Superman has been written into situations where he has to kill or permit even greater evil. If that is a valid thing to...then much, much easier to do with Batman.
Imagine a homicidal villain (Batman has a few...) is about to kill a kid, and the only certain way of preventing that is to seize a gun and shoot to kill the bad guy...then it would, I think, actually be completely out of character if Batman did not do just that.
I really don’t think that the “no kill” policy is an integral part of the character..I think such a story could be written staying true to Bruce’s known personality.
Traditionally superheroes are supposed to be exemplars of morality, by upholding life for even those who don't deserve it.
For instance, if I was Batman I wouldn't be able to live up to that high standard. I wouldn't kill the likes of Two Face or Penguin, but the Joker would be having an accidental misstep of a 20 story building.
If we are keeping it real Batman would be more heroic as the Warden of Arkham than on the street fighting crime. Keeping the Gotham villains captured away from the public and never escaping jail would save far more lives than he does fighting crime.But heroically keeping people in jail doesn't make for good book I am not blaming the character of Batman for this flaw. This is the weakness of the genre the fact that comics have to be ongoing which means you have to keep villains alive and you use your interesting villains over and over.
Also I have small solution to the problem l would make story called "The List" on the anniversary of his parents death every year, Batman goes into Arkham and other places beats the crap out of his 10(maybe more) worse villains leaving them pretty much unable to function until the next year when he comes around. It answers the question of knowing that he is responsible for what these people do after puts them in jail and it adds to boogeyman mythos for Batman to the criminals Gotham. It would also answer of what Gotham Police are doing as well, Every year they go through "the motions" of trying to stop Batman from beating the crap out of these bad guys but they are really happy that is doing it.
Something like this would shift the narrative a little away from this convo and that is all I think it needs. With this you are just trying to shift the logic blame from Batman to elsewhere. If Batman captures them AND nearly maim them to death every year so they can't do anything. Can you really get mad at Batman for not stopping whoever breaks them out too?
Exactly. It's just as easy to write a story where Joker is successfully sentenced to a lifetime in prison and stays there as it is to write any other kind of story. People tend to forget that. Batman killing him isn't necessary to prevent the deaths of fictional innocents (and let's face it, even if he was killed, he'd only be brought back less than a year later due to his popularity). It's only necessary if a.) someone wants to see Batman kill, and b.) someone just isn't interested in reading anymore Joker stories. In the latter case, there's an easy solution: just don't buy any stories featuring the Joker.
Last edited by phonogram12; 07-31-2020 at 09:46 AM.
Keep in mind that you have about as much chance of changing my mind as I do of changing yours.
Saying "the writers can do X" doesn't mean it's a good idea though. I mean the writers wrote "Emperor Joker" where the Joker had the powers of Mxyzptlk. #1 thing he did? torture Batman! And by extension the entire JL, but hey, involving the League made sense in this one.
I get the no kill thing with old comics when the audience was kids but that’s long gone. Comics are for adults. Characters like Batman don’t need to be models of a certain morality. Tell good stories and if a character kills it shouldn’t be a big deal.
I can agree that there are certain scenarios where Batman killing an opponent would be justified or allowable...
...But I would argue that even in the present, all possible steps should be taken to avoid even the vague appearance of Batman committing vigilante murder, and thus, since he can never really avoid being a vigilante, it’s simply best to only allow him to kill in situations where Superman or someone would be forced to kill (aka, a Darkseid or Doomsday kind of standard.)
It’s not a little thing to have Batman claim some kind of moral high ground that other characters and real world actors don’t have; in a city like Gotham, where corrupt cops are often depicted as being exceptionally numerous and entrenched, and with a rogues gallery that features “Extremists of Order,” I’d say Batman benefits greatly from the same traits that lend themselves to the “too soft” criticism... because all too often, the “too soft” criticism in the real world comes from more fascistic or authoritarian forces that abuse real world authority.
Giving Batman that rule gives him a nuanced but important distinction from a real world vigilante *and* from the sadly real world authorities who have failed in their duties and become threats to peace and the sanctity of life. Unless Batman gets deputized again, like he was in the Silver Age, I’d say that vigilante Batman really should operate with as much of a zero-tolerance policy towards avoidable killing as possible. People don’t want to whittle down his rogues gallery, and Batman with lethal weapons is honestly a bit boring to read because they ta’e some of the challenge out of it... so I’d say that writers should follow the general rule where if there *is* a way to avoid killing, Batman takes it, no matter how impractical or potentially dangerous to himself it is.
And I’d say the standard applied by the Nolan films is actually pretty good: all the deaths he’s tied to there are either the result of circumstances where he can’t act to save people Because of the logistical problems + their own skill levels (the ninjas in the temple he blows up to escape, Ra’s himself aboard the train, Two-Face when Batman saves Gordon’s son), or when the stakes are so high that even a super powered being would be likely to make ruthless choices (the nuke truck in TDKR.)
Like action, adventure, rogues, and outlaws? Like anti-heroes, femme fatales, mysteries and thrillers?
I wrote a book with them. Outlaw’s Shadow: A Sherwood Noir. Robin Hood’s evil counterpart, Guy of Gisbourne, is the main character. Feel free to give it a look: https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asi...E2PKBNJFH76GQP
Actually they must: be models of morality is what make them heroes. If they doesn't have that morality, they would be only crazy vigilantes (if not criminals) like Punisher or Lobo. Batman needs to return to be the hero he was before Knightfall, not to become a Punisher's clone.
Last edited by Gotham citizen; 08-01-2020 at 05:18 AM.
«It's like kids trying to write stories for adults or something.»
There is an huge difference among write a good story and try to write a great one.
«Heroism is not about being perfect or always winning, but breathing hope into the hopeless.»
Batman's world isn't realistic. It's grounded in psychological realism… In real life, Batman's crusade would be a horrible idea.[…] But in the world Batman inhabits, it not only makes sense, it's absolutely the right thing to do.
It's not the fact that Batman doesn't kill that bothers me.
It's the fact that Joker never seems to get a punishment fitting to his crimes. The bigger the crime, the biger the punishment, otherwise there's no catharsis for the reader. A bank robber would be taken to prison for example, but a guy that's trying to take over the world should have his story end with the cops just taking him away in handcuffs. If we have the big crossover villain that threatening reality, the story needs to end with them being utterly destroyed somehow.
Joker basically gets slaps on his wrist for his crimes. He commits huge city threatening crimes when tons of people die and gets the same punishment you'd give Condiment King. More Joker stories need to end with him suffering badly, such as "dying by his own hands" (think of what happened with Green Goblin on the Marvel side) or the classic "Nobody could have survived that" when he falls off a cliff or gets caught in an explosion or something. Yeah, we know he's not going to stay dead, but you leave him alone for at least a few months after that.