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Cassandra Cain Reading Order (Batgirl, Orphan, Black Bat)

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Created by Kelley Puckett and Damion Scott, Cassandra Cain is a member of the Batfamily who made her first appearance in Batman #567 (July 1999), during the No Man’s Land event (see reading order here). She then became Batgirl and got her own solo series. She’s also known as Black Bat and Orphan.

Cassandra Cain is the most lethal member of the Batfamily. The daughter of assassins David Cain and Lady Shiva, she was raised to become a killer. Most accurately, she was conditioned to become the world’s greatest assassin. To achieve that, she was deprived of speech and human contact during her childhood in order to develop an incredible ability to interpret body language to the point of reading complex thoughts – basically, body movement is her first language, and she didn’t talk for a long time. Her unique way of communicating made her an expert martial artist like no other.

Batman took her under his wing, and she soon became the new Batgirl with Barbara Gordon’s blessings. That was before the New 52 era. She got a new origin story after being reintroduced in the DCU in the Batman & Robin Eternal series.

Cassandra Cain Comics Reading Order

Cassandra Cain was introduced during an event, No Man’s Land (for more information about it, go to the full reading order). She first appeared in Batman #567 and Detective Comics #734, but also showed up as Batgirl in Legends of the Dark Knight #120 collected in Batman: No Man’s Land Vol. 2, then in several issues of the Azrael series, and in Batman, Gotham Knights, and Batman Chronicles.

  • Batman: No Man’s Land Omnibus Vol. 1 
    Collects Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #116-121, Azrael: Agent of the Bat #51-57, Batman #563-568, Batman: Shadow of the Bat #83-88, Detective Comics #730-735, Catwoman #72-74, Robin #67, The Batman Chronicles #16-17, Nightwing #35-37, Batman: No Man’s Land (Collector’s) #1, Batman: No Man’s Land Gallery #1, and Young Justice In No Man’s Land #1.

Following the conclusion of No Man’s Land, Cassandra Cain continued her adventures as the new Batgirl in her ongoing series–not entirely collected yet.

Issues #38 to #52 are not collected for now sadly, with the exception of #45, reprinted in Batgirl: A Celebration of 50 Years.

  • Justice League Elite Vol. 1
    Collects Action Comics #775, JLA #100, JLA Secret Files 2004, and Justice League Elite #1-4. In which Cassandra is an undercover agent called Kasumi sent by Batman to monitor the Elite.
  • Justice League Elite Vol. 2
    Collects Justice League Elite #5-12.

Tensions escalate and war comes to Gotham City when Batman is drawn into a skirmish between rival gangs in the War Games storyline (see reading order).

  • Batman: War Games Book One
    Collects Batgirl #53, #55, Batman #631, Batman: The 12-Cent Adventure, Batman Legends Of The Dark Knight #182, Batman Gotham Knights #56, Catwoman #34, Detective Comics #790-797, Nightwing #96, Robin #126-129 And Solo #10. Issue #54 is not collected yet.
  • Batman: War Games Book Two
    Collects Batgirl #56-57, Batman #632-634,642-644, Batman Legends Of The Dark Knight #183-184, Batman Gotham Knights #57-58, Batman Secret Files And Origins Allies 2005, Batman Secret Files And Origins Villians 2005, Catwoman #35-36, Detective Comics #798-800, #809-810, Nightwing #97-98, And Robin #130-131.
  • Robin/Batgirl: Fresh Blood
    Collects Batgirl #58-59; Robin #132-133.
  • Batgirl: Kicking Assassins
    Collects Batgirl #60-64.
  • Batgirl: Destruction’s Daughter
    Collects Batgirl #65-73.

The Infinite Crisis event happened (Reading Order here), and storylines in most DC Universe series jumped forward one year. Cassandra made her comeback in the Robin series, from #148 to 151, and in the World War III miniseries. And then, she joined Batman and the Outsiders, and got her own series back for 6 issues.

Cassandra Cain during The New 52 ora

Like a lot of “secondary” characters, Cassandra Cain was mostly absent from the New 52 era. She eventually made her comeback (in what was known as the DC You era), but she was not the same. She resurfaced in the Batman & Robin Eternal series and got a new origin story. For more context, you can take a look at the Batman New 52 Reading Order.

 

Here is the synopsis: Bruce Wayne may no longer be Batman, but his legacy lives on. When an assassin begins targeting all of Batman’s past partners, the former Robins must join forces to untangle a mystery that stretches back to the early days of the Dark Knight’s career. Years ago, Batman encountered a human trafficker known as Mother.

Then-Robin Dick Grayson knew nothing of it at the time, but the case was much more complex than he could have ever imagined. Now, without Bruce to guide them, a grown-up Grayson and his allies must rely on the help of the silent, mysterious Cassandra Cain to pick up the trail and stop Mother’s deadly plans.

Cassandra Cain during the Rebirth Era

Written by James Tynion IV, the Detective Comics of the Rebirth era was a team book featuring the BatFamily. Cassandra Cain joined Tim Drake, Stephanie Brown, Clayface, and Batwoman. After that, Cassandra joined another team, the new Outsiders.

This run of Tynion’s Detective Comics is available in one big omnibus…

… but you can also find those issues in trade paperbacks:

This is the end of James Tynion’s run on Detective Comics. The next book written by Bryan Hill collect the story setting up the new Batman and the Outsiders series.

Joker Batman New 52 Reading OrderLike the other members of the BatFamily, Cassandra Cain took part in The Joker War, see reading order here.

  • Shadow of the Batgirl
    An Original Graphic Novel. A new origin story, a one-off for the YA crowd who’s not familiar with Cassandra and would like to know her.

Cassandra Cain during the Infinite Frontier/Dawn of DC Era

Batman - Cassandra Cain Reading OrderA new era begins with more of the same as James Tynion IV’s run on Batman coming to an end with another crossover event: Fear State (Reading order of the event here). Cassandra played a small part necessary to launching her new series: Batgirls. Mentored by Oracle, the Batgirls Cassandra Cain and Stephanie Brown move to the other side of town where Barbara Gordon can keep a better eye on them.

Cassandra Cain has now joined the last iteration of Birds of Prey from Kelly Thompson, Leonardo Romero (BATMAN), and Jordie Bellaire. She teams up with Black Canary, Big Barda, Zealot, and Harley Quinn.

  • More stories to come…
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