Azrael

Trained from birth by the secretive Order of St. Dumas to serve as its deadly assassin, Jean-Paul Valley eventually broke free of his conditioning and allied himself with Batman, operating as a vigilante in Gotham City — here presented in German-language editions from Panini Deutschland.

Stepping out of the pages of a 1998 Panini Deutschland crossover event, this Azrael has kept remarkable company across nearly three decades of comics — sharing adventures with the likes of Batman, Bruce Wayne, Cassandra Cain, and Batwoman in the shadowy corners of the DC universe as filtered through a German-language publishing lens. Most at home in the pages of Batman – Detective Comics and DC Crossover, this is a character whose longevity speaks for itself, persisting from the late Copper/Modern Age all the way through to 2025. With co-creators Dennis O'Neil and Joe Quesada behind that debut, there's serious pedigree here, and for collectors hunting the Panini Deutschland corner of the DC world, Azrael is a name well worth tracking down.