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#he needs a mini batplane or something
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JLA: World Without Grown-Ups #1
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fightabear · 3 years
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so some time ago, someone asked me to do meta about a scene in Injustice and i wanted to revisit that scene with the scene from Year Zero in mind. and then i ended up getting deeply into injustice damian, his relationship with his two awful dads, and it’s kind of a mini character essay?
so! here’s a warning for: tyrannical totalitariam regimes, child abuse, abusive fathers, emotional manipulation, evil superman, character death & also random he-man. please note that this is entirely about injustice and its characters, which are not a reflection on their mainstream counterparts.
there’s tension between damian and bruce from the get-go in injustice, and we’re never really told why. if we take cues from the game (though that entire scene doesn’t make sense) then it’s because bruce didn’t save jason, which fits in with my reordered robin theory in which tim and jason were switched, and jason has only recently died.
now, we don’t know whether jason is running around as red hood right now or not. but i’m inclined to say he isn’t, as his injustice 2 ending makes a big deal of him becoming red hood. and damian is close with jason in injustice 2, close enough that jason listens when damian tells him that he’s a lot more than bruce thinks he is and drops the shitty batman costume. close enough that during the (extremely weird, extremely out of alignment with the comic) scene in injustice 2 where damian betrays bruce for clark, jason is the name damian throws at him with the most vehemence. regardless of the robin ordeer, bruce’s failure to save jason is seems to be an incredibly sore point between them.
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so it’s interesting that bruce is already counting damian out before injustice even starts. he’s comparing damian to jason - someone who he apparently no longer considers part of his legacy. 
the kicker is: damian in injustice is actually probably the most morally centered version of himself. he shows open compassion and care for other people more often than he does in most of the mainstream runs. damian’s sense of right and wrong is solid, but what he wants is to break the cycle that gotham is trapped in. which from his perspective, is something bruce doesn’t seem to want to do.
injustice’s version of bruce is someone who truly believes that the ends justify the means - which means he’s apt to do some heinous things to people until they see his side of things. he seems to view people questioning as an act of betrayal, so instead of ever explaining himself he resorts to things like installing viruses in cyborg, kidnapping hawkgirl and replacing her, beating allies within an inch of their life - all of it is fine to him so long as they’re not dead. 
but it’s not fine to damian.  damian is constantly horrified at the lengths bruce will go to.
damian is afraid of his father. 
so, this is about a specific scene.  let’s get to that scene. its just important to note the difference between them, and emphasize that he’s not going with any intent to fight. if he was going to do that, he wouldn’t be doing this:
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or respond like this:
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or this:
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he’s there to make amends, or at least try to. he still loves his father and he wants to be forgiven, and this is something that will carry on ten years later in injustice 2. damian made the choice to oppose bruce’s controlling nature but damian didn’t choose to abandon him and the bat family permanently. that choice was made for him. damian wants to come home. 
and he’s terrified of his father. i cannot stress that enough. bruce at this point has already shown that he knows how to hurt his closest friends if they oppose him.
damian is a highly trained fighter, but he’s also a  thirteen year old boy who knows he can’t overpower a man twice his size and weight.
and bruce?
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bruce’s entire argument really hinges on ‘you, my thirteen year old son, didn’t take my side in this argument’. because, i have to put this in bold, the league was not executing the criminals they were removing from arkham. they were just transferring them to a more secure facility. something which is actually sorely needed, especially given what has just happened to metropolis. arkham isn’t fit to house them. and as far as damian sees it, bruce doesn’t like it because it’s removing an element of his control.
now, bruce isn’t wrong about how things will escalate. 
but damian’s not wrong about his motivation here.  i think there’s a conversation to be had about how bruce’s methods in trying to stop the regime actually drove it to further and further extremes. bruce never tries to talk to clark - or anyone, really. he just starts playing mind games to make them do what he wants.
it harkens back to the conversation bruce and dick have in the batplane. that bruce doesn’t talk to people, he doesn’t explain himself. he’s either right or you’re wrong and he won’t explain his stance. there is never room for debate. he’ll just stop talking and leave until you agree.  there is no option where he sits and listens to an open and honest dialogue, no scenario where he entertains that he might be in the wrong or maybe things aren’t black and white.
and that’s why injustice bruce is not a good guy. 
even on prime earth, damian had to bend over backwards to prove to bruce that he wasn’t a monster. it was damian who spent months digging through the sewers for martha’s pearls. damian who had to prove he was capable of loving titus. damian who constantly had to show that he was capable of empathy and thinking of others - bruce did none of the heavy lifting in that father-son relationship, he made damian climb the entire hill and still continues to put little effort into it.
and injustice bruce is even less empathetic and expressive than prime bruce.  
which is why you get a confrontation like this:
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this goes beyond dick’s accident and ties back into what clark said about bruce not tending to his son’s who are grieving because they lost friends in metropolis.  damian’s fed up with never meeting bruce’s expectations. but more than that, he’s fed up with his feelings coming second to bruce’s. 
bruce has already made a judgement on who and what damian is. damian has the potential to be dangerous and requires work to fix, and so he’s not interested in getting to know him beyond that. he tells dick that he’s “worried about  damian being seduced by darkness” but never talks to damian himself with him about it.
but clark has looked at damian and and decided that damian is good. damian has problems, clark can admit that and does, but damian is good. like bruce himself.
and ultimately why when dick dies, clark is the one that reaches out to him because he sees damian for what he is: grieving child who just made a terrible mistake. it was an accident. damian didn’t mean for this to happen. meanwhile, bruce feels as though he was proven right. damian was dangerous and now his real son is dead. bruce will later admit, once he stops trying to manipulate damian, that damian was dead to him the moment dick died.
going back to year zero for a minute, they subtly show that damian is doing his best to be like bruce. baby damian idolizes his father. so i imagine a lot of bruce’s own feelings towards damian stem from self-hatred. from bruce seeing himself in his son and not liking the reflection it forces him to confront. injustice bruce projects a great deal of his own insecurities and shortcomings onto his youngest. damian is his worst what-if.
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even though damian doesn’t deal with his grief the way bruce does. there are similarities, he puts his feelings into his fists and hits. just like bruce. but unlike bruce, and most likely because of dick, he does try to communicate. come injustice 2 he even talks about his feelings.
that doesn’t justify any of the violent outbursts. and he has a lot of them. he has significant issues with controlling his anger and struggles with lashing out, verbally and physically. it both worsens and improves as he gets older.
damian knows that he’s more than his grief, his loss, his anger. he’s also compassionate and capable of incredible feats of kindness. we see that in the flashback chapter in injustice 2. people aren’t pawns for damian, they aren’t a means to assuage his own guilt and validate himself as a good person. he wants to be good for those people.
damian’s relationship with heroism isn’t built on an intrinsic need for control or power, nor is it a means of validating his self worth.
people just need him. they’re suffering.  and he wants to be there for them.
but again, we’re not there yet.
so, alfred reaches out to touch damian. damian asks him repeatedly to let go. when alfred doesn’t, damian tries throwing him off, not realizing how much strength he now possesses.
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damian  has a thing about being touched when he’s wound up tightly. it almost always ends with him lashing out at someone. which, tying back into why he felt comfortable coming back here, probably goes into his expectation that he’s going to get the lights knocked out of him. because again, damian did not go to the cave to fight or hurt anyone. the pill is entirely for his own defense.
from what we know of damian’s childhood in both prime and injustice, violence is the expected retaliation for misbehavior. toeing out of line is grounds for getting the shit beaten out of you, and while things should be different here....
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from how bruce reacts he’s not wrong to expect it.  note that bruce dodesn’t run to alfred to see if he’s okay, he goes after damian for hurting him. it’s damian who runs to alfred after he’s thrown bruce away from him.  
( granted, yes, he threw bruce into the penny and it almost crushes alfred )
damian apologizes and he means it.  alfred’s first question is to ask for bruce.  
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“”hawkgirl”” intervenes to try to end this fight before it can escalate further.
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damian deduces that this isn’t hawkgirl and blows some stuff up.  bruce calls after him probably - not to have a serious heart to heart with him about what just happened, or what happened in arkham, but to try to manipulate him into taking bruce’s side or in the very least stop his ruse from being uncovered.
this is a theme moving forward. bruce will dangle forgiveness in front of damian, but only when it benefits him and can be used to control him. eventually he’ll stop and will use the guilt he knows damian feels to wound him.
and here’s the second theme it introduces: damian is scared shitless of his father. he’s not afraid of bruce’s violence, as after this he charges straight for him time and time again, but he is utterly terrified of the lengths bruce will go to get his way.
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this is also where he takes dick’s suit. i think this was his way of telling bruce that he didn’t deserve to use dick’s memory the way he uses his parent’s death - as justification for what he does.  this comes up in injustice 2 later down the road, damian will bring up that bruce uses his pain to justify how he brutalizes the people around him. damian does the same thing -- but we also see damian grappling with his conscience about it. he wants to be better. he doesn’t want to be all his violence and loss.
back to the topic at hand, damian doesn’t do anything with dick’s suit. unlike bruce, damian doesn’t wear his grief and guilt in plain sight. he puts it in a box and doesn’t look at it, he covers the wounds with anger and as he gets older, develops a death wish and basically begins seeking a noble death in order to make up for what he’s done. it isn’t until dick passes the mantle to him in an attempt to steer him back on the right path that he even looks at it again.
damian isn’t the one that ended his relationship with bruce. bruce did. damian is very willing to reconcile if bruce genuinely wants it, but bruce doesn’t bother with damian outside of combat or when he needs something. damian actually keeps up visits with alfred, he gets him birthday presents, they meet up often and despite their opposing viewpoints, they get along just fine. damian even listens to what alfred says. he still loves his family.
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damian himself is a mess. this line resonates because damian, too, is afraid. afraid of bruce, afraid of being what bruce thinks he is. there’s only so far he can bury it under the anger.
by the next issue of year one, after the confrontation at the manor, damian’s discarded any notion that bruce is a good person or justified in anything he does. everything he says on this page is true.
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he’s not wrong. he’s more than bruce has even given him credit for being. injustice bruce sorts people into boxes impossible to climb out.  damian made his attempt at reconciliation and instead, found out that bruce has kidnapped and replaced one of his friends to spy on all the rest. in that split second when bruce came at at him, he saw the disgust and anger in his eyes. he’s seen how bruce sees him and wholeheartedly rejects it. 
he doesn’t want to be bruce. he will not be bruce.
batman was supposed to be better than the league. it was supposed to be a new way. instead he just found a new, different means to brutalize and control, and a new way someone justifies causing harm. and he doesn’t want it.
this isn’t to say that damian is a saint. he’s a very flawed, very broken person. he went from one abusive parental situation, to another, to another, and has the damage to show for it. he’s got bad habits from all of them, many of which he isn’t aware of or doesn’t think are a problem. 
but unlike his two dads, damian doesn’t close himself off to what he’s feeling completely, nor does he decide to rush towards external solutions for his pain. he’s, again, very aware that something is wrong. he doesn’t hold to his convictions the same way bruce or clark do, he questions.  he’s deeply unhappy with who he is and what he’s doing. 
but damian is seeking answers using a very limited toolset, and there’s a very limited pool of people he can ask that won’t give him a biased answer or try to manipulate him for their own means. one of the people he confides in does just that.
the other gives him the honest truth.
his relationship with selina is fraught and she’s often one of the very nastiest people towards him, but it’s because of that  he ends up opening up to her. she isn’t going to bullshit him and just say what he wants to hear.
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and this is what makes damian different from them. both of them.
because he stops, because he questions, he’s still connected to reality. to his own humanity.
injustice’s bruce is a bruce that has quietly let his humanity die. he’s completely given over to the cold logic of batman and the idea that whatever he does to the people around him, no matter how morally dubious, is justified so long as it means protecting lives. he might not kill, but he really stops just short of that. he just doubles down on his beliefs and takes anyone who doesn’t agree with him as a traitor. he will go out of his way to rationalize how a largely guilty person is innocent (harleen) and how a largely innocent person is guilty (damian). and so he uses damian’s “betrayal” - ie, damian standing with clark instead of him - as justification for icing him out. that way he can ignore all the people who have reminded him time and time again that it was an accident.  
bruce also can’t stand that damian won’t do what he says. bruce will ignore damian unless it benefits him. bruce will go on to frequently weaponize how badly damian wants forgiveness against him. there are multiple instances where he says “just do as i say and i’ll forgive you, son.”
and then in the next breath, he’ll tell damian that he “can’t forgive the deaths”, all the while he has harleen as his new sidekick.   it’s fine that harleen helped with the scheme to blow up metropolis, killed jimmy olsen, and countless others. it’s not fine that damian did something he did all the time to dick - something dick himself shrugged off, because the expectation for this behavior was that dick would catch the baton - and it ended in tragedy.
because harleen listens to him and damian doesn’t. bruce cuts damian neatly out of his life and only really cares about him again when he’s a corpse.
damian, meanwhile, never stops trying to earn bruce’s forgiveness. in the canonical bad end (or well a comic offshoot of the canon ending) damian essentially dies begging bruce to forgive him, admitting that he always cared. he launches an absolutely insane rescue mission to save his father from clark’s torture and it costs him his life.
( but it’s worth mentioning - it takes damian showing bruce an image of kara for bruce to acknowledge him. )
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even before this, damian was looking out for bruce in other ways. he was the reason selina got involved with the regime. because he offered her the chance to join and save bruce. damian’s anger towards bruce is less that he wants him dead, and more that bruce won’t stop unless he’s killed.
and damian is willing to kill him if bruce poses a threat to his ‘new’ family. he’s not going to watch bruce hurt the people he loves.
but his new father sucks just as much as his old one.
talia and bruce were more obviously abusive parents. they were controlling and sometimes asserted that control and obedience using physical violence and intimidation. in obvious ways you can point to and see abuse. 
damian doesn’t recognize clark is using him until he sees clark discard kara, who should be everything to clark and is someone important to damian. before that, he has inklings that they’ve gone too far, but clark has been such a paragon of good that when he tells damian not to worry about it, he doesn’t. he hides all his darkness behind that  smile and tells damian he’s good and worthy of people loving him, that they’re saving people and they won’t let another metropolis happen. clark talks to him and still (seems to) accept him even when they disagree.
damian misses clark’s equally as abusive tendencies because they hidden under the guise of a fatherly concern. 
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clark is manipulating him into divulging more than he wants to. a boundary damian set is being broken without damian even realizing it.  damian’s uneasy. his body language goes from very easy and relaxed to overtly uncomfortable and almost submissive. it’s also very subtle but clark actually rises higher off the ground to intimidate and loom over him.
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damian, who has only known bruce’s stormy silences in moments of disagreement, doesn’t recognize this for what it is.  clark doesn’t take the slight out on him. clark doesn’t stop talking to him because he dared to question.
instead, he loops an arm around damian and praises him, rewards him for being honest and makes it seem like this is an open dialogue and not an interrogation. which it is. i wouldn’t call it gaslighting, but i would call it lovebombing. damian doesn’t realize that there was anything off about the encounter, or if he does, he’ll tell himself he’s just being paranoid.
after all. this ended amicably, not with him standing alone wondering what he did wrong, or being thrown across the room. clark basically stops just shy of ruffling his hair and calling him sport. 
he was rewarded for honesty. and so any discomfort he felt was imagined.
 i think a thing that a lot of fans miss is that injustice’s damian is a forthright person. he doesn’t lie or deceive much, and later on it will bother him that he’s keeping secrets from kara for ‘the greater good’. he loathes that bruce does it and works hard to not fall into that trap. he wants to be honest. he’s glad when he’s rewarded for that honesty. 
because injustice’s damian doesn’t want to be batman. he wants to be superman. he wants to be good.
but injustice’s superman is not a good man. 
clark keep secrets, many terrible secrets, and often hurts people and justifies it to himself. he just hides it far better than bruce does.  clark is even more controlling and cruel, but he leans harder into his humanity and emotions to hide it. it’s easier to see bruce being cold and calculating and miss the way clark subtly uses what you want to get what he wants out of you. and you never really see it coming when he lashes out. he’ll apologize for it, of course, and if you’re not dead you’ll forgive him, because it’s clark. he didn’t mean it. right?
bruce manipulates overtly and grandly using intimidation, clark manipulates subtly using emotion. damian only recognizes one of these things when they happen.
so clark gives damian what he wants - a parent who loves him, someone he can talk to and even show a little vulnerability with - and then uses that against him. 
the worst thing -  the very worst thing - is that bruce and clark love damian. he knows this. both seem to genuinely consider him their son. and he knows this.
in injustice vs motu, bruce snaps fully into awareness just as diana snaps damian’s neck. he’s awake just in time to watch his son die.    and when clark is brought onto the scene, clark falls to his knees and mourns damian and laments his role in driving him to this.
but they weaponize this parent-child bond he wants against him and each other. frankly, neither of them were very interested in him for who he was. nor for helping him be better and master his anger. damian’s body isn’t even cold before bruce uses it against clark, failing to acknowledge his own part in damian’s all too early demise.
he’s another chess piece on their board. one clark can use to wound bruce. one bruce can use to wound clark.
the person damian is when away from both of their influence is a more complete damian. he’s the very best of both of them.
the damian here is still curt and sometimes rude, but he laughs and bonds with the people around him. he values people’s freedom and seems to strive for honesty and communication. meaning no one is in his war to reclaim the world doesn’t want to be, and he makes no move without everyone knowing.
when he recruits adam,  he tells them their story and what they’ve gone through and gives adam the choice to join them or stay in eternia.
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anyway, all of this is to say that even all these years later, i continue to be so sad about injustice damian wayne. 
edit:
now, there’s actually one other thing i want to bring up because i totally forgot about it.
so. issue 8 of injustice 2.  
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if we’re going with the idea of the reordered robin theory, which is what makes the most sense to me considering jason’s age and the friction between bruce and damian, this before jason dies. and if i’m wrong and the robins don’t have a different order, then this is before some enormous event that broke the slowly building trust.
there’s none of the undercurrent of hostility and distrust that shows up in year 0, which is immediately before year 1. we’re not given a timeframe for when this occurs, either, it’s just happier times.
but what’s really hard to ignore is that the dynamic between bruce and damian is completely different here. maybe tom taylor’s just settled more into writing the two of them, but i don’t think so. year zero comes after this. 
he even acknowledges damian’s anger earlier in the chapter. but it’s less of a condemnation of his character and more a concern that he might not be ready to be on his own. alfred is the one advocating for caution, asking if he’s ready, bruce is the one saying yes, he is.
it’s a complete reversal.
and his trust is rewarded with a night of damian abandoning the “”mission”” he was given (get home from the furthest point of gotham in three hours) to help everyone along the way. which was the real goal all along, it was a test to see if damian’s compassion would win out over his want to win. and it does. bruce is proud of him.
so... what happened between them? what caused that shift? 
i’m kind of worried we’re never going to know. like, i’m so glad that tom taylor is dc’s new golden boy and they’re just letting him build a million different aus. i buy every book he writes. 
but also i’m dying because IJ2 was clearly planned to go on a lot longer than it did and i have questions that i know netherrealm doesn’t care about answering.
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batman-is-me · 5 years
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Here it is everyone. My take and evidence of the Batman and No Killing/No Guns. Detective comics 27-46 (December ‘40) and Batman 1-4 (December ‘40).
Batman 4 is the stopping point because it is that issue where the rule is stated.
Detective Comics 27. Read it but everyone knows the deaths. So skip. We all know that none of the chemical syndicate makes it, but for the record 2 people. The guy he throws off a roof and the one he punches into acid. However, there was no guns used by Batman.
Detective Comics 28. Kicks a guy out a window. He was charging him right when he entered. So the simple throw is easily survivable but the fact the window was open and they where in the penthouse didn't help.
Detective Comics 29.Doctor Death in Detective Comics does not die at the hands of Batman. His death comes at his own hands. Jabah, Doctor Deaths assistant, isn't said to be dead. Suspected to be dead tho, due to Doctor Death not Batman. Except Batman cause him to be unconscious. So deaths being the caused by Batman. More like from Doctor Death.
Detective Comics 30, Batman, on panel 62, ends up killing Mikhail and implies that Jabah is dead. Killing him by kicking him way to hard.
Detective Comics 31. No deaths no guns.
Detective Comics 32. Batman ends up killing the Mad Monk. A vampire with two silver bullets. Up to this point Batman is not shown to have a gun since Detective Comics 28. This is the first time since Detective comics 28 Batman intended to kill a person.
Detective Comics 33. Batman is shown welding a Gun. Doesn't fire it. But is the source of the cause of death of the villain. He throws a chocking gas pellet into the cockpit of the plane the villain is flying. I mean he could have survived with a little thought. Hold your breath and continue to fly the gas would have disipatted fast cause of speed and open air.
Detective Comics 34. Batman is the indirect cause of death. Batman tussles with the villain in the car, saves the girl and gets out of the car and grabs the rope of the batplane with her before the car drives over a cliff.
Detective Comics 35. Batman is shown with no Gun. Again. One of the death in this issue is not at the hands of Batman it's in the hand of the other Sin Fang henchmen. Yes Batman did kick him back but the intention would not have been to kill. Just written so that he fell into his partners sword who could have easily avoided it. The other is at the hands of Batman when he hurls the idol of kali at Lenox (aka sin fang) and he falls out the window. Kind of weird. To be honest.
Detective Comics 36. So Batman has a gun. It seems like at this point the gun isn't an actual fixed point to his character. It's more or less there if needed. And he uses it signal the police. There is no deaths in this issue by Batman.
Detective Comics 37. No Gun. Three deaths. 2 cause by other henchmen to other henchmen. The 3rd was not the intentions of Batman. He punch Count Grutt into a door, that The Count stabbed into the door himself so he is the cause of his own death. Cause in the next panel Batman states that it is better that he died. It shows his intentions where not to kill.
Detective Comics 38. Famous for the first appearance of Dick Grayson. Now another issue of No Gun. Now Batman does not kill anyone in this issue. Robin does tho. Kills 2 of Zuccos henchmen and Zucco kills one of his own.
Detective Comics 39. Batman does a pretty big bad one here. Pushes a giant statue on some people. And yeah. Kills people. The other death in this issue is when Batman and the henchman both fell out of a window. Also no gun.
Detective Comics 40. Hey look it. No deaths in this issue. Also no Gun. First appearance of Basil Karlo. Very interesting issue with Clay face. Trying to not to give a way plot points in this one.
Detective Comics 41. No guns and deaths caused by Batman or Robin in this issue. Sort of follows the pattern of bad guy does something. Encounters Batman, escapes encounters Batman again, gets captured/killed.
Detective Comics 42-46. All of these issue have 2 things in common no deaths cause by Batman and no guns used by Batman. There are two apparent deaths in this span that one would say caused by Batman. Both characters actually are not dead. As evident by later issues. One being the Joker in Detective 45 and Hugo Strange in Detective Comics 46.
Detective Comics 46 Is the last in the span of comics (in Detective Comics) in the timeline till Batman 4 (released same month and year)where the no Killing rule is Stated clearly. Last seen being the cause of Death in Detective 39.
Batman 1. This one is interesting cause you get two Batman stories. One clearly made for Batman 1 since it's the first story in the book. No deaths, no Gun. The second Batman story is basically a different Batman. The writing, the art, and the overall fell is just different. He uses a gun on his Batplane to shoot one of the monster men and hooks/hangs the other monster man. The third Batman story in this issue is more like the first. Especially in feel, art, and tone. Plus a proto-Catwoman. The fourth and final Batman story in this issue is also true to form of story 1 and 3 in tone, art and feel. No death, no guns. Basically your basic hero captures bad guy.
Batman 2. I'm doing this one different than Batman 1, as in I'm just gonna say talk about all 4 Batman stories in general way with the overall purpose of this read through in mind on point out what is necessary with the specific story listed. So.... All stories in Batman 2 followed the model of Batman 1 (stories 1,3, and 4). All in tone, art style, and overall feel.
Batman 3. The four story share the same tone as the previous issue. All light hatred. No guns, no murders. It's basically the tone of the silver age but a little darker. Hell in the 3rd story of this issue Batman says he has a problem that points guns at him. Which is obvious since you know it's a gun and he is human and he probably gets it a lot so it's gotta get annoying.
Batman 4. Also like the previous stories in the first 3 Batman comics minis the 1 story in Batman, they all have that same light hearted feel. In the 4th story in this issue you see Batman wielding a gun but it's not his, and only used it to shoot gun put of another criminal. No death. Well not directly caused by him. The death comes from gangster on gangster violence Batman tried to stop. Now the most important panel comes in story 2. The “No killing with weapons of any kind."
Outside of That 1 story in Batman 1. The killing and use of gun are not seen since Detective Comics 39. And even with that it isn't all that common for Bruce to really kill anyone in that DC 27-39. It was more sporadic, just like the use of the gun. Hell even in DC 37 you can tell that he didn't intend on killing the bad guy. Now the time Batman 1 released was June of 1940 and Detective Comics 39 was May of 1940. So basically a month or two due to how dating of the books where not really exact in that time period. For example, a Spring issue (Batman 1) could be either May or April. So I find, like my opinion suggests, that using these comics as a legitimate argument for the character to kill are absolutely idiotic. Approximately 8 issues from this time period of pre-statement of "The Rule" (including Batman 4 in the timeline) had him kill/use a gun. Thus the DECADES of the rule being one of the Character's defining characteristics. It's what makes him better than the villain. It gives him a moral center. It shows that you can reform and be better if given the opportunity. This rule, as high top production (the video I shared) has said, it makes the death of his parents mean something in more ways than one. Hell even Frank Miller, had Batman say that guns are the weapons of the enemy as he snaps a shotgun in half. And the fact he is a writer that I absolutely dislike and is given more than necessary knew that. And people who think these rules are outdated and should be removed have no idea what Batman is all about. I don't care if they have been reading Batman for 40 years they completely missed the point and where not paying attention. They need to go back and reread them.
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