#dark batmen

[gotham-at-nightfall]

Dark Nights: Metal

By John Becaro

[nefarious-616-necromancer]

[epicgnome23]

I’m reading a Batman The Drowned crossover into the MCU fanfic, and it’s well done, but this brings me to a point I want to make. The DC dark multiverse is so lame. Its punisher in a silly hat taken to the extreme, because the Batman Who Laughs is just a terrible villain, he has no motivations. And like the character doesn’t even achieve the goal of being opposite Batman, because he tries too hard. That’s why opposite Batman will always be Owlman, because while Batman cares, Owlman really doesn’t, dude knows that as long as Batman is around nothing will happen to him, so why bother. And like I have no final point here beyond I’m voting for Owlman in the next midterm election.

[tanoraqui]

obviously the Historical Figure Episode(TM) of Doctor Who that I’d write would of the Noted Author subset endemic to the RTD Era; it’d be called “Spiders in the Trenches” and be set in the middle of World War One ft. one Lt. John Tolkien.

idk if the main aliens are spiders or if they're just using giant robotic spiders as soldier-minions. Either way, Tolkien is a little too defensive when he says he's not afraid of spiders.

The alien invaders want some sort of shiny mcguffin, maybe as a power source for their ship? Or for a mega-weapon? We do not want them to get it, at any rate. Race to find the Shiny Power Jewel-Thing which has been lost somewhere in this like 20-mile radius of the Western Front.

When our heroes narrowly beat the spiders to the SPJT, Tolkien realizes that the spiders only ever attack at night because light hurts them somehow, so he holds the SPJT up as it flares and shouts, "Get back, foul creatures! Back into the shadows from whence you came!"

(They're from the dark side of a tidally locked planet, and made for extremely low-light conditions? The SPJT flares because it's controlled telepathically and it connected to Tolkien's mind when he touched it?)

Ideally Tolkien's first encounter with the Doctor is that he wakes up in the trench one day (after losing some men to a mysterious monster in the darkness a couple nights ago?), and there's 2 random strangers in weird clothes idly singing and playing an instrument which they stole from someone a couple bedrolls down. (This works well with Fifteen & Ruby's established inclination to music!)

We do need an Eowyn Moment, because that's iconic, but I'd split it: for dialogue, at one point the head boss evil alien boasts, "No human can defeat the Tenebrarachnid Empire!" and the Doctor replies, "Good thing they've got me, then."...

[I don't know if this is a Fifteen line yet. I know it's a very Eleven line]

...and there's a soldier in Tolkien's unit who is revealed to be secretly a woman! Who disguised herself as a man in order to enlist for ??? reasons, and who dramatically pulls off her hat to reveal her long hair.

The third notable local character is the sort who inspired Sam Gamgee, "...the English soldier, [like] the privates and batmen I knew in the 1914 war, and recognized as so far superior to myself.”

^those two can have a romantic subplot if it fits (comrades-in-arms is also extremely good). Tolkien, however, at some point shows Ruby the picture of his wife Edith which he carries at all times, she of the black hair and bright grey eyes, and is obviously ready to monologue about how wonderful she is.

In the same scene(?), Tolkien looks up at the stars and says their brightness shining afar, clear of all the horrors on the ground, is always a source of hope and strength to him.

Maybe also in the same scene? Tolkien is shown to make up stories for fun, or to read them in his little spare time - fairy tales and mythological epics. Maybe he tells them to the men around the fire, maybe he keeps a little notebook, maybe he just admits to daydreaming... When asked why, he paraphrases his quote from later life, " Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisoned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?"

At some point (Star-watching scene? when the Doctor inevitably has to explain that aliens exist? when they're all saying goodbye in the end?) there's a line drawing attention to the Doctor's parallels with Eärendil - eternally wandering figure of hope, sailing the stars in a ship with a light on top, not quite mortal...

Tolkien DEFINITELY tries to figure out the alien language, in writing or speech.

Something the aliens are doing is making people sick. Maybe the attacking robo-spiders are venomous, maybe there's a toxic byproduct of the alien ship, maybe it's a deliberate first assault of the planned invasion... By the end of the episode, Tolkien is very ill. The Doctor has figured out an antidote and given it, but Tolkien says goodbye to him and Ruby only to stumble to a medical outpost - from where, the Doctor explains to Ruby, he'll be sent home with this bad case of what's assumed to be trench fever. Between the fever and the brief psychic entanglement, and unentanglement, with the SPJT, he won't even remember most of this, and what he does remember, he'll put down to fever dreams amidst the horrors of war.

But he'll remember some things! He'll remember an eternal wanderer of the stars, unaging and undying and ever-hopeful, heralded by light (and a vworrrp vrorrrp noise).

[brucewaynehater101]

Hi!

New to the blog (Almost steered clear reflexively because of the name - the self announced 'hater' blogs mostly tend to be edgelords - then got lured in by the spider Tim posts)

So don't know if this has been asked before...

In DC Multiverse is real. The stable Universes and the Dark ones born of people's fears which will just disintegrate sooner or later. We saw it in the Death Metal arc...

So, picturing Cartoon/Silver Age/World's Finest/WFA/Fanon Good Dad Bruce somehow ending up in the canon universe.

He's already encountered the Dark Universes.

And he's convinced this is another of those - with a Batman who embodies his fear of letting his mission consume him, making him betray his children.

So, since this Universe is set to disintegrate soon anyway... He can maybe kidnap/rescue his - well, not exactly his, but hey, semantics - kids and take them to his stable universe?

Or Canon!Bruce showing up in a Good Dad Bruce timeline and everyone immediately clocks him as one of the Dark Batmen?

Hi!!!! Glad you found and enjoyed some of the content despite misgivings of the name. I often find myself reminiscing in humor on how much the name doesn't match this blog. I hate Bruce (specifically comics Bruce), but that's a much smaller part of my content. This blog is basically an AU/HC focused one that tends to favor Tim (I'm a bit biased. I love all the batkids, though).

As far as the AU you've proposed, I've seen somewhat similar AUs but not quite the same. A universe that holds more than one version of all the batkids is gonna be intense and full of chaos. I'm all here for it.

I'm also all here for Bruce beating the shit out of his "evil" self. Just let good dad Bruce beat up canon Bruce.

There's a few fics out there where Tim or one of the other batkids travels to another universe where the batfam is not nearly as messed up as they are in canon. Just healthy communication, support, etc. I absolutely love and devour those types of fics.

If y'all want me to do a list of them, let me know.

[liebelesbe]

RATING LIVE-ACTION BATMEN COSTUMES FROM 0 TO 10 ON SCARINESS AND SILLYNESS

scariness as in would i cry and/or piss my pants if i came across him in a dark alleyway

sillyness as in heehee silly :-)

Adam West: come on. look at him. his suit is so thin, that's not protecting anything! the eyebrows drawn on in white pen are a nice touch, though. silly king!

Scary: 0

Silly: 10

Michael Keaton: he can't move his head!! at first glance he might be scary, but just stand behind him and he won't be able to see you... first one to mold angry eyebrows into the suit and everyone else after him just copied that.

Scary: 8

Silly: 4

Val Kilmer: why does he kinda look like someone just put a baby in the batsuit, and to not make it too obvious they put extreme fake abs on the suit. and nipples.

Scary: 6

Silly: 8

George Clooney: not much to say about him. he has a very triangular nose + he seems very.. smooth? pretty boring. and once again: nipples.

Scary: 5

Silly: 5

Christian Bale: the cutout around his mouth is very round, which makes it look kind of silly imo. sorry. it looks like someone threw a small pie at him.

Scary: 7

Silly: 6

Ben Affleck: he's pretty broad in stature which adds to the scariness, but I've said it before and I'll say it again: he reminds me of a chipmunk. nice try though.

Scary: 8

Silly: 7

Robert Pattinson: his head is a lot rounder than the others (I think it's because his ears are so thin) which makes him more approachable/pettable. his suit looks more mechanical (for lack of better word) which does help the scariness factor.

Scary: 6

Silly: 4

[ultrakeencollectionbreadfan]

Chronological List of Batman Elseworlds (1986-2011)

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (1986-retcon)

Batman: Gotham by Gaslight (1989)

Batman: Digital Justice (1990)

Batman: Master of the Future (1991)

Batman & Dracula: Red Rain (1991)

Batman: The Blue, the Grey, and the Bat (1992)

Batman/Dark Joker: The Wild (1993)

Batman/Houdini: The Devil’s Workshop (1993)

Robin 3000 (1993)

Batman: Bloodstorm (1994)

Batman: Castle of the Bat (1994)

Batman: In Darkest Knight (1994)

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight Annual #4 (1994)

Detective Comics Annual #7 (1994)

Batman Annual #18 (1994)

Batman: Shadow of the Bat Annual #2 (1994)

Catwoman Vol. 2 Annual #1 (1994)

Robin Vol. 2 Annual #3 (1994)

Batman: Brotherhood of the Bat (1995)

Batman: Man-Bat (1995)

Superman & Batman: Doom Link (1995)

Batman: KnightGallery (1996)

Batman: Dark Allegiances (1996)

Batman: Scar of the Bat (1996)

Batman Annual #20 (1996)

Detective Comics Annual #9 (1996)

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight Annual #6 (1996)

Batman: Shadow of the Bat Annual #4 (1996)

Robin Annual #5 (1996)

Catwoman Annual #3 (1996)

Batman: Dark Knight Dynasty (1997)

Batman: Masque (1997)

Elseworld’s Finest (1997)

Batgirl and Robin: Thrillkiller (1997)

The Batman Chronicles #11 (1997)

Batman: Crimson Mist (1998)

Elseworld’s Finest: Supergirl & Batgirl (1998)

Batgirl and Batman: Thrillkiller ’62 (1998)

Batman: Two Faces (1998)

Batman: I, Joker (1998)

Batman: Reign of Terror (1998)

Superman & Batman: Generations (1998–1999)

Batman: Nosferatu (1999)

Batman: Book of the Dead (1999)

Catwoman: Guardian of Gotham (1999)

Superman and Batman: World’s Funnest (2000)

Realworlds: Batman (2000)

Batman/Lobo (2000)

The Batman of Arkham (2000)

Batman/Demon: A Tragedy (2000)

Batman: The Doom That Came to Gotham (2000)

Batman: Haunted Gotham (2000)

The Batman Chronicles #21 (2000)

Batman: Gotham Noir (2001)

Batman: Hollywood Knight (2001)

Batman: League of Batmen (2001)

Superman & Batman: Generations II (2001)

Batman: The Dark Knight Strikes Again (2001-2002)

Batman: Nine Lives (2002)

Batman: Detective No. 27 (2003)

Batman: The Golden Streets of Gotham (2003)

Batman: Nevermore (2003)

Superman & Batman: Generations III (2003)

Batman: The Order of Beasts (2004)

Batman: Year 100 (2006)

Batman Annual #27 (2009)

Detective Comics Annual #11 (2009)

[hero-villian-blog]

Injustice But Batman Takes The Place Of Superman

So recently I was thinking about Batman's moral code and people's problem with it, people's problem with Batman's many incarnations that aren't the greatest, and alongside people not always caring for the evil Superman thing which got me thinking.

While we've had the dark mirror Batmen of the Batman who tries too hard, Owlman, and Justice Lord Batman. What if we got a story where Batman breaks his 1 rule, where goes over the line. He always says he doesn't do it because if he does he probably won't come back from it. So how about an injustice type story where Batman snaps instead of Superman. Where Batman uses his plans to deal with the Justice League and twists it, where he takes the role of Injustice Superman and uses things like red sun lights, Kryptonite, and magic to keep Clark at bay. With something like a Civil War Scenario going on but Batman is the head of it. This Batman could be like say the Dark Knight Returns Batman in all the worst ways that people criticize that version for, all the negative aspects of that Batman.

[princess-of-the-corner]

Okay so, while most of the Dark Multiverse Batmen are the epitome of 3edgy5me "very clearly not as cool as the writers think they are", two of the Dark Multiverse Batmen are actually so stupid they loop right to being GENIUS (even though they were created to serve as examples of bad ideas mandated by executives):

B-Rex: Dark Multiverse Batman who's consciousness was transferred into the T. Rex robot he keeps in the Batcave upon his death. He can't throw batarangs with his tiny arms, but he can still talk.

Batmobeast: Dark Multiverse Batman who's brain was placed in a monster truck upon his death.

Just THINK of the potential with those two!

That's fuckin fantastic actually

[yandere--stuck]

i saw rqs are open and im curious if you’d write more yan joker? i dont have any specific ideas in mind, i just rlly love how you write him ^^

I hope this is to your liking! ^^

Can be any Joker but I leaned a bit towards Arkhamverse!Joker

---

Moonlight poured in through the barred window of Joker's cell like how sight managed to slip through shaky fingers covering one's face. Joker had huddled himself into the corner closest to his bed where the most light was shed. He made swift, smooth motions with his arms, fingers flecked with red chalk dust.

He wasn't sure who had originally smuggled it in, not that it really mattered, but it had changed hands enough for The Joker to borrow (read: steal) it from Jervis. His cell was far too drab and colorless! He was sure ol' Jervy would understand. Being in this place really could make one go mad.

With a groan, the Clown Prince of Crime straightened up his back. It gave a few loud cracks and the man heaved a heavy sigh. This cell was far too cramped! It was an outrage! An outrage, he said! Two feet wide, and even then the bed took up most of the space, and what? Just barely over seven feet? Hell, his own bed was barely enough to fit him.

Not that he exactly had room to complain. He knew full well that, in the eyes of many, what he's done - and will continue to do - was beyond redemption. But, they still stuck him in this place to 'help' him. No space to move, barely any time outside, shitty food… So much for humane treatment.

It was funny. A smile rose to his lips. It was so, so funny. You'd laugh about it, he was sure. You always got the joke. 

He turned his attention back to his drawings. Big, gaping smiles, batmen made of blobs of red, harlequins with big hammers.

Joker's heart gave a twinge. He wondered how Harley was doing. It had been a long time since they allowed them to stay in the same cell block, so his nights had become a lot more quiet. A lot lonelier.

But among the other drawings that decorated his walls was a more consistent figure, consistent name. Doodled with hearts around them or drawings of clowns with heart eyes to the side. 

More than he wished for a bigger cell or Harley or Bats or a sudden explosion that caused hundreds of inmates to pour out and wreak havoc upon Gotham, Joker wished for you.

Joker sat back against his bed, knees tucked against his chest and back against the hard, rough walls of his cell. He slipped the chalk underneath his pillow and wiped the remaining red on his jumpsuit. 

Looking up, he watched as a cloud stretched over the sky, suffocating the moon and blotting out the sky, plunging his cell into darkness. A nervous, shaky feeling filled the Clown's chest. It was so quiet and so dark. Nothing for him to see, hear, nothing for his mind to clutch onto and distract him.

And most importantly, no you. Light of his life, treasure of his soul, oh, how awful they were for separating you from him. Not that that would stop him in the long run, of course, but it still hurt! Oh, where was he without you? And more importantly, where were you without him? Sure, he had his men observe you from the shadows, but they were idiots! They didn't know you like he did!

... Suddenly, a thought flitted into his mind and another smile graced his lips. It'd been some time since he last graced Arkham with a serenade.

"This song goes out to a special someone out there," The Joker giggled to himself. Laying his head against the wall of his cell, he began to croon, "Where, oh where, has my darling gone? Where, oh, where could they be?"

Memories of you flashed through his mind, making his grin grow and grow until his lips were near splitting from how happy you made them.

Green eyes twinkled with delight as the clouds passed overhead, light once again shining down on him. "We make such a great pair, when they laugh without a care…"

You really were magic, weren't you?

"With them, I'm a happier me…" He trailed off, voice soft and expression content.

Filled with warmth at the thought of you , granting him a bit of peace, The Joker laid down and allowed himself some rest. And he hoped that if he dreamed, it'd be of you.

[nefarious-616-necromancer]

[zahri-melitor]

Anyway for writing reasons (I’m going through all of Henri Ducard’s appearances to figure out what his relationship with David Cain would be like), I’m jumping all over canon at the moment and it’s fascinating.

Here’s very early Ducard. “It’s nice to feel wanted. I’m wanted on four continents”. I snorted.

This is part of Batman: Blind Justice, a ‘Tec story that runs #598-600.

I haven’t read Blind Justice before, and I’ve got to say, it makes a fascinating set-up for ALPoD, falling as it does in the famous ‘Bruce doesn’t have a Robin’ gap.

A collection of things that struck me about it:

Bruce is indeed not doing particularly well, during this period, though hindsight makes it even clearer.

Jim Gordon in this story 100% knows Bruce is Batman. There is no subtlety about it.

For all the Batman Works Alone bros, we are here in the very centre of the No Robin gap, and Bruce…ends up working with Roy Kane (no relation), a young man who is staying at the Manor with his long lost sister for plot related reasons.

Bruce gets shot and told he may never walk again, and spends an issue mostly in a wheelchair and rehab, while Roy Kane dresses up as Batman to go out and solve the mystery (Bruce is controlling his body by a mind control device for plot reasons).

Roy Kane ends up falling from an elevated railway track to his death, in the Batsuit

Jim Gordon then turns up to see Bruce and broadly hints that maybe if Batman wants to take a break or retire for a while that might be a good thing.

The RESONANCE I see here that follows into Jim’s reaction during Knightfall to the question of ‘how many Batmen are there?’

Also if you want to ask ‘how is Bruce coping’? Well here he is at the end of the story:

Bruce Wayne lives in a private world. An unseen world — as deep as an ancient, arching cavern, as dark as his own embittered soul. Only a handful of others have been allowed to enter it. The names are few. Jason Todd. Roy Kane. The sparse ranks of those he trusted, who trusted him…the ranks of the dead.

Somewhere, Dick’s ears are itching over being forgotten and he’s feeling a desperate need to go yell at Bruce.

[the-batacombs]

Thinking about Jason. I don't know why, he hasn't had a serious turn in my head yet, I guess. Also the half-argument from...Batman 137? where they're yelling about like, death and crime and utilitarianism -- that got stuck in my head.

Anyway it lines up with this other issue I have with DC comics, which is that the way they write Batman sometimes feels...deeply hypocritical? Other heroes kill people and fight violent criminals but aren't enmeshed in a deep dark tragic space where they're always apparently two steps away from turning into a deeply immoral/abusive/totalitarian figure. But future/AU Batmen are routinely stuck in this box. As far as I can tell, the potential reasons are

(a) there's something wrong with Gotham. (This is what's happening in the current 'Tec run, I think, and exists in all the "Gotham eats her children" headcanons.)

(b) Gotham's villain-hero landscape is uniquely disturbing and eats away at the souls of its participants. (??? I guess? This feels silly unless it's explained by (a), and fairly boring as a basis for storytelling, at least to me.)

(c) Bruce Wayne is has a uniquely sensitive empathetic response, and is probably really poorly suited to a life with this much violence, and all of it just hits him harder than it does the other heroes; people like Bruce tend to self-select out, and Bruce is just stubborn.

Wonder Woman kills people and the WW writers don't throw themselves all over the page talking about how Wonder Woman is going to succumb to a life of violence and trauma. (I mean, maybe sometimes they do. I'm woefully under-read on WW, but I'm confident enough in this assertion to put it here. Corrections welcome!)

So like...what's up with Batman? Future!Batman!Tim and future!Batman!Damian get this treatment as well, sometimes, and that's also baffling -- because Bruce Wayne, so far, hasn't succumbed to the kind of deeply immoral/abusive/totalitarian figure that DC likes to portray as just lurking around the corner. Is he uniquely able to withstand the pressure of the role? (Well, Bruce and Dick Grayson, of course.)

And with Jason...I do get Bruce's position. A death is a death is a death and at its heart (thank you Kingdom Come), Bruce is just trying to make it so that no one dies. Jason has a utilitarian point, as is sketched out in Batman 137, but it seems clear the actual issue is simply that his ethical position is different from Batman's. Jason thinks a death can be justified; Bruce doesn't.

(Are there any Cass and Jason comics? Because I would love love to see a Cass "ripped the bat off of Kate's costume" Cain and a Jason Todd ideological clash.)

(Why are Cass and Jason on the same side of Gotham War? DC, did you think this through?)

But, see: Batman works with Wonder Woman. Batman adores Wonder Woman. He may disagree with her methods, but that doesn't prevent Trinity team-up after intergalactic mission after them all showing up in each other's comics. So why are Batman and the Red Hood constantly at each other's throats? / Or -- why does DC seem to act as if there is no solution? / Why can't Batman work alongside the Red Hood? Some thoughts:

(a) The paternalism issue; Bruce considers himself uniquely responsible for Jason's actions, and his stepping aside as condoning them. The feels like an easy solution: Bruce Wayne's kid is not a kid anymore. He can make his own decisions.

(b) Gotham again. What other people do in other cities is their own business, but Gotham is Batman's city and he's not going to stand by and let Gothamites be killed. (Counterpoint: Kate? I haven't read any Batwoman but the extent to which DC keeps these separate is wild.)

(c) Jason refuses to consider a team-up without Batman's concession to his methods/refuses to change his methods in the interests of temporary peace. (Valid as an interpersonal stance but I thought we did this already in Urban Legends? Maybe not.)

Anyway I don't have a solution to this yet but I'm pretty sure Wonder Woman is the key. It'll probably come out as a fanfic by the end of the year; I've got a title already, so it had better.

[gabbieranting]

My Silly Application Piece for Screen Rant

Why Only Terry McGinnis Should Succeed Bruce Wayne as the Next Batman 

The cowl has been passed throughout the Bat Family with reverence, and possibly, with too much frequency for something which has been identified by the Lasso of Truth as a singular person’s true identity. Bruce Wayne, as Superman says in Superman/Batman #76, is the disguise. The true identity is the one that formed in the dark, and much of Bruce Wayne died in Crime Alley with his parents. However, one of the many Paul Dini creations to make it from cartoon to comic, Terry McGinnis, is the most appropriate successor to the title Batman, for several reasons. 

The Gotham that Terry lives in is different from, but similar to, the Gotham which Bruce aged protecting. A technological arms race with Batman and his team has led to street gangs armed with hovercrafts, drones, and explosives. Criminals have taken up the themes and adapted the costumes of classic Gotham villains. Wayne Enterprises has been merged with Powers Industries to form Wayne-Powers, and its leader, Derek Powers, murders Terry’s father to hide the development of a mutagenic nerve gas. Early in his career, Terry creates his own first nemesis, exposing Powers to the toxic chemicals that will turn him into the villain Blight. In the same manner as his mentor, Terry creates a slowly escalating chain reaction among the Gotham underworld. 

Terry’s personality is also the most similar to Bruce’s. Of all Bruce’s proteges, Terry’s brooding is the most familiar. Dick is unique in his ability to heal emotionally from trauma, Jason in his inability to do so. Damian is, in a way, loved and raised by both of his parents, as is the Helena Wayne who is the daughter of Bruce and Selena (in Tom King’s Batman/Catwoman.) Each of these Batmen wear the cowl in situations where they are mourning Bruce Wayne, their surrogate father. When Bruce is off-world or when he is dead, a Robin picks up the mantle. But Terry is trained not as Robin, but as Batman, by Batman. Terry is a direct answer to the Gotham he serves, and has solid reason to avenge himself upon the city. The loss of his father to a brutal crime, the creation of his own nemesis, his refusal to fully join the Justice League, and his perpetual exhaustion from living two lives leads Terry to be a mirror of Bruce in his misery. 

Thanks to Amanda Waller, another Terry is an appropriate successor to Bruce’s city is because he is Bruce’s biological offspring. Waller, fearing a world without a Batman, found a psychological match to Thomas and Martha Wayne in Mary and Warren McGinnis, and used nanotech and a sample of Batman’s blood to replace Warren’s DNA in his reproductive cells with Bruce’s. Terry, and his brother Matt, therefore, are biologically Bruce’s. Waller’s original intent was to have Andrea Beaumont - the Phantasm - murder Mary and Warren in front of Terry as a child, to spur him into a crusade against crime.

Phantasm backed out at the last minute out of respect for Bruce, and Waller agreed, canceling the project; but her actions unintentionally spurred on the McGinnis’s divorce when Warren found out his sons weren’t his and suspected an affair. Terry coming to grips with his origin in Project Batman Beyond further aligns him with the struggle of the original Batman. 

Finally, out of all of Batman’s potential heirs, only Terry has the luxury of never having worked alongside Bruce as Robin. Terry and all his rogues are a clean slate, a new chaos, and unlike any of the others,, Terry has never been a sidekick. In Batman Beyond, Bruce the role fulfills is Oracle’s; manning the computers from the cave and feeding intel into the comms.

For Terry, Bruce isn’t Batman; the batsuit isn’t Bruce’s skin, his identity, and taking on the name Batman isn’t the burden of wearing your father’s shoes for Terry in the way it would be for any of the former Robins. Terry has the ability and distance to become his own Batman, and not a temporary replacement for the real thing.

[dalekofchaos]

So let me get this straight. The Flash movie includes

3 Barry Allens. Two good Barrys and one evil Barry instead of the logical thing like, oh I DON'T KNOW HOW ABOUT BARRY, WALLY AND FUCKING THAWNE

No Flash villains

Supergirl instead of Wally, Bart, Jessie, Jay or any of Flashes allies

General Zod

Michael Keaton and Ben Affleck as their respective Batmen, but not Grant Gustin or John Wesley Shipp as The Flash

How is this a Flash movie? Why Dark Flash? Why Zod? WHy not Reverse Flash, Godspeed, Red Death, Zoom, Grodd or The Rogues? I mean, the DCEU ALREADY set up the fact that Henry Allen was framed for Nora's murder and they STILL decided on Dark Flash over Thawne. Why are we getting two old Batmen over former Flashes? The fact that they couldn’t put in the other live action Flash actors there despite this being like the most expensive movie ever made is kind of a joke.

[twistedtummies2]

Year of the Bat - Number 9

Welcome to Year of the Bat! In honor of Kevin Conroy, Arleen Sorkin, and Richard Moll, I’ve been counting down my Top 31 Favorite Episodes of “Batman: The Animated Series” throughout this January.

  TODAY’S EPISODE QUOTE: “So, it wasn’t all for nothing.” Number 9 is…Beware the Gray Ghost!

This is one of the greatest and most renowned episodes of the Animated Series…but as of these recent years, it’s also become one of the most difficult to talk about. In some ways, this episode is even more profoundly impacting now than it ever was before. It’s funny, because the reason(s) for this, I’m sure, will be lost on many future Batman fans; they will never know just how big a deal this episode was when it came out, and how big a deal it is now in this given year. Thankfully, however, those points will not detract from the greatness of this story on its own terms, and a great story is exactly what it is. In this episode, Batman finds out about a series of bombings, committed by a mysterious villain simply referred to as “The Mad Bomber.” He recognizes the crimes as being almost identical, in every way, to the attacks of a fictional villain in a TV series that Bruce Wayne loved dearly as a child, “The Gray Ghost.” To try and solve the case, Batman gets help from the Gray Ghost’s original actor, an aging performer by the name of Simon Trent. Simon has seen better days, as the combo of his typecasting and other personal issues have led to him falling on hard times, and he’s grown bitter about the role that once made him a household name. Batman must find a way to not only stop the Mad Bomber, but reinvigorate Trent’s spirits, as he teams with the Gray Ghost himself to end the crime spree.

Much like the later “Legends of the Dark Knight,” this is an episode that essentially pays homage to Batman’s roots, but in a much more subtle way. I guess I can’t go any further without bringing up the big point: the voice of Simon Trent. It’s none other than Adam West: the original 1960s Batman. The creators of B:TAS were huge fans of the original Adam West series, and odes and homages to the show are sprinkled throughout, some more obvious than others. Trent’s character is one of the biggest examples, as his fictional foibles are a sort of exaggerated mirror of how West’s own career and life went after the 60s series ended. It goes even deeper than that, however: the Gray Ghost himself is a thinly-veiled parody of The Shadow, a character I’ve mentioned many times in the past, who was one of the main inspirations for Batman as a character. (The first Batman comic ever made was an outright ripoff of a Shadow story. No joke, look it up.) Even the villain of the piece feels more like something out of the Shadow than your typical Batman tale, let alone the silly sixties. It’s a double-homage, in a sense, to two great influences on the creators of B:TAS.

This is also what makes the episode hard to watch now: Adam West has been dead for only a few years now, yet, and Kevin Conroy’s passing is still even more painfully recent. You can’t watch this episode as a Batman fan without feeling a sort of pang, realizing not only the significance of two of the greatest Batmen in history onscreen together, but the fact that both are no longer with us. In a weird way, though, that makes the episode even more powerful, because of what the whole story is really about: nostalgia. The way nostalgia effects all three of the main characters in the story – Batman, the Gray Ghost, and the Mad Bomber alike – is a BIG part of this story. Trent is someone who tries to shun the past, who feels pained when he looks back, and has to come to terms with the fact the world has changed, and he has to change, too. He’s haunted by the role that made him once iconic, while also dealing with the issue of being seemingly obsolete, no longer sure of who he is or what his life has truly become. The Bomber, meanwhile, is the opposite extreme: without giving away who it is, it’s someone who clings TOO CLOSE to the past, and to the things they loved in youth, and that obsession drives them to toxic self-destruction, not to mention acts of cruelty and spite. It’s probably not a coincidence that Bruce Timm, one of the show’s creators – a fan of the 60s series – plays this character; a sort of self-parody in the form of the world’s most unsettling fanboy.

It's Batman himself who shows the value of nostalgia and the balance of where it needs to fall: he clings close to his past, as we know, and the Gray Ghost character and series is revealed to be no exception. But he doesn’t allow these things to rule him or destroy him. For people who grew up with Kevin Conroy and Adam West alike, this episode shows just what made both of them such special actors, and reminds us of why both of their respective takes on Batman were so interesting, while also providing a fascinating story that combines all kinds of tonal elements to create an intriguing and entertaining tale. But above all, it serves as a lesson in the dangers and the values of what we keep close in our memories. I think it’s fair to say that everything about this episode – it’s actors, it’s inspirations, and the series it hails from – will be a treasured, nostalgic memory for many years to come.

Tomorrow we move on with Number 8! Hint: “But they share my unique face! Colonel Whathisname has chickens, and they don't even have moustaches!"