...NOT Batman.
Let's get this out of the way right now: the old Adam West "Zip! Bow! Bam!" version of Batman isn't the real deal. Never was, never will be. It's about as much Batman as a gay hairdresser with no fighting experience would be acceptable as Rocky Balboa. No offense to gay hairdressers. It's just a comparison.
The character who we call Batman today was created seventy-three years ago by artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger. Bill got the short end of the stick when they created the character, since he didn't have a lawyer representing him. Thus, Bob Kane was credited until his death (and as long as DC publishes the character) as the sole creator of Batman.
Specifically, the sole creator of "The Bat-Man," who made his debut in the spring of 1939 in Detective Comics #27. For those of you want to impress your friends around the water cooler, Detective Comics is the book that gave National Publications its second and eventually final name: DC Comics. I've been asked by many what DC stands for. Now you know.
So, The Batman. My mother has pictures of me (which should be destroyed) in an awful Batman costume, circa 1983 or thereabouts. I loved the character even then. Like The Man of Steel, I'd been exposed to The Dark Knight Detective through my brother's comic collection. Superman and Batman were the coolest of the DC characters, though I also loved Green Lantern and The Flash, two of my other favorite characters to this day.
I also remember putting a blue towel around my neck while dressed in Batman Underoos and interrupting my brother and a girl who was visiting with her parents one day at home. They were talking in his room and listening to tapes (yes, tapes. And that's all they were doing, trust me.) I crept into the room unbeknownst to them and then sprang onto the bed at the foot of which they were sitting. I stood with arms akimbo, declaring nothing in word but everything in poise, posture, and presence (or so I thought at the time, but without those big words.)
And that's the essence of the character. At age eight or so, I got The Batman better than the folks that made that old Batman TV show and director Joel Schumacher. The Batman doesn't need to talk, or threaten, or do anything but just stand there . That's all it takes.
The Batman is distinctly different from just plain old "Batman." Batman is more of the superhero version of the character, the one well-known from that insipid TV show, from the old Super Friends cartoon, from Underoos and Halloween costumes and Scooby Doo Meets Batman and Robin.
But The Batman is something else entirely. He's a shadow come to life, a piece of the inky black that envelops Gotham City. Imagine it. You're in New Orleans, let's say. It's night time. You're leaving a bar after a few brews. You're tipsy, so you don't see the mistake you made going to your car alone in an unlit area. A scumbag with a gun appears from behind your car. He's got the desperate look of the crazed on his face. He demands your money and the keys to your car. You're terrified, and you freeze. He thinks you're trying to play with him. His finger tightens around the trigger. Then...
...a jagged shard of the night itself detaches from somewhere above you. It falls upon your assailant with blinding speed, yet does so with unearthly silence. You can no longer see the gunman; he's engulfed in pitch. The gunman screams as you imagine a pig would in the slaughterhouse when its turn is up. You fall back a few steps, now more sober than you've ever been. The screaming is cut off in such a rapid and final way that you wonder if the guy's dead. Still you can't see a thing. Then, as if being spat out from the maw of darkness itself, the mugger falls to the ground. You can see that he's still alive, though unconscious. You hear a faint mechanical sound. Eyes wide with terror, you look skyward to see a massive, dark form launch into the blackness above you. As far as you could tell, it was a giant bat, six feet high with a wingspan twice that.
That, folks, is The Batman. A dark avenger of the night who metes a swift justice to those who would prey upon the innocent. I rediscovered The Batman when I was in middle school. I kept reading and hearing about the new Batman movie that was going to be released. I was interested, and of course started buying any Batman comics I could get my hands on. Before long, I'd read not only comics starring The Batman, but also, anything else I could about the history of the character. I learned that this new film was going to bring The Batman back to his true roots. He was going to be a dark, intense guy, not some smiling fool in a bat suit.
I've stayed in love ever since. The Batman resonates deeply with me because I can identify with him. We all can. Not because I lost my parents to violent crime at an early age. But because I know what it's like to know loss, period. To know loneliness. To know fear and doubt. And to know powerlessness. Bruce Wayne felt all of these things until he resolved at his parents' graves to rid Gotham City of the crime that took their lives. We can all say that we would want to do something like this if someone we loved was taken from us in a violent way.
So for me, it's the fact that Bruce Wayne is human. He's breakable, he's just a regular guy. But he's the ultimate self-made man. He wasn't born with abilities far beyond those of mortal men, and he didn't fall ass-backwards into powers. He trained his mind and body to the peaks of human perfection and then kept going. I know that same drive and passion when it comes to those things in my life that I'm passionate about. My wife and daughter, my writing, my hobbies and interests. The list goes on.
And I love The Batman because of the darkness of the character. I'm just a dark guy. Always have been. I've always been attracted to Halloween, to vampires, to gothic stuff, to black. My high school friends will attest to this, and the all-black clothing phase I went through.
But at the heart of my love for the character is that The Batman wants to help people. He wants to make a difference in the lives of others. I want to do the same thing. I know that all of us do as well. And so we're drawn to this character, who built himself into something more than just a man, a creature of the night, who goes out and does the things we might wish we could do. Maybe not scaring the crap out of thugs or fighting colorful yet freakish villains. But changing the world around us for the better.
Tomorrow, the third hero of the Spandex Trinity: The Amazing Spider-Man.
Chris
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