The Narrows is an island in the middle of the Finger River, situated between Midtown and Downtown Gotham City.
History[]
Nolanverse[]
A probable testament to the achievements of urban sprawl and its excesses, its claustrophobic and rigid streets are made none the safer with the borough being one of Gotham's more derelict and lower income segregated neighborhoods. It is home to the decaying and dilapidated neighborhood in which the infamous Arkham Asylum is located. It is also the place where Ra's al Ghul began his assault on Gotham City.[1]
New 52 / Rebirth[]
The Narrows were eventually inserted into the modern Gotham City map. In "Prime Earth" continuity, the Narrows are located on a small island surrounded by the Finger River, which is a tributary of the Gotham River. This places the Narrows between the Diamond District in Downtown and Robinson Park in Midtown.[2][3]
Other Versions[]
Gotham[]
The Narrows appears in the origin show Gotham. Following the Court of Owls attack on Gotham City with a weaponized virus, the Narrows is the part of the city which was hit hardest the most which resulted in poverty and an increase in crime. Leslie Thompkins takes over the Narrows in order to help out the unfortunate living there, and later gets assistance from Edward Nygma.
Behind the Scenes[]
- The Narrows is actually a riverside neighborhood in Blüdhaven in the original post-crisis 90s comics, a city even more dangerous than Gotham.
- Nathan Crowley told his illustrators to take inspiration from Kowloon Walled City of Hong Kong, an extremely condensed fort turned neighborhood of Kowloon, Hong Kong comprised of a maze like hive of narrow alleyways and corridors between closely positioned buildings notorious for its location being a hotspot for Triad and criminal activity, and police corruption and informal hands off jurisdiction that did not allow them to pursue criminal organizations within the district. Later interest in Kowloon Walled City would rise after its demolition in 1993, where it has been a focus of both self sufficient civilian "guerilla capitalism" and futurist mystique for dystopian and "punk" like infrastructure.
- When the Narrows were introduced in the regular comics, DC revised the original map of Gotham City by Eliot R. Brown that was created for Batman: No Man's Land back in the late 1990s. The current map for Prime Earth now includes the Narrows and places them in the Finger River, located between the Downtown and Midtown islands.[2][3]