Reading comics
is one of my favorite past-times. My brother used to work at a comic shop so as
a kid, I was exposed to all sorts of amazing stories of super humans facing
super problems. But underneath the Kapows! and super villains (which are a
wonderful topic to explore as well) are some really interesting human stories
and sometimes tragic themes explored by the writers. When you look at superhero
origin stories, almost all of the heroes are outcasts, have suffered a horrific
event or tragedy, death, mutilation, and/or abandonment by family. Superheroes
have to be driven, almost pathologically, to make the sacrifices needed to
fight the bad guys, so such drive can only be born from an intense trauma.
One of my
favorite superheroes is Batman. His story is pretty well known after multiple re-tellings
in movies, cartoons, tv shows, and of course comics. His father was a wealthy
philanthropist in Gotham. After leaving a show with his parents, a mugger
accosts them and shoots his mother and father in front of him. A new tv show
called Gotham is set to air that takes place before Bruce Wayne becomes Batman,
when he’s still a young kid. The show includes a young Bruce Wayne,
Commissioner Gordon, and some of Batman’s most famous foes before they became
criminals.
Batman is truly
a hero, but one who struggles as much with the darkness inside him as he does with
the good side. I loved the line from the Chris Nolan directed, Batman Begins, when Arthur asks Bruce
Wayne why he choose the name Batman. Wayne replied with: “Bats frighten me.
It’s time my enemies shared my dread.”
Batman fights
crime and pursues justice, but a part of him gets off on scaring the crap out
of people and raining his own brand of hellfire down on the bad guys. That’s
why the Joker is one of his greatest foes. They mirror each other. “You’re just
a freak. Like me!” the Joker says in the Dark Knight.
What else makes
Batman the perfect tortured hero?
His tragic past
as explained previously.
Even though he
fights for a just society, he is at odds with society. The police sometimes see
him as more of a menace than a hero, and as Bruce Wayne, he often challenges
the board of directors of his company and refuses to act like the good,
malleable rich boy.
Darker heroes
are obsessed with self-sacrifice to an almost pathological degree. Batman is
pathological and obsessed. Probably too much, which is partly what makes him so
interesting.
And of course, he’s
irresistible to women. Women are drawn to tortured heroes like Batman. They want
to be the one to touch the lost and emotionally
fragile side of such a man, believing they will be the ones to heal him. Batman
has had many romantic entanglements with femme fatales. I find his relationship with Catwoman particularly
fascinating. While they often find themselves on opposite sides of the law,
they more often than not find themselves on the same side in the bedroom J He’s also gotten together
with Talia al Ghul, the daughter of his enemy, Ra’s al Ghul, and even had a son
with her in one Batman incarnation.
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