TheReelFolkBlues

Batman/Bruce Wayne is certainly one of the most interesting fictional characters to psychoanalyze. The professor in this video has an interesting take on it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRlbV8tNILg.

When it comes to looking at the psychology of superheroes, the duality/split between identities is superfun to look at, especially when you realize not all heroes have the split in consciousness. Batman is a separate persona from Bruce Wayne, Superman is a separate persona from Clark Kent, but Wolverine and Logan/James Howlett is pretty much the same personality whether the mask/costume is on or not.

1. Needed more setup; Superman’s “death” can’t have a meaningful impact in-universe at this point without him being at-least almost universally loved by the public and being a longtime protector of Earth. Would’ve been way better to set up Batman and the other heroes with their own films before going into World’s Finest territory.

2. This is our introduction to this incarnation of Batman, and we all know that this is him in a bad emotional/mental state. DOJ’s ending moves towards him being being his “proper” self but it would’ve been better to have been introduced to him like that.

3. Batman was way too much like Classic Lex Luthor in this. “If there’s a 1% chance he could be our enemy we need to take that as an absolute certainty.” That kind of paranoid/extremist line of thinking would be perfect for Lex Luthor, but not Batman, as much as a paranoid jerk he can be in comics and other media.

4. Eisenberg’s Luthor sucked. Nuff said.

5. Sets a bad precedent for the Bats/Supes relationship in the future installments (realistically). It’d be one thing if it was like in the DCAU/comics where they simply start off disagreeing with one-another’s methods, but here, I cannot seriously see a strong partnership/friendship growing after Batman tried to MURDER Superman out of his own paranoia. Realistically, even when working together in later DCEU movies, the partnership/relationship should remain tense from Superman’s side and he should not really ever trust Batfleck.

I could say more but that’s all I have right now. Of course, I will be seeing future DCEU films in theaters.

The current trend of superhero films/shows reminds me of the massive amounts of Westerns that were produced decades ago. The amount of superhero films has definitely not reached the saturation that Westerns reached at their peak, and they have a more intergenerational appeal than Westerns in my opinion, so it’ll be interesting to see what the peak of superhero shows/films will be like.

Not comic book/superhero fiction but this read reminded me of how fans and his portrayer Charles Dance discuss Tywin Lannister from Game of Thrones/ASOIAF. Definitely a villain, cold-hearted, etc. but some would argue is a cold logic and rationality to his actions. To paraphrase Dance in an interview, “They’re are not my values, not your values, not the values most would agree with, but they are his and they make sense to him and the system/world he’s living in”. I think this applies very much to Zod in Man of Steel. In the context of the film, it does make perfect sense *for him* to pursue the course of action that he does.

The Blade comics/films get left out a lot but they definitely provide interesting allegories for class, racism/racial identity and disease.