The final week of Villains Month is here, and this week’s issue of Batman and Robin features Killer Croc. Written by Tim Seeley and illustrated by Francis Portela, this one-shot explores in more detail some of the moments in Croc’s life that influenced his criminal career that we haven’t seen before. Here are some of the pages that were released:
Croc’s most recent big appearance was his role in Batwoman, during one of the story arcs written by J. H. Williams and W. Haden Blackman, who recently quit their positions due to a number of frustrating executive decisions that limited their creative freedom. When Williams posted a letter on the internet explaining why he and Blackman quit, included in his list of the things they were “asked to discard” was their plans for Killer Croc’s origins. Could this have had something to do with Villains Month? Perhaps DC didn’t want Croc to be in two places at once, or maybe he ties into Forever Evil in a way that would have conflicted with Williams and Blackman’s own take on him?
So far, Batwoman has been isolated from the rest of the DCU, so it’s possible that Williams and Blackman’s interpretation of Croc may have been too far estranged from what his possible intended purpose was somewhere else. And if that somewhere else happened to be in a bigger event that would bring in more revenue for the company, such as Villains Month or Forever Evil, cutting his origins out of Batwoman would be a clear decision for the executives, and yet another frustrating editorial change for the writers. As for his future in the comics, all we can do is wait to find out.
(source)