen.  Put It on The Stack.