Which TPBs or HCs should I read to get caught up?

[jb681131]

If you want it streamlined go with the following books.

The New 52 (in 20 books)

Batman: The Court of Owls
Batman: The City of Owls
Batman: Faces of Death
Batman and Robin: Born to Kill
Batman: Death of the Family
Batman Incorporated: Demon Star
Batman Incorporated: Gotham's Most Wanted
Batman and Robin: Requiem for Damien
Batman and Robin: The Hunt for Robin
Batman and Robin: Robin Rises
Batman Eternal Volume 1, 2 and 3 or the new omnibus
Batman: Endgame
Batman: Superheavy
Batman: Bloom
Batman and Robin Eternal Volume 1 & 2
Batman: Epilogue
Justice League: Darkside War (optional)

Rebirth

Batman: Rise of the Batmen
Batman: The Victim Syndicate
Batman: League of Shadows
Batman: Dues Ex machina
Batman: A Lonely Place of Living
Batman: Fall of the Batmen
Batman: Batmen Eternal
Dark Knights Metal
Scott Snyders Justice League
Dark Knights: Death Metal

you can now start on Tynion's Batman and Tomasi's Detective comics.

I do not recommend any of Tom King's Batman, it is not good, if you really need something from it get I Am Gotham and City of Bane, everything inbetween is horrible. with charcters being written out of character (Booster gold in the gift story), robotic dialogue, characters suppsoed to be having a discussion but really they're talking to themselves because the other character is ignoring them and having their own discussion with themselves, stories jumping all over the place, dialogue simply not making sense. the complete waste of time that was the wedding. just an awful, awful run.

I am not sure that Batman Eternal and Batman & Robin Eternal are must reads even if they are not bad.

Tom King's run is indeed not that great, but I still found his run better than Snyders. And it has some important stuff (even if it could have been written better) about the Bat/Cat relationship.
But indeed you can read only "I am Batman", Batman Annual #2 and "City of Bane".

[DrewHLMW]

I am not sure that Batman Eternal and Batman & Robin Eternal are must reads even if they are not bad.

Tom King's run is indeed not that great, but I still found his run better than Snyders. And it has some important stuff (even if it could have been written better) about the Bat/Cat relationship.
But indeed you can read only "I am Batman", Batman Annual #2 and "City of Bane".

True i suppose the Eternal Series are only needed if you want more of the bat family stuff which I always do, I dunno why DC always mandate he be solo, its much better imo when he's with the family.
Snyder is a bit overrated (His all star batman sucked) but he has 4 awesome volumes imo in Court of Owls, City of Owls, Death of the Family and Endgame, where as I dont like a single one of Tom King's and at least Snyder's characters feel human where as King's are just robots to me with the way he writes their dialogue.

[Juniper2099]

Thanks to everyone for that information!

[Wrestler]

White Knight has great art.
The Story in the first book is interresting. The purrist would say that some similar topic have already been done about Batman, so there's nothing amazing. But it is much betterly done than all the other's I've read and to me one of the best Batman in the past 15 years.
The Second book, I haven't read, but I heard the art is still as good, but the story is a little lower and a bit far fetched. But still a great read and much better than most of the Batstories from the past years.

Thanks. I'll definitely give it a read sometime, I'm on my mission to finish the modern era main stories and up to date with Joker War, I'll have to fit it somewhere between these two lines.