So, I was catching up on New 52 Batman recently. As hard as I am on the reboot material coming out of DC for the past couple of years, I actually really enjoy Scott Snyder's work on Batman. He really has a penchant for Snyder-ising a lot of well-known aspects of the Bat-mythos and making them feel undiscovered. His "Court of Owls" story arc was particularly engaging while still exciting and fast paced. But there was one particular plot point that bothered me, though.
In his fight to defeat the Court of Owls conspiracy threatening to envelop Gotham from the inside, Batman had to exploit the weakness of their nigh-indestructable "talon" assassin agents (imagine ninjas who dress like owls) which has to do with extreme cold. Obviously, this led to the Bat-family having a brief run in with Mr. Freeze. While his driving motivation is still his beloved icicle of a wife, Nora, this retconned version of Victor Fries has actually never met Nora and is just a lonely man who became obsessed with her during his early days of researching cryogenics. Batman recounts this story to exploit as a weakness and, of course, beat Freeze. It was a decent, well-written story, but it also sheds light on my biggest problem with contemporary Batman.
The thing about Batman villains is a lot of the really good ones tend to have a sort of driving force that gives the reader a way to connect and, sometimes, sympathize with them. Granted, this isn't exclusively Batman territory, but Mister Freeze was definitely a character who, over the years, has been particularly popular because of his understandable motivations. Despite being released as a straight to video animated feature (probably because the "Batman and Robin" movie still had a stink on it so strong, it may have been mistaken for actual chemical warfare), SubZero was a very well received movie essentially about Supervillain John Q, a guy trying to save someone he loved and was willing to be an asshole to do it.
This was interesting, but not only because it adds depth to the bad guy. Ideally, it adds some layers to the good guy. Batman actually had to understand someone's motives outside of "because I'm an asshole, that's why." More often than not, during the time of "The Animated Series," Batman went out of his way to still try to save his foes when outside variables seemed to fall apart. By the time he met Animated Series Superman, this gave them something to have in common despite varying methods of getting the job done.
The whole point of the World's Greatest Detective is that he's smart and physically capable, but he's still just a man and, in his own way, serves as not only Gotham's protector, but its conscience as well. The Batman Problem comes when you do things like reduce Mister Freeze, a villain with depth, to a delusional dickhead who never had hugs as a kid just so Batman can look tougher and "above it all" when he beats his ass. In fact, if you look closely, he spends a lot more time outsmarting and looking tough in front of his own Justice League teammates than he does the bad guys You can even see it in the Dark Knight trilogy (although I loved those movies) where Batman's code about not killing holds up....until he kills someone (Ra's Al Ghul, Two Face, Talia). Even though it's awesome at times, the Problem is that Batman has gone from a badass Sherlock Holmes analog with a roguish attitude to the New Chuck Norris.
I would also like to point out that the same nerds who think Batman is awesome because he's seemingly all powerful, unbeatable and omniscient are the same nerds who chastise Superman for being seemingly all powerful, unbeatable and omniscient (in other words, Superman haters, your argument is invalid).
I could throw a digital rock out into the internet and hit millions of memes that all pretty much reduce Batman to Punch'emInTheFuckingFace Man. I was watching a commercial promoting the Arkham Origins video game and it was comprised primarily of Bruce Wayne growing up 1). scowling and 2). beating the unholy shit out of people until he became Batman scowling and beating the unholy shit out of people.
Don't get me wrong....it makes for some really fun action more often than not, but it also cheapens a character capable of so much more which is evident, by the way, in Long Halloween and Year One. Honestly, this is why I'm actually very excited about Superman's upcoming team-up with the Caped Crusader in Man of Steel 2: Superhero Boogaloo. This is a chance for one of Batman's peers (who is pretty much the epitome of superhero morality) to show him something about moral discernment, something we didn't see much of in the Dark Knight movies because Batman had to be portrayed as knowing better than everyone else even though he really didn't (seriously....WHY THE FUCK DID HE TAKE THE BLAME FOR COLD BLOODED MURDER????....They could have easily blamed all that shit on the Joker....I mean, they're lying either way, so.....).
Oh, and by the way.....I'm completely fine with Ben Affleck Batman. Fight among yourselves, internet.
