Sunday, February 14, 2016
Thursday, February 4, 2016
On Batman
Another one of those times when I'm thinking way too much about something totally trivial. Maybe it's good to let my mind wander on silly things for a minute.
Batman is seventy five years old. That means most living Americans have spent their whole lives with him as a character. After all that time, he is still insanely popular, even though he's becoming more and more antiquated as a character. Everyone knows the story about how his parents were murdered and from that day forward he vowed to fight against crime. Depending on the story, his parents' murderer may or may not be found, leaving even the greatest detective a mystery that cannot be solved. I actually kind of prefer the time when it's not part of some greater conspiracy and is instead a random act of senseless violence that shook the city to its core. The murderer was some sad, desperate person who resorted to murder more out of fear than anything else. Then they were gone into the night, not realizing the thing they unleashed.
Gotham is supposed to be a stand in for the city of New York, although it's apparently a darker version of it, whereas Metropolis is the shining beacon of hope that shows what the world could be. Never mind that they have Superman, who can solve most problems before they become problems. The basic idea about Gotham is that the city has become so corrupt that its rotten to the core. Every story talks about how organized crime really runs things and the police are all on the take. If it's really a stand in for New York, that's basically saying that in a city of eight million people there are only two kinds of people; criminals and victims. Somehow criminals have taken over ever facet of the city and anyone who opposes them is corrupted or destroyed. Even before Batman arrives there is really only one police officer who is willing to stand up to the corruption and do the right thing. So in what would likely be the biggest police force in America, out of over thirty thousand police officers, there is only one guy attempting to stem the tide of evil?
So Bruce Wayne dedicates his life to becoming the perfect instrument to fight against crime. He does this by traveling the world and learning to become a ninja, because that's the most reasonable way to counter corruption in your home. After a decade away, learning untold secrets that will help him on his crusade against injustice, he comes back to Gotham and teams up with his butler to start his one-man attack against the concept of crime. Using the icon of something that scared him as a child, he dresses up as a bat and calls himself Batman, which may be a little on the nose if you think about it.
His real power comes from his willingness to do whatever it takes to fight against crime, except for using a gun or committing murder himself. I get that if your parents were murdered by a gun, then you'll probably have an aversion to them, however, throwing razorbladed metal bats at people's faces, using explosives, and breaking bones with your bare hands probably isn't much better than shooting a small piece of metal at high velocity into someone in order to stop them. Regardless of his method of choice, he's still one man fighting a fight, he knows he'll never win. The stories keep making sure to point out that Bruce Wayne is a billionaire and uses his vast fortune to supplement his war on crime. It seems like a drastic misuse of resources to have an armored car outfitted to look like a bat, a super computer that only he gets to use, and various pieces of tech that are necessary as the story requires. He has the money and influence of Elon Musk and uses that to put on a cape, drop down into alleyways and punch out bad guys. That's his war on crime. It's like fighting cancer with aspirin. Bruce Wayne could probably do more good with his money as a humanitarian than as a crime fighter. At the very least he could use the money to make organized crime irrelevant by buying them out or creating opportunities for people that would mean crime would seem like the more risky option than the legitimate one.
Most of the time Batman is defined by his villains. He lives in a city that has been driven so insane that it creates literal monsters. It could be that his very existence helped create them. It's almost as though he showed Gotham that it's OK to dress up like a lunatic and do whatever you wanted. If you don't want to be just another widget in the system of criminals and victims then dust off that purple suit and name yourself after a playing card. At least that way you'll stand out from the crowd. Those crazies aren't even the real threat, they're just the most colorful. The Joker is going to release a hot air balloon of poisonous gas on the city and only Batman can stop him? What about the Gotham police force, the National Guard, the FBI, or the NSA? That would be an act of terrorism and they're able to stop a lot of those plots long before they start filling up the balloon. Try checking the abandoned fairgrounds on the edge of town. That would leave Batman the ability to fight actual corruption.
I get that he's a fictional comic book character. After seventy five years though, you'd think there would be a way to make him relevant to today's world, instead of constantly rehashing the same story over and over again. What would someone with his willpower and resources really be able to do if he stopped and rethought his strategy on fighting crime. That's probably where most people get lost and realize that it's a lot more complicated of an issue. There isn't some evil Court of Owls that secretly controls the whole city. Instead it's just people doing whatever they think they can get away with. Since that would require a lot more nuance, we go back to the well of having a man dressed as a bat showing how bad ass he is by breaking the face of that would-be rapist.
Batman is seventy five years old. That means most living Americans have spent their whole lives with him as a character. After all that time, he is still insanely popular, even though he's becoming more and more antiquated as a character. Everyone knows the story about how his parents were murdered and from that day forward he vowed to fight against crime. Depending on the story, his parents' murderer may or may not be found, leaving even the greatest detective a mystery that cannot be solved. I actually kind of prefer the time when it's not part of some greater conspiracy and is instead a random act of senseless violence that shook the city to its core. The murderer was some sad, desperate person who resorted to murder more out of fear than anything else. Then they were gone into the night, not realizing the thing they unleashed.
Gotham is supposed to be a stand in for the city of New York, although it's apparently a darker version of it, whereas Metropolis is the shining beacon of hope that shows what the world could be. Never mind that they have Superman, who can solve most problems before they become problems. The basic idea about Gotham is that the city has become so corrupt that its rotten to the core. Every story talks about how organized crime really runs things and the police are all on the take. If it's really a stand in for New York, that's basically saying that in a city of eight million people there are only two kinds of people; criminals and victims. Somehow criminals have taken over ever facet of the city and anyone who opposes them is corrupted or destroyed. Even before Batman arrives there is really only one police officer who is willing to stand up to the corruption and do the right thing. So in what would likely be the biggest police force in America, out of over thirty thousand police officers, there is only one guy attempting to stem the tide of evil?
So Bruce Wayne dedicates his life to becoming the perfect instrument to fight against crime. He does this by traveling the world and learning to become a ninja, because that's the most reasonable way to counter corruption in your home. After a decade away, learning untold secrets that will help him on his crusade against injustice, he comes back to Gotham and teams up with his butler to start his one-man attack against the concept of crime. Using the icon of something that scared him as a child, he dresses up as a bat and calls himself Batman, which may be a little on the nose if you think about it.
His real power comes from his willingness to do whatever it takes to fight against crime, except for using a gun or committing murder himself. I get that if your parents were murdered by a gun, then you'll probably have an aversion to them, however, throwing razorbladed metal bats at people's faces, using explosives, and breaking bones with your bare hands probably isn't much better than shooting a small piece of metal at high velocity into someone in order to stop them. Regardless of his method of choice, he's still one man fighting a fight, he knows he'll never win. The stories keep making sure to point out that Bruce Wayne is a billionaire and uses his vast fortune to supplement his war on crime. It seems like a drastic misuse of resources to have an armored car outfitted to look like a bat, a super computer that only he gets to use, and various pieces of tech that are necessary as the story requires. He has the money and influence of Elon Musk and uses that to put on a cape, drop down into alleyways and punch out bad guys. That's his war on crime. It's like fighting cancer with aspirin. Bruce Wayne could probably do more good with his money as a humanitarian than as a crime fighter. At the very least he could use the money to make organized crime irrelevant by buying them out or creating opportunities for people that would mean crime would seem like the more risky option than the legitimate one.
Most of the time Batman is defined by his villains. He lives in a city that has been driven so insane that it creates literal monsters. It could be that his very existence helped create them. It's almost as though he showed Gotham that it's OK to dress up like a lunatic and do whatever you wanted. If you don't want to be just another widget in the system of criminals and victims then dust off that purple suit and name yourself after a playing card. At least that way you'll stand out from the crowd. Those crazies aren't even the real threat, they're just the most colorful. The Joker is going to release a hot air balloon of poisonous gas on the city and only Batman can stop him? What about the Gotham police force, the National Guard, the FBI, or the NSA? That would be an act of terrorism and they're able to stop a lot of those plots long before they start filling up the balloon. Try checking the abandoned fairgrounds on the edge of town. That would leave Batman the ability to fight actual corruption.
I get that he's a fictional comic book character. After seventy five years though, you'd think there would be a way to make him relevant to today's world, instead of constantly rehashing the same story over and over again. What would someone with his willpower and resources really be able to do if he stopped and rethought his strategy on fighting crime. That's probably where most people get lost and realize that it's a lot more complicated of an issue. There isn't some evil Court of Owls that secretly controls the whole city. Instead it's just people doing whatever they think they can get away with. Since that would require a lot more nuance, we go back to the well of having a man dressed as a bat showing how bad ass he is by breaking the face of that would-be rapist.
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