I just don’t think Bats is doing anything different than a peak human and quite frankly there’s never been a point post the 40’s where he hasn’t been well beyond what a normal man does.
And okay you listed two things (I’d argue losing your child is worse than anything Superman or Wonder Woman ever went through). Again though you have him getting tortured, poisoned, nearly killed and resurrected via Lazarus pit, hit with the omega sanctions and jutted through time, being betrayed by all his friends and being moms wiped, having his ward come back and try to kill him, having his ex lead and army to destroy his city, had a man bastardize his fathers memory to stick it to him, been drugged with weapons grade street drugs, back broken, skull cracked and nearly comatose.
Point is, the character goes through a lot.
And I’m not talking about Night of the Owls or No Mans Land. Those almost exclusively only effect the Bat books. Until Metal, Batman really hasn’t had DCU events where he was the focal point. While the rest of the trinity and GL and Flash have
It just doesn’t make sense. Batman had 3 films in the 80’s and 90’s that were the top films of the year, then had the top film of 08 which was the first comic book film to break one billion. Then only the the Avengers team up film beat TDKR (which grossed more than all the phase one Marvel films outside of Avengers). Then he had the show that launched the DCAU which did wonders for exposure for the rest of the brand.
If you go by Diamond Charts the top selling books of 2002, 2003, 2005. After that it was always event books, then a Batman book. When the New 52 launched Batman #1 was the highest selling book after Justice League #1. Then Batman was book that maintained its readership the most. The next year Batman 13 was the highest non event, non #1, non anniversaries issue on the charts (basically the only non gimmick book in the top 20 outside Justice League and the highest DC book of the year. Similar for the following year.
Like at some point you do have to just concede that Batman might just be DC’s most popular character and it just economically justifies itself to push Batman more because the returns and market are there.
I get that and I’m sympathetic to that. However the idea that Batman is only popular because of how hard he’s pushed is just untrue. He’s proven to be vastly popular for decades now and the market is what it is on him. Years ago Jimmy Olson and Lois got titles. Batman is just at that level
Nobody is saying that that's the only reason that Batman is popular, but it's a part of it. It becomes part of a cycle: Batman gets more titles than other characters because he is more popular than other characters. Batman remains more popular than other characters because he has more titles and therefore more opportunities to read about him. Other characters remain more obscure because there's not nearly as much material promoting them or showcasing them because most of DC's effort goes into promoting Batman.
Last edited by Green Goblin of Sector 2814; 08-10-2020 at 04:12 AM.
Considering his long existence it's for the first time that Batman had received a 'event' where he is front and center and that also was achieved by combining him with other JL characters and the joker so it seems that far from being batgod he is constantly dependent on others in events. In new 52 he was just playing a supporting role to luthor, in Zero hour he was dispatched in a most ignominious fashion, his role was non existent in Crisis on infinite earths, in Infinite Crisis he was stuck at reconstruction of a black box and then had to put together a team to stop brother eye and then again he didn't stop it but it was terrific who eventually derailed it and Hal had to save him. This was after Max cockculed him by stealing his satellite in the first place and almost killing him via Superman. In jl vs suicide squad he was again forced to work with the squad as he could achieve squat alone against eclipso and in fact manipulated by Amanda to recognise the need of the SS. Then again in identity crisis he got mind wiped and also didn't solve the mystery on his own despite being "the world's greatest detective". In Final Crisis all he managed was being taken captive and if didn't have the bullet and Darkseid wasn't dying he would have been vaporized before he reached him not to mention even then he was able to do so because darkseid intended to use him as a weapon against time or whatever nonsense. Even in metal it was joker who played a key role in defeating the BWL and Bruce didn't take him down alone. In fact this is almost a trope that he never managed to do bumpkin in events except by sticking with others and depending on them to pull his ass out of trouble.
Meanwhile how many characters especially those of certain demographics (Black Panther and Carol Danvers) do we hear that mess tossed at?
That some fluke of nature is the reason Cyborg, John Stewart and others finds fans OUTSIDE of comics.
The folks who buy Batman books and stuff BUY IT. What happens to all the UNSOLD stuff once they are done? Same thing happens to Games of Thrones, Friends, Star Wars and others-they leave a ton of unsold stuff. That gets discounted, tossed in bins, grab bags and sold to places like Half Price Books and Movie Trading Post.Why do you always have anecdotal evidence about people supposedly not wanting Batman stuff? Even if that is true, ok, so? Are you saying kids don't like Batman? It's blatantly obvious you have some bizarre, petty bias against Batman and are more than willing to share your stories of his books/merchandise collecting dust. I bet you've seen kids who prefer Batman to other heroes but you never tell those stories only vice versa. What do you think will happen if you admit he's popular?
Yet for some ODD reason no one wants to talk about that. Yet we get SERMONS on youtube and harassment on Twitter about POC, LGBTQIA and female lead stuff that is unsold.
Or because he does not have to face the CRAP others do.Like at some point you do have to just concede that Batman might just be DC’s most popular character and it just economically justifies itself to push Batman more because the returns and market are there.
If Batman wants a book-he doesn't need Ms Marvel (Khan) to sell to justify a Storm book.
His movies don't have to worry about not getting greenlighted because Steel and Catwoman bombed.
His shows won't get shelved because the network doesn't like them like Black Panther's 2003 show.
No store is going to refuse to sell his books like everyone else has had to deal with.
No one is going to use his movie as a shooting gallery because a black Johnny Storm or Stormtrooper is in it.
So economics justify the books because everyone else has to deal with reality.
Sooner than later Batman is not going to be enough. Movies and tv are trying to tell the comic side something.
And by the time they get the message-too late.
I don't care about the Batman money. I want that kid who fell in love with Black Panther to DUMP him and be in love with John Stewart. I want those Carol Danvers fans to be Wonder Woman fans ONLY. Before Fantastic Four get another movie-I want kids LOVING the Terrifics.
I want to FIGHT Marvel and everyone else-not send them disgruntled DC fans. Who are fed up with "not good enough" or goalpost moving.
Don't tell me Aquaman with a billion dollar movie isn't good enough.
All those CW shows got them for a REASON.
It seems you would have sung praises of Batman and extolled his virtues to heaven if he was BLACK. That seems to be a arbitrary choice for comic book characters. You should ideally be able to enjoy characters stories despite their color imo though of course it is dependent on personal choice and i am not saying you shouldn't have your own criteria for enjoying a character's story but ideally you shouldn't want to force your choices on others. If kids like Black Panther I would hardly try convincing them to drop him and go for Batman or Blue Adam but rather would hint that if they enjoyed so and so characters story then they may like this similar character who is rather like the character they enjoy. You sound like a crusader or reactionary who feels like only black characters should receive attention after years of neglect and while not totally a wrong approach it gets tiresome if someone is constantly forcing their rhetoric down your throats.
Bingo, and before anyone tries to start anything I'm black but that poster makes EVERYTHING about race. I guarantee you if Bruce was made black tomorrow they'd start praising him. Batman doesn't just get pushed over minority characters he gets pushed over ALL characters in DC, whether they're black, white, LGBTQ, straight, etc.
I'm not anti diversity in any way and can appreciate skyvolt's passion for minority characters but let's not act like POC are the only one's not getting their fair share because of Batman. And not everything is about race, yes a lot is but there may be other factors but this isn't the place for this kind of discussion.
On the Batgod front another poster pointed out how Green Arrow has beaten the same meta characters Batman has but he doesn't get crapped on anywhere near as much. Street level characters beating people out of their league isn't a Batman only thing, TONS of street level heroes do it. But surprise, surprise since they don't have the popularity of Batman people either don't know about it or choose to conveniently look the other way and give them a pass.
Batman has legit been doing sci-fi **** consistently since the 50s, I remember there being a Silver Age story with him making a suit that gave him Silver Age Superman level powers. Him being enjoyable to read or not (entirely subjective btw) has nothing to do with anything.
The Batman Who Laughs didn't have superstrength, superintelligence, superspeed or supertech or anything like that to start out with. He was Batman exactly as we have him now and went evil and crazy. This is what Snyder tells us he is capable of doing with it.
There actually have been comics published after the 40s that depict him fighting crime in Gotham rather then taking on multiversal gods, you just need to know where to look for them.
Going from this
super human bruce.jpg
to this
silver bruce.jpg
Is pretty clearly superhuman. They didn't need to do this to write this comic. They wanted to write this story though, and decided to do it with Batman. And also have the main villian be Batman. And also have the 6 evil henchman who each have their own tie-in comic be Batman. This really doesn't happen to anyone else in DC Comics.
I'd argue Damian dying is something quite bad for Damian as well. Offering up bad things happening to Damian or Alfred or Dick or Tim as evidence that Bruce is the whipping boy of the batfamily as opposed to Damian or Alfred or Dick or Tim seems wrong. Bruce is Alfred's boy, Alfred has all but raised Dick as well. All the bad things that happen to them should be considered to make Alfred the whipping boy of the bat family by that same logic. Seeing Bruce suffer doesn't exactly leave Dick and the other cold either, they care a great deal. This logic doesn't get us anywhere.And okay you listed two things (I’d argue losing your child is worse than anything Superman or Wonder Woman ever went through). Again though you have him getting tortured, poisoned, nearly killed and resurrected via Lazarus pit, hit with the omega sanctions and jutted through time, being betrayed by all his friends and being moms wiped, having his ward come back and try to kill him, having his ex lead and army to destroy his city, had a man bastardize his fathers memory to stick it to him, been drugged with weapons grade street drugs, back broken, skull cracked and nearly comatose.
Point is, the character goes through a lot.
Batman was the vocal point in Final Crisis. He was as much the protagonist of Infinite Crisis as anyone else as well. Same with most new 52 events. It is difficult for him to be both the protagonist and have it be his powerset that is making the event happen like the Flash is Flashpoint or the Green Lantern in Darkest Night/Brightest Day but that's because he doesn't have any powers. That's not him being treated unfairly. If his peak human abilities are threatening the very fabric of the universe I don't think they should be described as peak human anymore, cause we definitely can't do that.And I’m not talking about Night of the Owls or No Mans Land. Those almost exclusively only effect the Bat books. Until Metal, Batman really hasn’t had DCU events where he was the focal point. While the rest of the trinity and GL and Flash have
Last edited by DurararaFTW; 08-10-2020 at 12:37 AM.
It's Barbatos who was threatening the universe in metal and who had empowered BWL enabling him to pull off paranormal stunts. Once he was defeated BWL reverted to his previous stats as seen in BWL miniseries where he wasn't a supernatural creature but just another thug with a elaborate plan.