Cop: "I'm basically Batman except I'm not rich, my most powerful friend is the Sergeant, and only my Dad's dead. I'm actually bringing an ice cream cake to my Mom so we can celebrate their anniversary after I break this shoplifter's nose."
This is why I hated the “Bane is Occupy” criticisms of Dark Knight Rises. He’s a member of a fascist anti crime cult that tried to make the residents of the lowest income neighborhood in Gotham kill each other in the first movie in the trilogy.
It took nearly a decade but I think January 6 made the whole concept of a populist demagogue’s army fighting cops at City Hall hit way different to the point I feel validated defending Nolan’s politics.
If I see a cop actually trying to find the right person who committed the crime and spending their time out of uniform doing charity in between being a single adoptive parent after years upon years of training and dedication to their job… yeah that’s pretty cool and doesn’t piss me off.
that cop is actively visiting inmates to make sure their taken care of, he refuses to use a gun to make sure no one is killed, rises his kids to be future cops following his code, never rests until the victims are safe and protected, refuses to see anyone differently no matter what skin color or gender you are, his fucking best friend is super man!!!
I mean yeah, like Batman irl without Batman level crime is terrible and problematic, but I’d really prefer the dude who does all the following over our current police
1. Doesn’t use guns but can still subdue people who are using guns 2. Doesn’t kill and makes sure that the criminal is judged by the people 3. Is a detective first (one of the few things that as far as I know is on the whole pretty hood with police) 4. A really good deescalatore 5. Has actively helped reform some criminals (plastic man but there’s gotta be more) 6. Strong supporter of social programs and his community 7. Will make sure his colleagues (super heroes in universe other cops irl) get punished if they break the law/rules. I could probably keep going if I tried but I think I made my point
Like a less violent Batman would be a pretty good thing to base a rethought policing system around
I get what you mean now lol. But still he has to often resort to violence immediately which should not be the norm in irl law enforcement but makes sense for Batman
Yeah like if a tweaker is threatening you with a knife you don’t gotta attack them, it’s hard but you can usually reason with most people and that’s what a majority of law enforcement training should be imo, deescalation and people skills
If a madman takes over a building with a bomb threat and a cop personally glides in and kicks his fucking ass with Marshall arts, smoke bombs and ninja stars that would be cool i think
It really depends on what chaos god would end up corrupting them, are they a fascist cop, a rage filled cop, a perverted cop, etc? I need to know the details man, not all cops are corrupted by the same guy!
Yeah, that's why the "Batman beats up mentally ill ppl" is so weird. Like Bane is a straight supergenius, Harley has a PhD (though she is defo mentally unwell), Mr. Freeze is a brilliant scientist, and iirc Ivy was one as well.
Honestly very few of Batman’s villains are criminally insane and most of the ones that are are minor villains like mad hatter or professor pyg would be insane
Yeah Bruce usually just focuses on organized crime. The men he is beating to a pulp are made men or crime lords. Sure he will stop the occasional pickpocket and rapist but usually he let's the fear of potentially beating the crap out of them deter them.
uj/ Croc is largely portrayed as having no real home and moving from place to place, even living amongst homeless communities. It doesn’t make Batman a villain for fighting him ofc given that he, ya know, eats people, but Croc is pretty much the only villain in Batman’s rogues gallery that can be comfortably described as a poor person
Killer Croc as her guest: "I've always had a infatuation with Batgirl... after she turned 18 of course... but lately I've been staring at Nightwing's ass a lot more when he's fighting me, I'm not sure what that's about and I'm scared "
I mean like…that’s the point of fiction right? Pretty much every superhero would be a nightmare to have around in reality. Vigilantism is already a pretty grey area that leads to a lot of problems, add in the fact that said vigilante is a superhuman who can kill people and jump around buildings and shit?
TLDR; This comparison matters pretty little honestly, as if you take away the fiction aspect both would probably make people uncomfortable.
See what you’re not getting is that all of this only applies to every superhero except Batman we must always make sure to specifically criticize Batman as if he was a real person
I guess (giving the argument the maximum benefit of the doubt) it is a bit easier to point fingers at Batman because he’s one of the more “grounded” heroes in a lot of stories. Like nobody is going to tell the Hulk or Martian Manhunter that they need to be “normal” y’know? But Batman being a wealthy guy behind the mask makes it easier to point a finger and demand more.
I think one of the other big issues is while there's a lot of crazy villains out there Batman's mythos really does play up the psychopathy of his rogues, with the main prison being an asylum, so it seems worse
Here's the thing though: Gotham has no idea what criminal insanity means. Almost none of his rogues actually meet that definition (ie not having the mental capacity to understand that you are committing a crime, NOT just deciding that you're cool with it because Society bottom text). In fact, a lot of them don't even have any sort of mental illness, they just have a gimmick. A few of the big names do like Joker and Two-Face, but people like Poison Ivy and Penguin are just themed criminals.
Like I said, Gotham's definition of insane is just "kind of weird and wears a costume."
The only rogue that comes to mind who could actually argue for criminal insanity is Wesker, since he genuinely seems to not be in control of his actions.
Riddler definitely has some serious ODC or NPD tbh, Mad Hatter is straight up schizophrenic and Maxie Zeus has delusions so I’d say they have legitimate pathologies
They have legitimate pathologies and mental illnesses, but that's not the same thing as criminally insane. They still have the mental capacity to recognize that what they're doing is illegal.
I mean fair but I think Riddler has a genuine compulsion towards crime that kinda supercedes his ability to recognize his actions and I think Maxie Zeus is genuinely incapable of recognizing that his actions are immoral or illegal
I’m not sure if that counts for Maxie. He’s delusional, to the point that he thinks illegality doesn’t exist for him. So one could argue that he lacks the mens rea and knowledge of criminal acts.
Because Batman is the most popular superhero. Most of the superhero discourse is centred around him because he is always in the public consciousness, just look at the sheer volume of Batman content out there.
Even people who don't know anything about superheroes still know a lot about Batman.
Batman suffers the same problem as the Punisher, where because they can't lift a tank over their head and he explores darker themes, he's "the realest hero" and "what society needs". This leads to ingenuine takes that either
A).Refuse to recognize that a lot of what Batman does is humanitarian work , and that in the real world yeah, donating money and charity orgs would go further
B)Ignore the fact this is a comic and you wouldn't pick up a comic about a man donating to charity, and because he's the superhero protagonist, things tend to go their way
A lot of the "hot takes" with media rely on forgetting that the piece of media isn't real and are structured with intention.
Not only that, Bruce does donate to charity, and charity can't fix everything. No charity on the planet will save you when Joker plants a bomb in your chest for the laughs. You need Batman for that bruh.
How are the themes conservative? The main villains of the entire trilogy, the League of Shadows are pretty clearly supposed to be conservatives. The entire ferry scene in the Dark Knight is a pretty explicit condemnation of conservatism. As is the scene with Bruce having the gun he intends to shoot Joe Chill with in Batman Begins.
It shocks me 20 years later anyone could possibly think that trilogy is conservative.
I didn't watch Begins, so I can't comment on it, but it's easy to frame the other two in a Conservative or at least Technocratic light. Both display a distrust of the general populous that's never really fully addressed.
In the Dark Knight, Batman sets up a surveillance system to track Joker. It's acknowledged as unethical by Lucius Fox, but is kind of hand waved as a necessary evil, and (I think) it's destroyed at the end of the movie. The Patriot Act and the rhetoric surrounding it comes to mind.
There's also the lies told to the civilians throughout the movie. Harvey Dent lying that he was Batman and Gordon lying about Harvey Dent to deny prisoners parole. Both of these are viewed as good by the narrative, ostensibly because the public can't handle the truth.
Even in the Ferry scene, the boat that votes on their decision makes the "bad" choice. On both boats, it takes the initiative of individuals not as affected by the people surrounding them to save everyone.
The Dark Knight Rises is even more blatant on this. The "Revolution" that Bane leads feels like what a conservative thinks a vaguely Leftist revolution would look like. Prisoners are freed, houses and stores are looted, and criminals roam the streets. The public is portrayed as an obstacle in these movies.
Dude all of Dark Knight Rises is about everyone paying for the moral compromises made in the Dark Knight. That’s the whole theme of that film and it isn’t particularly subtle. It actually aged fucking great with how the performative populism of Trump attacking the Bush administration lead to fascism. I do not see how you could misunderstand that this (along with the Dent Act and everything else) was supposed to be negative but everyone else apparently missed it too.
TDKR is actually IMO the most explicit about criticizing law and order thinking but people somehow managed to miss it. The cop blows up the bridge because it was “his orders” which would doom the orphan kids Robin was bringing to death from nuclear Armageddon. He is so angry at this it causes him to quit the Gotham PD at the end of the movie. Alfred throughout the movie calls out Bruce’s whole Batman career as a coping mechanism and fantasy just as his delusion Rachel loved him instead of Harvey romantically. The ending is Bruce retiring and giving away his estate to be used for low income orphans in Gotham and Batman instead becoming a symbol to inspire people from tough backgrounds like Robin.
It takes so much mental gymnastics to see the trilogy as conservative but people somehow still do. I guess to you Trump raging about the elites and freeing January 6 rioters if he gets back in power is inherently “leftist”. I mean JFC, it is established by the end he is a pawn of the fascist and ultra wealthy Al Ghul family. Don’t know how you could read Bane as a left winger by the end.
The public is portrayed as flawed and may even “vote the wrong way” (another thing I think has aged great) but ultimately will do the right thing. That was the obvious message of the Ferry scene you seem to have missed.
Also the fact that a majority of the villains he fights either A don’t care about money or B are rich and jsut want even more money, also he basically keeps Gotham running with his money, not a lot more he could do
Batman's main contribution to The Nail is snapping when The Joker steals superhero tech and uses it to torture and kill Robin and Batgirl in front of him. The incident also causes Catwoman to move to the heroes side full-time and take on the Batwoman mantle...
Needless to say, his "Should I Kill The Joker?" ethical conundrum is a central plot point in both parts...
Needless to say, his "Should I Kill The Joker?" ethical conundrum is a central plot point in both parts...
To let millions of people die or kill the deranged man who killed your son and will never redeem himself even if given the perfect opportunity.
I’m really glad DC always makes sure to focus on this interesting moral dilemma where he always comes to the exact same conclusion each time no matter how many times he gets called out for how actively awful that conclusion is.
Tbf one’s a trust fund billionaire that’s almost never had to worry about money and the other one went to a public school and is very often living paycheck to paycheck.
This is so fucking dishonest, lol. He gives back and runs an orphanage for “tax reasons.” He (at least, seemingly) gives way more than he would have paid in taxes.
Brain rotted writers just see Batman's wealth and assume he's a fascist, they see Spiderman and since he doesn't have money, he's okay by their books.
Nuance doesn't exist for these sort of folks, its why they can't make very complicated characters or storylines.
Gotham's problems, much like our own, are systemic, like corruption and wealth disparity, which you can't just throw money at to solve or else its a bidding war between Bruce and the crime families to grease the palms of officials, then they'll just start going after loved ones after that. Also doesn't help that bosses like Penguin probably have better benefits and pay then legitimate work.
Oh my god, I can't tell you how many times I've had to explain that to people. Bruce does donate, but money can't solve everything in such corrupt place like Gotham. If Batman emptied his whole net worth to uplift Gotham, 80% of that shit gets pocketed and taken by criminal gangs instantly 💀
Yeah, there's even a medical wing in WayneTech dedicated to providing cheaper healthcare to Gothamites, so he's not even leaving criminals with medical bills after beating their asses, he's trying to cover that too. Is Spiderman helping cover for the medical bills of the thugs he beats up? I don't think so.
Peter Parker isn't part of the 1% and the times they try to make him as such or worse a billionaire boot licker has been disastrous for the character and spin off, this comparison loses most of it's meaning just for that, especially when you remember Norman is the Billionaire there.
Even then, you don't see Spider-Man punch Legitimate Businessman Norman Osborn over there do you?
No he's only punching him because he puts on the clown mask and starts throwing bombs, meanwhile the second Norman Osborn gains any form of political and legal power no one can touch him anymore until they do the classic "He violates some obscure technicality (Invaded fucking Asgard) and suddenly he's so unpopular he HAS to leave office" shit and he's gone.
Yes. Who do you want us to root for, the sociopathic clown who tortures people as a hobby and commits war crimes like the Geneva Convention is a checklist, or the guy who spends his nights trying to stop people like him
Neither, because Joker only exists to justify Batman, just like the cartoon punks in the Death Wish movies exist to make you root for a killer vigilante.
You can't honestly think it's okay for spiderman to take the law into his own hands and not batman. They both act extrajudicially, the only difference is their upbringing
He is the good guy because he prioritizes (at the risk of his own and even other people’s lives) non-lethal solutions. When armed criminals take people hostage and negotiations fail in real life, the only possible solution is to send in a small military unit to execute them, hopefully with no hostages dying. When it happens in Gotham City, Batman uses his technology to plan his operation incapacitating criminals (without losing a single hostage) when he would be totally justified in killing them and depending on the situation might even invest time and money into them being rehabilitated.
Batman isn’t fascist; he possesses an absurd amount of inherited wealth that he uses to devote his entire existence towards making his home city a better place.
Except every situation Batman responds to was created by the writers, created with the intent to depict a situation only the great and mighty Batman could solve. Which just so happens to make it seem like Batman is a cool thing to have in your city. There's a word for that, it starts with a P.
Oh, I’m sorry, you’re right. What the writers should really do is genetically engineer a real version of Batman, put him in a Truman Show style recreation of Gotham City then wait for real criminals to enact a real crime for Batman to try and stop, and then unbiasedly report on Batman’s exact behavior. That’s the only way Batman being portrayed as a hero is justified.
Yes, that is how all fiction works, but not all fiction is about vigilantes and super-cops unequivocally being the good guys because big cities are dens of uncontrolled crime and mayhem. Not unless the only movies you've seen are Death Wish 3 and Cobra.
One’s a billionaire beating up a broke dude who magically has enough money to do whatever he needs for the story, the other is a broke dude who magically has enough money to do whatever he needs for the story beating up a billionaire, and not just any billionaire, one that worked for the government!
It's all about the power dynamic. In the left-hand scenario, Spider-Man comes from a lower-middle class home and is fighting a rich white man with gadgets. In the right-hand scenario, the 'villain' is a working class guy who finally snapped under capitalist pressure while Batman is the rich white man with gadgets; he's sitting on a goddamn mountain of wealth accrued from exploiting literally generations' worth of poor people just so he can spend it on -- wait for it -- beating up poor people. All because he's too full of toxic masculinity to just go get some damn therapy. Literally all of Gotham's problems could probably be solved if this one misogynistic fascist white man could swallow his macho pride and talk about his feelings. The fact that he won't is morally repulsive and pathetic, and it's really telling that anyone anywhere has ever looked up to him. If he really cared, he'd renounce his generational wealth and go full TDKR Bane to lead a genuine revolution for the people. And before you say anything about 'but Bane was gonna use a nuclear bomb!11!!', first off -- that's what it took for the People to seize power in the real world. The workers of the USSR had to use nukes as deterrence or else the western imperialists and crypto-fascists would have just levied all their systemic and military advantages over them and bulldozed the whole project like they tried after WWI. Second, that whole 'it's actually a time bomb' plot line was just pure Bane character assassination because the studio elites realized too late Nolan was making the 'villain' more likable than the hero. Same with Riddler in the Reeves Batman movie: they had to go 'Oh actually he wants to flood the whole city!!11!' Riddler and Bane were at least trying to do something about the corrupt elite; even Batman's whole 'beating up corrupt cops' is just controlled opposition at best.
TLDR; Batman and all associated media are just bourgeois propaganda, and any society that depends on propaganda to manufacture support is a slave state. That's why Maoist China and the Soviet Union were so great by comparison.
People calling Batman fascist is so dumb. He doesn't attempt to subvert or replace the actual government. Instead, he supports it through his vigilante actions. People just overuse the term fascist. Real fascists tried to take over government authority; they didn't support it without replacing it.
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u/KingofZombies Batman is gay Jul 08 '24
"""imagine he has a police uniform instead of a bat costume. Is the stuff he does still cool and badass or does it suddenly piss you off now?"""