Guest Post: Batman Primer Part IV - My Favourite Batman Media

Crystal from The Uniblog is back with another guest post to complete her series on all things Batman. You can read Part I here, Part II here and Part III here. Now, on to Part IV...

There are so many iterations of Batman that have been around since his original appearance in Detective Comics, it can be a bit overwhelming to the newbie.  I'm here to tell you about my favorite pieces of Batman media to perhaps lead you to something that will be fun for you.  Batman has been light and campy, dark and gritty and had many, many other personalities over the years.  Just as his personality can vary, so does the type of media that he inhabits; comics, movies, TV shows and video games are just a few of the places where you can find The Dark Knight.  I know most of you have probably seen the Batman movies, both the ones from Tim Burton and the new versions from Christopher Nolan; but I am going to try to delve into slightly less mainstream variations on The World's Greatest Detective.

Batman:  The Animated Series

I was aware of Batman before I was exposed to Batman: TAS, but this was the show that made me a Batman fan for life.  Created by Paul Dini (the writer) and Bruce Timm (the artist), Batman:  TAS was revolutionary in children's animation in the early '90s and informed many of the ways Batman has been written over the decades following.  The idea that Gotham is in an anachronistic noir world, equal parts the '40s and present day, was a visionary idea that allowed a fantasy character like the Batman to become more plausible.  The crew didn't talk down to their audience and Batman: TAS was one of the most mature, dark, and character-driven animated series of all time.  I HIGHLY suggest giving it a go if you haven't already.

Some of my favorite episodes:  

-Heart of Ice:  In which Mr. Freeze's background is explained and he becomes a tragic figure representing love and loss and losing yourself to revenge.

-Perchance to Dream:  Bruce wakes up one day and he is no longer Batman, in fact he never was.  His parents are still alive and his fiancee is Selena Kyle.  What is really going on here?

-The Laughing Fish:  The first episode I ever saw of this show.  A surprisingly scary episode with a dark mystery surrounding The Joker, poisoned fish, and disguises.

Later on there was a streamlined redesign of the show and they produced more episodes, from that series I suggest:

-Mad Love:  The origin of the Joker's lover and partner in crime Harley Quinn.  She was his clinical psychologist, how did she get driven to a life in crime?

Batman:  Arkham Asylum

Want a good Batman video game to play?  Well until 2009 there wasn't one.  That was until Batman:  Arkham Asylum for the X-Box 360, PS3, and PC came out.  It takes everything that is cool about Batman -  the gadgets, the fistfights, the detective work, the sneaking around, and the classic Batman villains - and puts them together into one fantastic ball of awesomesauce.  Plus it was written by Paul Dini, who created Batman: TAS and one of my favorite Batman Baddies, Harley Quinn.  The graphics are rad, the story is good, and the play mechanics are some of the tightest out there.  If you like video games and are interested in Batman, you can't go wrong.

Batman Graphic Novels You Should Read

Of course the core of Batman is the comics, and the best of them have been collected in graphic novels.  A graphic novel collects a few issues or a story arc of a comic and puts them into one book.  Here are a few of my favorites, and what I suggest you pick up, should you be presented with the opportunity.

-Batman:  The Long Halloween by Jeph Loeb and Time Sale. A fantastic Batman story concentrating on what makes Batman shine - detective work and villains.  It's a mystery centering on the early years in Batman's existence.  There have been mafia hits going on each consecutive holiday.  Batman is searching, with the help of Jim Gordon and a pre-Two Face Harvey Dent, for the killer before tensions rise to an all-out mafia war.  If you like The Long Halloween make sure to check out its sequel Dark Victory.

-Arkham Asylum:  A Serious House on Serious Earth by Grant Morrison and Dave McKean. If you like a strange, psychological tale, this is for you.  It''s dark to a fault, but beautiful and grants you an inside look into the world of Arkham, the place the villains of Batman live when they are taking time off from maiming the populace of Gotham.  It may be a bit difficult for a novice comic reader, but if you can get into some unconventional story-telling, definitely give it a try.

-Batman:  Thrillkiller by Howard Chaykin and Dan Brereton. This is from a series that DC published called Elsewords.  Elseworlds sets up alternate reality worlds that put familiar DC characters in unfamiliar states.  Thrillkiller is a steamy noir thriller set in the '60s.  Bruce Wayne is the only honest cop on the force and Batgirl is the main vigilante in Gotham.  The Joker is an eccentric and insane lady who needs to be stopped.  It is fun for anybody with a basic knowledge of the Batman Universe.

Here are a few more to check out:  Batman:  Black and White, Mad Love, and Batman: The Killing Joke.

If you aren't feeling up for the darker side of Batman, you can always go back in time and watch some of the old Batman series from the '60s or the newer Batman: Brave and the Bold.  Batman: B&B is inspired by the lighter age in comics of the '60s and '70s and is sharply animated with an equally sharp sense of humor.  It features tons of obscure heroes and villains and is great for people steeped in comics and also people just getting to know them.

Well, that is the end of my Batman Primer, I hope that with the information presented you know a little more about The Caped Crusader than when we started, and with this final entry you have all you need to get started down the road of being a Batman junkie!  Whether you are into action, adventure, mystery, romance, comedy or all of the above there is something for you.

Thanks Crystal for the awesome series on Batman! Check out The Uniblog for more pop culture goodness.

Guest Post: Batman Primer Part III - Batman's Rogues Gallery

Crystal from pop culture website The Uniblog is back to continue her series on all things Batman. You can read Part I here and Part II here. Over to Crystal...

 

The villains in Batman are what really set his world apart from that of most superheroes. They aren't generally very high-powered, they aren't looking to take over the world, and most of the time they are batshit (pun intended) crazy. Sanity, or lack thereof, is a topic explored at length in Batman; even the sanity of the Dark Knight himself has been tackled by many writers. So let's take a look at some of the most prolific and famous members of Batman's Rogues Gallery.

Catwoman, one of Batman's most recognizable villains, has gone through many changes since her creation in the 1940s. Selina Kyle is a cat burglar who has been a socialite, a hooker, and even an amnesiac flight attendant (wait, what?). She's Bruce Wayne's most prevalent love interest and, contrary to most of the villains in Gotham, she isn't generally a murderer or criminally insane. In recent years, Selena has been let into the inner circle of Batman lore by being in on his secret identity, and has already proven that under great duress, she could keep that secret.  

The Penguin is another very recognizable figure from the Rogues Gallery.  Like most of the lasting characters in the DCU (DC Comics Universe), he too has gone through many changes over the years. A rotund "bird" of gentlemanly style with a penchant for using weaponised umbrellas, Oswald Cobblepot may not seem very menacing, but he is one of Batman's oldest, most persistent enemies.  He is mostly a mobster and thief, but is not against killing should the situation call for it. These days, he is quite often seen running a nightclub, The Iceberg Lounge, as a front for his criminal activities.  Contrary to the Penguin of the Tim Burton films, The Penguin is not some sort of mutant, but a strange stout man who leans to the ugly side.  He is also sane, and in complete control of his actions, which creates a novel dynamic between himself and The Batman.

Mr. Freeze gets a bad rap from mainstream media today. The incredibly cheesy and inexcusably awful performance by "The Governator" Arnold Schwarzenegger may have ruined him a lot of people, but make no mistake, Victor Fries is as nuanced and interesting a character as comics are capable of. This wasn't always the case, as when he was created in the late '50s he was just a villain with a cold theme. When the lead writer of Batman: The Animated Series (which will be explored further in a future article), Paul Dini, reworked the origin of Mr. Freeze, he really took shape. Dr. Victor Fries' story became that of love and loss. His wife, Nora, had a terminal disease which he was attempting to cure. He had cryogenically frozen her to keep her alive until he could come up with a solution. Unfortunately, his funding was cut and the person who owned the equipment violently caused an accident between Victor and his cryogenic machinery, which changed him into the icy cold man he is today.

Two Face is another villain who is an almost tragic Shakespearean character in nature. Former Prosecuting Attorney Harvey Dent was a champion for justice in the corrupt world that is Gotham City. He was even a frequent contributor to cases that Batman worked on and was a friend of both the Bat AND his alter-ego Bruce Wayne. Dent had a dark secret though - a duel personality, and the side that was becoming more and more prominent was the dark "Big Bad Harv" persona. Then, depending on continuity, organised criminals either throw acid in his face or cause him to be in an explosion, but either way the result is the same: Half of his face is irrevocably scarred. The dark personality took complete control and Two Face was born, an organised criminal mastermind with an insane obsession with the number two. One interesting thing about Two Face: He uses a two-headed coin he got from his abusive father to make all of his decisions.  One side is scratched up and one side is clean, so if he is flipping to kill you, you better hope you don't get the scratched side.

Poison Ivy is the one of the most famous eco-terrorists in comics. She was used as a guinea pig by an insane professor who injected her with more poisons and toxins than a small army could withstand. Now she is attuned with plants in every sense. She feels closer to plants than people, she is immune to the poisons and toxins that created her and is an incredibly skilled biologist, especially with exotic and dangerous varieties of plants. She is a seductress and uses pheromones to snare her victims, and the poisons that naturally flow through her veins to take them down. Her (arguably) only human friend is her polar opposite - the light-hearted and sledgehammer-wielding Harley Quinn.

Harley Quinn is the clown mistress of crime. Otherwise known Doctor Harleen Quinzel, she was a physiologist who got through medical school mostly by cheating and seduction. She ended up getting a job at the infamous Arkham Asylum, where she planned on getting the dirt on some of their more "glamourous" criminals in order to write a tell-all book and make a mint. When she got the opportunity to treat the infamous Joker, it was just what she was looking for. In their session, The Joker filled her head with sympathetic stories, painting him as a tortured soul. The source of that torture?  Batman. Quinzel became infatuated with The Joker, and when he escaped she went mad with fear of what happened to her "Puddin". When Batman returned him battered to a pulp, she was driven completely over the edge. Helping The Joker escape in full Harlequin costume was her first act as a super villain. Now she is known for being almost as ruthless as the man who created her. Her insanity is based on her obsession with all things Joker; she is willing to put up with massive amounts of abuse from him, though as the years go on she has become more independent and has teamed up with Poison Ivy, Catwoman and even Batman for different adventures. Her popularity has even allowed her to carry her own comic series for a while.  

The Joker is THE most famous criminal in Gotham, and is Batman's opposite in every way. Where Batman represents order and justice, The Joker is chaos incarnate. He doesn't kill to be cruel (though he is cruel), he kills because to him, it doesn't matter - and that is the joke. His origin varies; the currently accepted version is that he was a poor comedian with a pregnant wife. Because he worries about supporting his family he gets roped into robbery. Unfortunately, before said crime transpires, his wife and unborn baby die in an accident, but he can't get out of the plan. The criminals make him keep his commitment to robbing a chemical plant. At the job, Batman shows up and scares him so badly he falls into a vat, causing his face to be bleached white and sending him the rest of the way into insanity. I tend to like a more mysterious Joker, where he is crazy because he just is. That is what makes him so menacing; he is just as likely to give you a hug as shoot you in the head.

There are many, many more villains to cover, but these are a few of my favourites. Others include The Ridler; a brilliant criminal mastermind who uses clues to outsmart the police and especially Batman. Killer Croc is a hardboiled giant with scales and sharp teeth, who at his best is a hired hand and at his worst is a cannibal. Bane an incredibly smart "roided-up" Caribbean super-criminal who arguably comes the closest to taking Batman out. If you want to learn more, Wikipedia is a killer source for info on all things comics.

The villains of Batman are my favorite part of Batman, and honestly what really got me into comics originally. They are varied and deal with the broken psyche in a dramatic but very human way. These are people who were driven over the edge and, generally, revel in their madness. They lead to one of the greatest debates in comics; is it having a Batman that created this breed of villain, or would they have existed in one form or another anyway?

Next Time: The Batman Primer IV - My Favourite Batman Media.

Thanks Crystal for another awesome post! I have to say the villains are definitely my fave part of Batman too - they're all so unique and intriguing. 

P.S. If you enjoyed this post, check out more of Crystal's writing and other fun stuff at The Uniblog.

Guest Post:: Batman Primer Part II - The Batman Family

Crystal from pop culture website The Uniblog is back to continue her series on all things Batman. You can read Part I here. Over to Crystal...

The Batman Family are the friends of Batman who fight crime with him. One of the more fascinating and contradictory things about Batman are his connections to the people who follow him to a life of crime-fighting.  As broody and solitary as he seems, he is constantly surrounded by others who know his secrets.

The most famous of these is Dick Grayson's Robin, the yellow-and-green-donning young man who was at Batman's side for decades. Robin gets a lot of flack for being kidnapped all the time and being pretty much useless, but in reality he's a kid who kicks ass and keeps Batman from falling too far into the darkness of wearing the cape and cowl. He has gone through the same thing as Bruce, losing his parents as a child to violent tragedy, but he doesn't let it consume him. He has since grown up and become his own hero, first as Nightwing and then as Batman himself (long story), but Dick Grayson will forever be known as the most famous side-kick of all time. 

Jim Gordon is the Police Commissioner of Gotham and is perhaps Batman's best "friend" who doesn't know his secret identity.  It's implied that he's smart enough to unravel the mystery of Batman's identity, but that he chooses not to. Gordon is cool because he is a beacon of honesty and goodness in a department corrupted with dirty cops. He is also a tragic figure, whose first wife leaves him with child in tow because his priorities keep him serving the dark lady that is Gotham, and not his family. Then that same city gets his second wife brutally murdered.  I like Gordon best when he is played as a grizzled and tough old man.

Batgirl is Barbara Gordon, Jim Gordon's niece (or daughter depending on the continuity). She is at first a very light character, due to the fact that her backstory wasn't born out of tragedy like Batman or Robin. Initially she's mostly a foil for Robin to argue over who is a better sidekick.

This all changed in 1988 during the famous and controversial "Killing Joke" storyline. During an attempt by the Joker to drive Commissioner Gordon crazy, the Joker shoots Barbara in the spine, paralysing her. In a world of comic books you would think that she could be healed through sci-fi science or magic, but there is no such cure for Barbara Gordon.   Rather than letting the character get what happened to her undone, writers chose to revive her as a character living with a disability - the information broker and computer expert Oracle.  She is actually empowered by this role enough to become the leader of her own superhero group, the all-female "Birds of Prey".

I am sure you know Alfred Pennyworth as Batman's faithful manservant and butler, but there is a lot more to the British gentleman than that. He is also an actor, an amateur surgeon, a sometimes spy and even a rose breeder. He bounces dry, sardonic humor off Batman in a way nobody else can, and in the sometimes humorless world that is Gotham that is a godsend.  He is the closest thing Bruce Wayne has to a father.

There are MANY other members of the Batman Family, including the formerly mentioned (in Part I) Zatanna - a magician who can wield magic by speaking backwards; Batwoman, Kate Kane - a kick ass military brat and the first homosexual to lead Detective Comics; Catwoman, Selena Kyle - who is somewhat reformed and actually has been let in on Bruce Wayne's secret; and more Robins than you can shake a stick at.  

One thing Batman does in spades is keep a certain distance from others, but over the years he has accumulated more compatriots in crime than even the usually sunny Superman. Why? I think for somebody as pained as the Dark Knight, you need others to keep you from going over the edge, especially when most of the villains you fight are violent lunatics.

Next Time on The Batman Primer:  Batman's Rogues Gallery

Thanks Crystal for the fascinating post!

Guest Post:: Batman Primer Part I, brought to you by The Uniblogger

I've been curious about comic books for a long time, but have always been too daunted to dive into them. There are SO many and each story seems so complicated that it's hard to know where to start. So I'm very excited that my blogging buddy Crystal (a.k.a. The Uniblogger - check out her blog for lots of pop cultural awesomeness) has put together a crash course in the comics of one of my fave superheroes - Batman. Here is part one...

Batman.  Everybody knows his name, as he is possibly the best known superhero (along with Superman and Spider-Man, of course) in the world.  He is dark, tough and rad as hell.  How familiar are you with The Dark Knight?  Well for those of you are just catching up with 'The World's Greatest Detective', these articles are for you.  There is over half a century of history behind Batman, so I am just gonna cover the Cliff-Notes mixed in with the stuff I especially love about him.

After the success of Superman in the late '30s many people in comics were working on cranking out more superhero stories for the public.  This is what prompted Bob Kane to create Batman.  Though his name is on everything Batman-related these days, a lot of the definitive features on Batman were created by Bill Finger, including the trademark cowl and his secret identity, Bruce Wayne.  They were influenced by many of the famous heroes and great detectives of the time - Sherlock Holmes, The Phantom and even Zorro.

 

All great superheroes have an interesting and tragic origin story, and Batman is no exception.  Born Bruce Wayne, to Gotham City socialite parents Doctor Thomas Wayne and philanthropist Martha Wayne, he was a generally happy and well-adjusted young boy.  While walking home from a movie (oddly enough some continuity says they were watching Zorro), they are approached by a nameless mugger who ends up killing the elder Waynes, leaving their young child Bruce alive. Depending on what version you are presented with, the Waynes' killer may be different, but the effect of this event is always the same; their traumatic deaths drive Bruce Wayne to become the protector of Gotham, Batman.

Bruce Wayne grows up into a very angsty young man and uses his endless funds to travel around the world and learn a lot of the dangerous and cool skills that Batman later utilizes.  If you have seen Batman Begins you may be familiar with this part of his life. 

Of course he learns a bunch of combat from all sorts of people around the world, including ninjas, Kung Fu fighters, and Tai Kwan Do masters.  Another leg of his journey sees him learning underneath the world's greatest escape artist, a Houdini pastiche named Zatara (whose daughter Zatanna would join the Justice League and be an on-again off-again love interest for Bruce).

When Bruce returned to Gotham, the city was in a state of chaos.  He couldn't stand by and let more damage be done to his beloved city, or more children be orphaned by senseless crime.  His belief that criminals tend to be a superstitious lot led to the creation of Batman, a dark avenger that could lead to a legendary status that would keep the weak of heart from even considering crime.  Though a solitary guy, Batman would need help to keep Gotham safe.

Next time: Batman Primer Part II - The Batman Family, His Allies and Love Interests

Thanks to Crystal for the awesome post!