So, this will be a large overarching look into Batman's history, in the style of Jello's Archie update. This also retcons parts of what I had previously written about the character in this thread.
Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader:
The Golden Age(1939-1956):
Batman's creation was largely the work of Bill Finger and Bob Kane. Kane had come up with the concept whilst working at Syndicated Features, as another hero to supplant SF's Superman. His original concept could be best described as "Blonde domino masked Superman in a red jumpsuit with Bat wings."[1] It was truly writer Bill Finger who melded the concept into its final form. The Bat wings became a cape, with a cowl in the shape of Bat ears replacing the domino mask, and the red costume became grey, with a large Bat at the center. As Finger and Kane began to hammer out the concept, the character gradually took shape. They took influences from classical and pulp literature, as well as pop culture. "ProBourgie" heroes (as they came to be called) like Johnston McCulley's
Zorro and the Scarlet Pimpernel, as well as Sherlock Holmes and more recent heroes like Lee Falk's The
Phantom and Walter Gibson's
The Shadow, were used as templates, to create a man from a formerly bourgeois family, who takes up a mysterious Bat-like persona to investigate and take out criminals and counterrevolutionaries. The Holmes influence made him a master detective, skilled in forensics sciences. The character's look was partially derived from the 1934 horror film
The Bat Whispers. Finger admitted in later years that he had considered ripping off an obscure Shadow story wholesale for Batman's first appearance due to time constraints.[2] However, SF head editor Will Eisner discouraged this, giving the two more time to come up with a more original story. Eventually,
Detective Comics #27 was completed, and hit stands in March of 1939.
The story where Batman debuted was "The Cult of the Cursed Cross"[3], which was the name of the Ku Klux Klan like antagonists of the story. The story begins with Gotham City Militia commander James Gordon talking with Bruce Wayne. Gordon congratulates Wayne on "successfully abandoning his bourgeois roots and joining the struggle," having successfully collectivized his business. Gordon gets news of a murder, which he brings Bruce to. Gordon finds the body, hanged on a tree, and a note, stating that there is a larger scheme at play coming soon. It was signed the CCC. In another scene, another person is killed and hanged by two men, who flee the scene. However, they are soon confronted by a masked avenger, whom the narration proclaims to be the "Bat-Man!" He defeats the two, and forces them to reveal their scheme. They are members of the "Cult of the Cursed Cross", who were murdering those they felt were of the "inferior race." However, they refuse to reveal their larger scheme. However, Batman gets their names, and finds their homes. Later, several other members of the Cult are heading towards "Gotham Square", but are stopped by Batman, who reveals he had figured out their plot to bomb the square. He defeats them, leaving them to the police militia. Later, Gordon is once again with Wayne, who seems to be uninterested, until the final panels reveals that Wayne was in fact Batman.
The feature was a massive hit, and Batman came to be a feature of
Detective Comics. His origins was recounted in #33. Bruce Wayne was the son of a prominent doctor and philanthropist Thomas Wayne and his wife Martha. Thomas teaches his son to be fair and kind to those less fortunate than him, and indeed, Thomas' workers are treated well. However, this causes conflicts with his business associates, most notably Allen Stryker, who wants to create more efficiency at the expense of caring. One day, after a particularly bad argument, Stryker orders the Wayne's death, in a bid to take over the company. The two are killed in front of Bruce as they leave a movie. Stryker takes over the company, while young Bruce is left to live off his inheritance, with the promise that . However, he begins to explore the dark underbelly of capitalism. While looking through the factories that he will inherit, he sees the abysmal conditions the workers are put through under Stryker, and even witnesses the death of a worker due to an accident. He soon becomes anti-capitalist, and begins to use up his fortune to train himself as a defender of the workers, travelling the world to enhance his skills for this task. He comes home, and learns through investigation into Stryker that he had ordered his parent's death. He also finds that Stryker had covered up the deaths of various workers, due to low conditions. He swears vengeance for all those Stryker had wronged, as well as the savagery of capitalism, but wonders how best to strike fear into the hearts of capitalists and reactionaries. That is when a Bat comes through his window. The story ends with him outwitting and killing Stryker in the Bat costume, and taking the reigns of his company, which he collectivized following the revolution, pledging to continue fighting for the worker at every opportunity as Batman.
Still, more elements of Batman's character were added as his popularity grew. He was given a utility belt with various tools, as well as his own plane and eventually, the "Batmobile". He was given two assistants: Robin (Dick Grayson), a son of acrobats murdered by mobsters, who Bruce takes in as a ward and eventually sidekick (added because Finger felt that Batman needed an audience surrogate), and Alfred Pennyworth, a British expatriate, who takes a job as an analyst at Wayne Enterprises, and as Batman's technical support upon learning his secret identity.[4] His rogue's gallery (created with the help of their assistant Jerry Robinson) steadily built up in both
Detective Comics and his eponymous solo series, such as the Joker, Catwoman, Clayface, Hugo Strange, the Penguin, and Two-Face.
Batman shifted his sights towards domestic Nazi agents during World War II. Many of his stories during that time period had him and Robin hunting down domestic spies and saboteurs, working as de facto spy hunters in Gotham. One memorable story had Batman and Robin actually take on German U-Boats off the coast of Cuba, using the Batplane, and another had them stop a Nazi scheme to poison Gotham's water supply. Batman also joined the Justice Society (a cross-company team of heroes from SF, R&B, Timely, and other major Comic collectives at the time) , where he largely fought in clandestine battles to help soldiers on the front lines.
Of course, the war also provided a backdrop for Batman's outing in film. 1944's
Batman serial saw Batman ( played by Lewis Wilson) and Robin (Daniel Kotter*), now Government agents, trying to find and stop a multi-nation Axis spy ring operating in Gotham, trying to get "secret plans" for an "atomic weapon" (Reportedly, government agents investigated the writers and studios behind the serial to see if they had access to classified information). The serial saw the debut of "The Bat Cave", a small cave underneath his manor, where Bruce keeps various weapons for use and momentos from previous battles. Batman also saw a daily comic strip, and a brief radio show from 1945 to 1947.
Batman was one of the few Superheroes not to slowly fade following World War II, with sales keeping the character strong through the immediate post war period. While he still fought supervillains on occasion, though, his stories began to take on more "street level crime" approach, likely inspired by Lev Gleason's and R&B's (often controversial) success with "True Crime" comics. Batman began to cooperate with militia forces more in taking down criminals. He also began to delegate the task of Batman to others, with Alfred Pennyworth, his cousin Kathy Kane, and other taking up the mantle in some stories. The end of the Golden Age saw a shake-up at Syndicated Features, with founder Will Eisner leaving to pursue independent projects, and a new guard of editors (led by Mort Weisinger, Whitney Ellsworth, Dorothy Woolfolk, and others) taking over, renaming the collective "ADC", after their two most popular books,
Action and Detective Comics. With these new editors, Batman's world would soon be shaken up.
The Silver Age(1956-1971):
1956 saw lightning strike, in the form of
Flash #1, which reintroduced the character in an new updated, Atomic age origin. This event started off the Silver Age, and comic collectives began to revive their heroes. ADC began to push Batman away from the "True Crime" trend of the late 40's, as that trend was on the decline thanks to lower counterrevolutionary activity and higher civilian participation in militias. So, instead of doing the milita's job in fighting street level criminal, Batman fought those who the militias couldn't handle. The Joker became more notorious during this period, becoming more sadistic and even murderous with his schemes, emerging as Batman's archenemy. However, the rest of his rogue's gallery wasn't neglected. More powerful enemy, like Mr. Zero and Poison Ivy, debuted, giving Batman more challenges to deal with. Still, the stories never grew too absurd (with exception of the occasional story where he deals with odd interdimensional being the Bat-Mite), and still remained in the same relative realism and darkness of the Golden Age stories.
Still, some updating became necessary. Dick Grayson began to enter militia training and college at this time, resulting in Batman going solo in many stories. Other Batman characters began to take over the role, to help spread out Batman's influence. Counterrevolutinary insurgents were replaced by far-right terrorism or lone wolf crimes in many of these stories. Batman also began to undertake missions by the government, going to various places beyond Gotham to defeat crime.
The popularity of old Batman serials in television reruns allowed for the creation of a TV show centering on Batman in 1966, to reflect the updated Batman comics of the 1960's. The series starred actor Anthony Geralds* in the title role, and took the form of a detective periodical. Batman would investigate crimes through Gotham City, and it would often lead to the villain (sometimes a comic villain, sometimes one invented for the show). While the show achieved popularity, and is generally praised for its mix of action and mystery solving, it was also mocked for its formula and its often strange villains and fight scenes. Robin would join on Batman's journeys, while Alfred would retain his role from the Golden Age as technical support. The TV show also prompted the creation of Barbara Gordon or "Batgirl", who would become one of the staples of the comics (becoming one of the "batmen"), and the Joker's more violent streak was represented, marking him as one of television's greatest villains. Batman (much like the comics) was given a number of gadgets (in the vein of spy shows of the era like "Agents of UNCLE") to help him out in his investigations.
Still, the television series would defy the aesthetic of the era. Dark and black as opposed to the lighter hues of the Second Cultural Revolution. In spite of the period, it would come to be seen as a classic of serious television of the era. It's imports would also be very popular around the world. A Batman Manga was produced in Japan.[5] The Soviet sketch show, Телевидение CCCP, had a recurring sketch, featuring "Rat Man" and "Swallow", who reenact tropes of the show. There was a cheap 1968 East Italian movie based on the character, called
Batman a Venezia (which later became one of the films on
Mystery Science Theater 3000.)
As part of ADC's Silver Age revamp, they attempted to revise Batman's origin in the comics. They split the original Golden Age Batman into a separate universe, (where he ages in real time), and the Silver Age Batman was given a new origin. While his bourgeois roots remain, the Waynes were now wealthy philanthropists who embraced the revolution. Stryker is now a reactionary mob lord who murders the Waynes because of this. Bruce's world travels (in part to train himself to take out reactionaries like Stryker) exposed him to the evils of capitalism, and he swears to fight it off in any form. This became the default origin for later incarnations of Batman, as the revolution went further and further away in time.
The sterility of the live action TV series was reflected in the comics, which started to have a sales decline around the late 60's. Later observers pointed to stories about Batman solving and fighting crimes was growing to be stale and dull. Yet another shake-up was needed.
The Bronze Age(1971-1985):
Dennis O'Neill and Neal Adams were given the task of reviving the character. Giving that he already essentially had a team of people working as Batman through the city, they began to look into a strain of stories revolving around Batman travelling outside of his Gotham setting. This was the impetus of their first story, "Batman International." Here, Bruce begins to wonder if he is really needed as much in Gotham, now that his role is now being fulfilled by various other characters, including now Dick Grayson, Barbara Gordon, and others. He begins to wonder what he could possibly do next. After hearing of the various wars going on around the world, Bruce suddenly gets an idea. He will travel the world, seeking out new individuals to take up the Batman mantle and fight for socialism all over the world.
This jumpstarted what would be called "Batman International," which would dominate most of the Bronze Age of Comics for Batman. While Detective Comics continued to focus on Gotham's crime fighters, the Batman series focused on Batman's travels abroad, finding and training new revolutionaries in various countries.[6] However, he finds an enemy more powerful than the Joker, who would become one of his greatest enemies. Ra's al Ghul was an explorer and scientist during the Islamic Golden Age, who had found a mysterious pit, which he bathed in for research. He learned that it stopped his aging. He periodically dipped the pool after that, lasting for century. However, after the Industrial Revolution, he became increasingly angry at what he saw as encroaching industrialism destroying nature's beauty. He built his "League of Shadows" to combat this, and eventually, he now wants to drastically reduce the world's population. This sets the stage for continued battles between Batman, his new allies (like El Gaucho, Nightrunner, Komori, Mr. Ludd, and other recruits), and the League of Shadows. With Ra's al Ghul came his daughter Talia, who would have a love-hate relationship with Batman over the years. The series renewed the character, and breathed new life into him. It was also an appeal to the international audience he had
Not to say Bruce was the only hero going abroad. In Detective Comics, Dick Grayson (now a Batman himself) is approached by the government. Batman had recruited a Cuban named "Muerte" for his Cuban operation. However, Muerte was killed in action, leaving his partner "El Pequeño Diablo" to take on his duties in Havana. However, it was becoming increasingly difficult for him to deal with the responsibilities, especially with the League of Shadows increasing their activity in the area. Grayson accepts their offer to become the Batman in Havana. The new series of stories deals with Dick becoming Batman, helping the workers of Cuba, and fighting corrupt government officials while evading the law. A new Robin was chosen in the form of Jason Todd, a young juvenille delinquent., who is taken in as an assistant (though the character was unpopular, and his run was short)
O'Neill, Adams, and editor Dick Giodario may have been the main creators, but they rarely actually worked together, and other creators began to also seep in, like Steve Englehart, George RR Martin, Gennady Gorky*, and others writing the occasional story.
The International Age of Comics(1985-2000):
The start of the International Age ironically began with the slow ending of Batman International. Now having a network of Batmen working across the planet, Batman returns to Gotham, and creates a full on team, (as the Batmen were working as if they were a single individual) to help coordinate efforts in Gotham and the Batmen abroad. However, then, the major ADC event occurred. Another shift in head editors and writers at the ADC Central Committee sought to streamline what they saw as an increasingly byzantine multiverse that each ADC character inhabited. Thus, came
Crisis on Infinite Earths, an attempt to create a standardized series of universes to base their stories around. The story is complex, so it will not be recounted here, but it had a large impact. Several universes were merged together. Batman's universe was merged with several other universes, including Superman's, the Legion of Superheroes, and the THUNDER Agents.
Batman played a role in the ending of the Bronze Age, with Frank Miller's
The Dark Knight and
Year One, bringing the character to back to his Golden Age darkness and his battle against crime, corruption, and counterrevolution, which revealed how Comics had grown dark since the Silver Age optimism that was still fresh in the public mind. The former set in a dystopian future, where Batman comes out of retirement, and the latter a look into his early years. Miller's work also preclude the growing International writers that were coming to write comics. Peruvian artist Andrea Guiterrez* started her own book on the El Gaucho and Dick Grayson's (now taking the mantle of Nightwing from the early 80's) books. Alan Grant took advantage of Jason Todd's cancellation from continuity to introduce a new Robin in the form of Lonnie Minchin, a young anarchist and political activist, who is at first opposed to the "statist" regime, but is gradually won over by the independence of the Batman from the system. Kim Newman's work on Batman drew on his love of horror films (such as those from Hammer) and gothic settings, which he explored in detail in the main series in the
Red Reign storyline(where Batman tracks down a killer, who is gradually revealed to be a vampire), and the Elseworlds story
Batman: Knight, which has the character fighting for textile workers in mid-Victorian England. Gotham was mentioned in Newman's own comic series
Anno Dracula, and Batman himself is briefly mentioned in its fourth volume,
Johnny Alucard.
Towards the end of the 80's, a Batman animated series was created[7] by Paul Dini and J. Michael Straczynski. Influenced by early 40's Superman serials, as well as more recent Soviet animation, to create a fluid and vibrant television series. While avoid the more absurd parts of its later seasons, it also took its influence from the 60's series in tone and in storytelling, creating a classic in 90's children's animation.
To celebrate Batman's 50th anniversary, an event was reached. The original Golden Age version of the character, now in his 90's, passed away in his sleep. His funeral is attended not only by his close associates from his old books (as well as guest stars from characters from other collectives), but the various incarnations of Batman from different universes, to symbolize his longevity.
The Modern Age of Comics:
2000 saw the release of
Batman, directed by Michael Stern* and starring Steve Wade*. The film mostly drew upon a basic story of Batman's origin story, and his battle with the Joker. The success of this film would result in a sequel, where the Caped Crusader does battle with Catwoman.
In a parallel to the previous anniversary, the now aged Silver Age Batman retires, and in an act of appreciation, bestows the title to Barbara Gordon. The mainline Batman reached a new status quo, with Bats and his associates protecting Gotham, and the Batmen across the world fight for the common man.
Recently, in a revival of the Batman International book, writer Grant Morrison introduced the idea of THUNDER cooperating with BI, thanks to negotiations between Bruce Wayne and the agency.
[1] Look up "Batman original concept" and you get the idea.
[2] OTL, the first Batman story "The Case of the Chemical Syndicate," was ripped off from a Shadow novella "Partner's in Peril," by Theodore Tinsley (using the pseudonym "Maxwell Grant" Here's more info:
http://www.dialbforblog.com/archives/390/
[3] The inspiration for the name came from the name given for the Klan expy in the famed Superman radio episode, which was "The Clan of the Fiery Cross."
[4] In his earliest appearances, Alfred was not the Wayne family butler, but had come to serve Bruce and Dick, and discovered their identity by accident.
[5] OTL.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat-Manga!:_The_Secret_History_of_Batman_in_Japan
[6] The idea for this came from Grant Morrison's
Batman Inc., which, in turn, got its idea from "Batmen of All Nations"
[7] Because no matter how convergent it is, I just can't get rid of the Animated series
