Batman Begins: The Thread

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this was the funniest batman movie, i'll give it that

― j blount (papa la bas), Wednesday, 3 August 2005 19:46 (eighteen years ago) link

Who cares? She's a girl!

― Huk-L (Huk-L), Wednesday, 3 August 2005 19:49 (eighteen years ago) link

Batman didn't kill Joker in DKR.

― giboyeux (skowly), Wednesday, 3 August 2005 20:16 (eighteen years ago) link

Didn't have the nerve.

― giboyeux (skowly), Wednesday, 3 August 2005 20:19 (eighteen years ago) link

yeah - the Joker *breaks his own spine* just to make Batman look bad.

man, Frank Miller can be so goddamned silly...

― Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 3 August 2005 20:53 (eighteen years ago) link

Plus, DKR has little gems like Robin's drugged-out parents saying, "Er... Did we have a child?". Doesn't sound like something a liberal would write, does it?
(x-post)

-- Tuomas (tuomas.alh...), August 3rd, 2005.

why the hell not?

― N_RQ, Thursday, 4 August 2005 07:44 (eighteen years ago) link

OMG EVIL DRUG-USER PARENTS SO STONED THEY FORGET THEY EVEN HAVE A 14-YEAR OLD DAUGHTER!!! You'd have to read the scene to understand.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 07:46 (eighteen years ago) link

Did you read/see Trainspotting, Tuomas?

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 4 August 2005 10:27 (eighteen years ago) link

See, yes. How so?

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 11:15 (eighteen years ago) link

What did you think of the dead baby?

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 4 August 2005 11:48 (eighteen years ago) link

Huh? I don't get what you're trying to say...

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 11:54 (eighteen years ago) link

haha

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 12:17 (eighteen years ago) link

This is a fine way of making an argument, yes.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 12:20 (eighteen years ago) link

One of the pivotal scenes in Trainspotting is when the characters get so high that they forget to feed the baby crawling around their flophouse for three days. I'm asking you what you thought of that scene in the context of that movie with an implied question of why having a similar scene with similar undertones in a story told in a superhero comic is a bad thing. I was going to ask you to answer one question at a time because it seems that when someone cuts to the chase and asks you a whole bunch of questions all at once, you don't understand what they're driving at or what the connections between their questions and the topic at hand are.

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 4 August 2005 13:18 (eighteen years ago) link

well, a liberal can't write scenes like that because obviously things like that *never* happen: drug addicts are *actually* famously Good With Kids and only crypto-fascists say otherwise.

― N_RQ, Thursday, 4 August 2005 13:25 (eighteen years ago) link

Yes, I am stupid. Thanks for pointing that out.

The difference is in the context: Trainspotting portrays it's drug users as reckless, stupid, uncaring, but not entirely unsympathetic, and definitely not evil. Whereas in DKR the only scene that features Robin's parents is one mentioned above (and I think the parents are taking weed, not heroin), and that combined with the general tone of the story gives you the impression that Miller's view is more like, "Drug users are bad people, mmkay?".

Have you read the Daredevil story Miller did on PCP? That is as fine an example as it gets of preachy scare story drug education.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 13:35 (eighteen years ago) link

(x-post)

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 13:35 (eighteen years ago) link

Nrq, I'm not here to celebrate drug use. I just wanted to point out that it's often easy to deduce whether people are left- or right-wing from the way they deal with the issue of drug use.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 13:41 (eighteen years ago) link

So the difference is in the stuff that you didn't include in the "Obviously, this couldn't be written by a liberal" quote?

Robin's parents aren't the only liberals in the book, obviously. There are others, and they look like idiots. And there are conservatives, and they look like idiots too. The only people who don't look like idiots are Batman and his allies.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 4 August 2005 13:43 (eighteen years ago) link

And Harlan Ellison.

― Truckdrivin' Buddha (Rock Hardy), Thursday, 4 August 2005 13:48 (eighteen years ago) link

I think it's pretty clear that Harlan Ellsion is Batman, you ignorant trollop.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 4 August 2005 14:02 (eighteen years ago) link

(xpost) I haven't read that story but I bet it's awesome. Stories about PCP are always awesome because they're always completely over-the-top.

What I got from that scene (and the lack of Robin's parents in the story in general) is that Robin's parents were completely wrapped up in their own thing and completely ignored her. The need for attention generated by this was one of the big drivers that led her into becoming the new Robin. Note the lack of value judgement on the parents.

The only people who don't look like idiots are Batman and his allies.

This is very OTM.

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 4 August 2005 14:09 (eighteen years ago) link

Dan, that Daredevil issue is quite something! It starts with a teenage girl getting a PCP flashback whilst in school, she begins to see snakes attacking her and hearing them whispering stuff into her ears, and drool comes out of her mouth, and she runs across the classroom while her classmates stare at her, and then she jumps out of the window to get rid of the snakes, and dies. And then Daredevil and Punisher fight a league of evil pushers... There's one particularly juicy scene, where Punisher is attacking the dealers from the shadows, and he shoots one of them dead, and only then does he realize it's was a kid (a black kid, of course), and he just says something like, "Hmm, they're reeling them in younger and younger", and shows no remorse. (Well, of course he has no remorse. He's The Punisher!).

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 14:38 (eighteen years ago) link

So you like the Punisher, but you're appalled at Batman's lack of moral definition?

― Huk-L (Huk-L), Thursday, 4 August 2005 14:48 (eighteen years ago) link

Hold, on where did I say like Punisher? Obviously he's the most reprehensible of all superheroes. Though the be fair to Miller, I think at the time the Daredevil story was released he was still considered more of a villain than a hero.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 14:54 (eighteen years ago) link

"I like"

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 14:54 (eighteen years ago) link

Main Entry: an·ti·he·ro
Pronunciation: 'an-ti-"hE-(")rO, 'an-"tI-, -"hir-(")O
Function: noun
: a protagonist or notable figure who is conspicuously lacking in heroic qualities
- an·ti·he·ro·ic /"an-ti-hi-'rO-ik, "an-"tI-/ adjective

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 4 August 2005 14:59 (eighteen years ago) link

Hmm, the Punisher stories I've read certainly didn't make him an antihero. He was mostly shown as such only when he was featured in Daredevil, because then the writers could pit Daredevil's liberalism against his extreme right-wing politics. But again, it's been ten years and more since I last read this stuff, so maybe things have changed.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:05 (eighteen years ago) link

Obviously he's the most reprehensible of all superheroes.

That's why he's awesome! But I am not here to argue with Tuomas.

― Leon C. (Ex Leon), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:06 (eighteen years ago) link

(xpost) I'm giving up now.

― The Ghost of I Have Seen The Brick Wall And Its Name Is Tuomas (Dan Perry), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:10 (eighteen years ago) link

What's the deal with the Punisher anyway?
He's obviously some sort of Batman, the Next Generation (you kill my family, I'll take a solemn oath, blah blah blah), but, like, is he actually interesting?
Y'know, like Batman, to me, is interesting because of this very argument/discussion we're having...he's got this very personal vendetta that he's imposed on a whole city. He painstakingly fosters a reputation for being more brutal than he actually is (in the comics at least...current issue of Detective Comics has Batman interrogating a street hood, and the street hood sez, "I ain't telling you shit! Everybody says you don't kill." and then Batman says, "That's cuz dead people don't talk, MEAT!"). His very existence negates his supposed premise of upholding the law. There's a wealth of contradiction and interpretation in Batman.

But Punisher...I don't know, he seems like such a dead end.

― Huk-L (Huk-L), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:11 (eighteen years ago) link

Hold on, are you saying that Marvel began to publish two different Punisher comic books just so that they could criticize vigilantism and right-wing politics through his character? And even if they did, do you think the kids reading these comic books got the idea? I certainly didn't.

(x-post)

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:17 (eighteen years ago) link

Huk, I think there's a clear continuum here: Batman > Punisher > Rorschach. Except that Punisher killed a helluva lot more folks than Rorschach.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:19 (eighteen years ago) link

isn't he basically a response to certain standard queries about superhero - 'how come no guns?', 'why don't they just kill the supervillain?' - along with getting at why people loved the batman myth in the first place: what if you had a superhero that resembled supervillains more than other superheros?

xpost tuomas using your inability to 'get the idea' as a gage of anything is a bad idea

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:24 (eighteen years ago) link

haha and whatever happened to yr allegiance to authorial intent? if marvel sez the punisher's a criticism of rightwing attitudes than that's all that matters!

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:26 (eighteen years ago) link

I think in order to make Punisher an effective antihero they should've made him more right-wing, like Rorschach. He should've been a bit of racist and a sexist and a homophobe. Now he's quite like all the other superheroes, except for his views on crime and ways of handling it.

(x-post)

Has Marvel ever said so?

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:27 (eighteen years ago) link

to be fair i think the only punisher comic i've read is the one where he kills the entire marvel universe. everywhere else i've seen him he's been a somewhat peripheral figure despised and regarded with suspicion.

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:31 (eighteen years ago) link

also guess what - not all rightwingers are sexists or racists or homophobes just as not all liberals think junkies make great babysitters or that murderers deserve more sympathy than their victims.

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:34 (eighteen years ago) link

(I know I said I was giving up but FFS, I think that being a vigilante on a murderous revenge rampage is kind of an elementary, no-brainer definition of an antihero! A story doesn't have to jump up and down and state in gigantic flashing neon letters "LOOK SEE WHAT HE IS DOING IS WRONG!" in order for it to communicate that the protagonist isn't doing "the right thing". Why should spandex stories have to explicitly spell out their moral center?)

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:37 (eighteen years ago) link

What?!?!?! (xp)

― Truckdrivin' Buddha (Rock Hardy), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:38 (eighteen years ago) link

Yeah, if I remember correctly Punisher started out as a Spider-Man villain who was shooting all the criminals, even litterers. But then, for some reason, he got his own comic book, and they explained that when he shot litterers he was under an effect of a drug or something, and in his own comic book he shot only criminals who "deserved" it. I did read Punisher issues published in the late eighties and early nineties, and if they were meant to be a satire, it wasn't very obvious.

(x-post)

Dan, because their primary audience is kids and because they still portray their characters heroic. Even the Punisher mags did.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:39 (eighteen years ago) link

I don't think their primary audience is kids anymore.

― Leon C. (Ex Leon), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:41 (eighteen years ago) link

tuomas and nairn should have a fishing show

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:41 (eighteen years ago) link

Jesus wept.

― The Ghost of Finland WIll Not Be Leading The World In Textual Analysis Anytime S, Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:43 (eighteen years ago) link

But Rorschach doesn't "exist" in same way that Batman & the Punisher do. He was part of a finite story, with a single (or at least concentrated), defined purpose. He appears in 12 comics ever. Batman, meanwhile, has had at least two adventures (in a multitude of media) a month for 65 years, and (despite some rumours) will likely to continue to do so as long that's profitable.
Punisher, I really know very little about. I think I may have read one issue of Punisher War Journal 15 years ago, and I've seen the latest movie.
I can understand how Batman's vendetta can easily be transferred from the personal to the civic ("No child should have to grow up as I did, stinking rich and loved and cared for by a well-heeled Brit."), especially considered his generally non-lethal methods and core (though prone to lapse) respect of the Justice System. But how did the Punisher go from Punishing his family's killers to Punishing everyone?
Batman, once he matures, at least, sees himself as a protector. But Punisher is just a killing machine, no?

― Huk-L (Huk-L), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:43 (eighteen years ago) link

apparently the redhead from wedding crashers is in the next one

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:45 (eighteen years ago) link

I don't think their primary audience is kids anymore.

We are all kids at heart in an infantilized culture.

― Goo goo WAH MY DIAPER IS FULL (Ned), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:53 (eighteen years ago) link

The diaper of my culture overfloweth.

― Huk-L (Huk-L), Thursday, 4 August 2005 15:56 (eighteen years ago) link

I think that being a vigilante on a murderous revenge rampage is kind of an elementary, no-brainer definition of an antihero!

Except that there's this place called the USA where many people believe that's the elementary definition of every hero!

― walter kranz (walterkranz), Thursday, 4 August 2005 16:25 (eighteen years ago) link

"many people"

― Leon C. (Ex Leon), Thursday, 4 August 2005 16:27 (eighteen years ago) link

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