One downside to this era were the backup stories in Detective Comics and Gotham Knights. I have some of the backups listed below, as they have more direct ties to current era Batman.

This still requires a bit of copying pages since a lot of the backups share a page with the main story. I have also skipped the brief Larry Hama run of Batman, because those issues were just horrible.

New Gotham
Detective 742
GK 1-2
Detective 743-746
GK 3-5
Detective 747
GK 6-7
Detective 748-750

The B&W backups from GK 4-7 can all go in place. #1 could probably go in published order. #2 is a John Byrne Generations story, and #3 takes place earlier in Batman’s career.

New Gotham 2
GK 8-11
Detective 751-753
Batman 582-586
Turning Points 5
GK 13 (B&W)
GK 17 (B&W)
LOTDK #168

None of the GK B&W backups from the issues in this volume actually go in place. I opted to skip GK 12, since it was a fill-in. It would have gone before or after Turning Points 5.  The story originally scheduled for GK #12 was finally published in a Zsasz TPB in 2020.  The LOTDK issue is from a few years later, but has to go here based on costume details, and Gordon being Commissioner — although I suppose it could take place after Infinite Crisis. I included the issue only because I had gotten the Batman Begins trade for a different project, and had this issue left over. Since I hadn’t sent this volume to the binders, I opted to include the story here so it wouldn’t go to waste.

Officer Down
Batman 587
Robin 86
Birds of Prey 27
Catwoman 90
Nightwing 53
Detective 754
GK 13
Detective 755

Unknowing
GK 14-15
Superman 168
Detective 756-757
GK 16-17
Batman 591-592
Detective 758 (backup – Oracle)
Detective 758-760
GK 18-19
Batman 593-594
Detective 759-762 (backups – Slam Bradley/Catwoman)

The backup in GK #16 can go before the main story. Other than that, none of the other backups fit in this book.

Family Business
Detective 761-762
GK 20-21
Batman 595
GK 22
Detective 763
Batman 596
Detective 764
GK 23
Batman 597
Detective 765
GK 24
Batman 598

None of the GK B&W backups from the issues in this volume actually go in place. I had a lot of back and forth on the placement of Detective 761-762, since they both follow each other and also follow up on the previous Tec arc. I ultimately moved them to the beginning of this book to try to even out the volumes a little bit.

I had contemplated making separate volumes for each of the three core series on either side of Officer Down, but there were enough subplots crossing through them that it wasn’t feasible. At least with this map, I only have 5 volumes, instead of 7.

Tie-ins to Joker: Last Laugh and Our Worlds at War are included here, since none of the main Batman titles really tied in that directly with the crossovers. Also, because of the timing of those two events, it would have left us with very thin volumes.

The Josie Mac backups that start in Detective #763 will go in a Dead Reckoning volume, which will come after Fugitive. The Jacobian (Detective #746-757) has no direct ties to Batman, so can easily be skipped, or just placed at the end of one volume as a bonus feature.

Of course, all of this leads into Murderer/Fugitive.