Can he ever truly be surpassed? Even his villains are top tier kino.
>>147147837Nightwing is cool
>>147147828No. Frank Miller cemented him as the GOAT.
>>147147892The irony is Nightwing sorta exposes the larger problem with the Bat Family. A key part of Nightwing's arc is that he learns to accept that Bruce was a caring father figure who did ultimately raise him well despite being extremely flawed and emotionally distant due to his own issues.In the 2000s through the first half of the 2010s, DC was sorta caught in this spot where Bruce was heavily preferred to be a dark loner with mental issues, especially when the Dark Knight movie came out. So they had him act as this cold distant 'commander' figure. Then when the late 10s and early 20s came, there was a cultural shift to a love of found families with 'Wholesome dad UwU' being a favorite so they shifted gears and now he's suddenly super emotionally available and well, a super fucking wholesome dad. The "Wayne Family Adventures" era. Fans of this take defend this by saying that its character development and accusing anyone who doesn't like it of being a TDK fan.The reality is, yes, the Bat Family provided a level of development in Bruce allowing him to be a bit more emotionally vulnerable with those he trusts and helping his complex. Yes, he has developed past simple vengeance against crime towards helping everyone around him. That said he's still supposed to be a very guarded figure who struggles with his own emotions. He still has the guarded nature, the trust issues, and the paranoia. Making him either a distant commander or a wholesome dad is wrong, he's a flawed father/mentor who lets his emotional guard down with people he's come to trust from time to time.>>147147828I've heard it best described that it's less about him being the best super hero and more about the fact that he's as much a crime noir character who reaches outside the conventions of capeshit better than other heroes, allowing him to thrive even when the genre gets old.Another thing I'd add is while best superhero is heavily contended, Batman is the best power fantasy (1/2)
>>147149112The whole thread probably predicted large parts of what I'm about to say here so I'll greentext those.>He's a better power fantasy specifically because he's more vulnerable.Yes but it's a bit more than that. It's a blurred line between vulnerability and invincibility. There's this idea that Batman can get downed with enough high caliber bullets, yet manages to make it up using not only his tech and skills, but psychological tactics, pre-planning, and on the fly thinking. There's a constant sense of thrill like in the predator gameplay for Arkham where you not only see the enemy growing terrified of you but trying to adapt to you. So when you end up taking em all out anyway, it feels earned.That is to say, a good Batman writer knows how to make Bruce feel vulnerable and in danger while also keeping it plausible that he can just wipe the floor with the room.Even the 'prep time' meme falls into this, in the original TDKR, Bruce knew Clark would likely hesitate and hold back and built his plan around that key advantage. That is to say, the 'prep time' meme works best when it isn't simply a bat gadget taking advantage of their greatest weakness but when Bruce uses his knowledge of their prior psychological profile to his advantage with a good amount of the fight being centered around his survival long enough to execute whatever plan he may have This is where his relationship to the larger DCU gets tricky, but not impossible. (2/3 I guess)
>>147149341This is one of the bigger obstacles that Batman faces when it comes to what makes him good, which is that combination of his psychology and what I've outlined in my last two posts. As everyone here will point out, this is where the infamous 'Batwank' comes in because they constantly need Bruce to be doing something extraordinarily badass to contend with the rest of the League, but I'd argue there's a pretty good way to balance that out. I think we've all accepted that what we'd consider 'the standard batsuit' is extremely well armored and high tech at this point, it definitely seems to add oomph to his strength and provides a degree of protection/resistance against a variety of things like heat, extreme cold, electricity, etc. Then there are the scanners in the cowl which would allow him to pinpoint enemy weak points or detect whether they're using their fancy weapon. Controversial take here, but considering the suit is designed to punch metahumans even without Batwank, most of the other heroes rogues aren't really that out of Batman's level until you get to the 'call the league' tier villains because most of them still have very much punchable faces. It's just about tactics>SinestroUse a device to fuck with the ring's scanning then stealth until he can find an opening where Sinestro wouldn't have time to react before whaling on him so he can't think clearly enough to make a construct.>CheetahInfighting, block her at the forearms and elbows to avoid her claws, electric current from the fist, aim for the gut first so he can catch her off guard when he goes for the face and keep her from biting.>GroddSimilar to Cheetah, odds aren't bad in direct combat, keep distance, resist the mind control batarang the helmet and move in.(3/4 now but the next one is the conclusion)
>>147149683My point could probably be summed up as follows, Batman is the best superhero depending on whose writing him because there always needs to be that tricky balance between badassery and vulnerability, pre-planning and winging it.Similarly, a good Batman writer knows that the answer to whether or not he's a noble hero whose successfully overcome his trauma or a batshit insane vigilante trying to stop 2 bullets is "yes" because he's complex enough to grow and evolve while still having that core damage.The core issue of Batwank is that the approach is that he always wins via skill, planning, knowledge, et cetera. The proper approach is that these are the things which mean he always can plausibly claw out a win. People get mad at the comic where he takes on the rest of the core league, but seeing him take on any one of them and going to great lengths to pull out a victory by the skin of his teeth is exciting.You don't wanna see him do shit like kick out the Specter but it's really cool when you see specifically how he pulls out a win on someone like Faust, Despero, or Giganta. The best argument for why Batman isn't the best superhero is that most writers kind of suck at writing him to this kind of extent. They either go all in on the "insane vigilante" or have him act just like any other hero with total nobility. They batwank by having him take easy Ws when the fun is how he manages to take all these wins while playing at a disadvantage. They have him be an expert in literally everything rather than having him learn as he goes like, y'know, a detective investigating things relevant to the cases he's working. At the end of the day, while I've seen a lot of people on /co/ rant otherwise, he's definitely up there
>>147147828>rapes his clown in front of you
>>147149112>>147149341>>147149683>>147150053huh?
