Why a Dark Knight bests a Man of Steel every time

I have a confession to make: I am a little bit of a fangirl. I don’t know that the term really exists, but it’s my modified form of “fanboy”. According to UrbanDictionary:

1. fanboy
A passionate fan of various elements of geek culture (e.g. sci-fi, comics, Star Wars, video games, anime, hobbits, Magic: the Gathering, etc.), but who lets his passion override social graces.

I suppose that my definition of “fangirl” would exclude the lack of social graces but definitely include the geek culture part. And this is true of me. I’m a big Joss Whedon fan, Firefly and all. I went to see all three Lord of the Rings films on opening night. I actually read V for Vendetta before I saw it in theaters. I discuss Lost theories for hours after the show ends. And finally, I can get pretty into superhero movies.

Case in point: Despite needing to be awake for work the next day, I rallied together a group of my friends to accompany me to the midnight screening of The Dark Knight last Thursday. Now that I think about it, this statement contains two pieces of evidence supporting my fangirl-ness. First, I attended a midnight premiere screening—you better believe it, there were people dressed up as characters. That factor is not personally important to this fangirl, but she does appreciate it when others contribute to the general air of excitement in this way. So the second piece of evidence, obviously enough, is that I put in all this effort for a Batman movie.

I love Batman. I love the idea of revisionist comics, the ones that dig beneath the primary-colored do-goodery of established superheroes and deeply explore the subtext. Frank Miller’s Batman series is an example; these comics provide one of the richest sources for the last two Christopher Nolan films. I think we can safely assume that the Joel Schumacher movies were, at that point, just making up their own shit (that was for you, Kate) and running with it. They turned Batman into more of a cartoon than the comics did.

Do any of you remember the fantastic superhero monologue just before the grand finale of Kill Bill: Vol. 2? Bill waxes eloquent about the merits of Superman, over all other supers, and actually develops a compelling argument. But I really dislike Superman. I loved Smallville in the earlier years—the awkwardness of a young (and way hot) Clark Kent coming to terms with his changing body and newfound abilities was relatable for anyone in high school at the time. I found the premise of Superman Returns to be fascinating (Does the world still need Superman?), even though the film didn’t deliver. Generally, though, Superman is kind of lame. He’s just……super. Some of the revisionist comics nailed him as a poster child for American idealism and referred to Kal-El as “the big blue Boy Scout”. Not super interesting, right?

Granted, I’m not as literate in comics as many guys my age, but I feel confident in saying that the majority (pay attention to what that means—not ALL but certainly A LOT) of comic-book superheroes became “super” through an accident of some kind: a spider bite, some chance encounter with toxic waste, or government experimentation. Batman is completely different. Batman is a man with no “super” powers; he went through rigorous training to become this masked ninja of night; he made brilliant scientific advancements in designing his crazy Bat-gadgets. See, Batman in some ways actually represents the American ideal of a self-made man. Let’s ignore for a moment that he inherited a huge fortune from his parents. Through discipline and concentrated effort, Bruce Wayne elevated himself from simple playboy to the Savior of the Common Everyday Citizen, the Scourge of Gotham’s criminal underbelly. He is more like Nietzsche’s Übermensch (superman) than Superman ever was. Superman’s struggle is to become as human as possible, upholding the law, conforming as best he can to social codes. The Übermensch, on the other hand, is so perfect that he rises above arbitrary human “treaties”—the lies humans tell themselves in order to maintain some semblance of order. We develop these “treaties” (i.e. laws, constitutions, governing principles, societal conventions) that vary from group to group and so lose meaning when you venture outside the nest. Nietzsche’s conception of the “superman” was someone who could transcend the restrictions society places on itself, because he has no need for them. Nietzsche—he of the “God is dead” credo—envisioned the Übermensch as being essentially human and of this world, not like a divine prophet or any Messenger of God that comes from The World Beyond. So the Übermensch stands in direct contrast to, say, Superman himself who definitely hails from a world beyond Earth. Not so, Batman. Lacking “superhuman” abilities and identifying himself as a boy of Gotham, Batman is truly one of the people, but one who operates outside of the boundaries of law and society.

*DISCLAIMER: I am fully aware that this is an overly-simplified reading of Nietzsche, but hey—I’m blogging, not writing a thesis.

This all goes to prove my ultimate point: Batman is way more awesome and interesting than Superman (Lord, save me from fanboy wrath). And this contributes to the fact that these latest Batman incarnations blow all other superhero movies out of the water (don’t tell Tobey). I don’t have too much to say about Heath Ledger’s fearless, terrifying, extraordinary performance as The Joker—it’s all been said by every critic out there. It is absolutely brilliant and will last forever as a tribute to a man just coming into his own as an artist. The Joker will always remind us of what we could have seen from Ledger and, personal tragedies aside, the world is right to mourn the passing of an actor with the ability to show us life from all vantage points.

What strikes me most about Batman Begins and The Dark Knight is the role Gotham City plays as a driving force in the story. Gotham becomes a very real character with personality and personal demons. Batman’s fight is the fight for her soul. When you consider that “Gotham” is a nickname for New York City and you take into account the post-9/11 climate in which Nolan wrote and directed these movies, the stakes of this fight become very high indeed. This sleeker, darker, more complicated Batman is the superhero for our uncertain times. We are a more cynical people, more suspicious of supermen who seem too good to be true. After all, Superman eventually becomes merely a pawn of the US government in Frank Miller’s Batman comics. Batman cannot be corrupted because he doesn’t work inside the system, and Nolan’s films argue that the system is broken—not the people. The Dark Knight continues the theme in Batman Begins of condemning the powerful who have been ruined by power and championing the people. Batman doesn’t fight for “Truth, Justice, and the American Way”—he knows how meaningless buzzwords like that are. Instead, he fights to stave off the evil poisoning his city, on whose fate hinges the fate of our world. As Gotham goes, so goes humanity. Dark as they are, the two films leave hope that despite everything that’s wrong with the world in which we live, there is something within us that can make it right.

Okay, so then perhaps NEXT week I’ll get to the question, “What is and is not cinema?” No quote this week, because I’m afraid that I’ll have to dig into Walter Benjamin and Christian Metz to answer that question and then we’ll have an overload of citations. Besides, there’s more than enough Nietzsche in this one. Check out Also sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spoke Zarathustra), in which Nietzsche lays out his “superman” ideas—this is a really cool piece of philosophy. In the meantime, you should all go see The Dark Knight and think seriously about what Nolan is saying with his film and what Ledger is expressing through his performance. I promise, the discussion will be just as fun as the movie itself.

Thanks for reading!

Sara