ENGL 685: Graphic Novels

Throughout The Dark Knight Returns there exists a tension between a fantastical world and a world based on reality.  This distinction stands out for me in the contrast of black-and-white versus color images, most notably in that the images of Commissioner Gordon  are always in black-and-white.  Gordon’s contrast is particularly evident on pages 58-59.  On page 58, fourteen of the sixteen images consist of Commissioner Gordon and the only one with color is the image of a member of the mutant gang.  The adjacent page includes images of the television, Robin, and Batman all in color.  Even the darker image of Batman stands against a blue sky and the density of the black used to color him, well, colors him. Even in the color heavy second half of the DKR Gordon’s images remain in black and white as can be seen on page 175.

The juxtaposition of these pages pronounces a distinction the book desires to make between Commissioner Gordon and the other images of the book.  Perry Nodelman’s article on picture books states that black and white pictures remind us of our “experience with newspaper photographs” and that they “tend to imply seriousness and authenticity” (137).  I agree with this in that having the Commissioner in black and white we are reminded of his humanity. Look at Gordon’s face and the evidence for seriousness and authenticity can be read in the marks of age and stress as compared with the lack of these lines and expressions in the faces of the people on the adjacent page.  Moreover, Gordon is a kind of realistic batman or maybe the poor man’s version of batman because he fights crimes and fights for justice from a more real-world perspective. Or maybe the black and white evokes a sense of nostalgia for a Gotham City before the mutant gang and before Batman was needed to instill justice.

If black and white is meant to bring a sense of “seriousness and authenticity,” what sense are the heavy color images throughout, but particularly those of the television, supposed to evoke?  I don’t want to say triviality and falsehood, but maybe to be very literal it speaks to the idea that television colors the seriousness and reality of its reports. The character of Batman also coincides with this idea – one must look past the costume and mask to discover the real man behind it all.  Do we see a triumph of authenticity in the end when Bruce leaves Batman behind and rallies his troops as Bruce?

I agree with the assessment that the villains that Batman faces in The Dark Knight Returns are reflections of himself.

Harvey Dent/ Two Face is the most obvious. It is clear that Bruce Wayne/ Batman sees Dent as a mirror of himself. Dent, a former District Attorney and hero is deformed and turned into a criminal at the hands of criminals. Dent is of two minds as well as two faces: The hero and the criminal. He cannot decide between these two, and so uses a coin to make decisions. When we first meet Dent he has been “cured” physically and mentally. He tries to return to society as a normal man, reformed, but as we discover he is incapable of remaining this way and his true divided nature reemerges. Wayne follows a similar trajectory. After the death of the second Robin, Jason Todd, Wayne has retired from being Batman and tried to return to normal society. He even sponsors Dent rehabilitation because he needs to believe that people’s “private demons can be defeated” (17). Both men finally succumb to their private demons and Batman must defeat Two Face. In this confrontation, Batman acknowledges that they are mirror images when he says he sees a reflection.

Less obvious reflections of Batman are the other enemies he confronts. Batman is a character of many divisions. The conflict between these divisions is reflected in Dent, but the divisions themselves take the form of the others that Batman faces off against. Batman squares off against the Mutant gang leader. The Mutant Leader represents raw brute force and criminality. Batman walks the line between law enforcement and criminal. To defeat the Mutant Leader, Batman must circumvent the law and defeat the leader at his own game. The Mutant Leader is the reflection of Batman’s criminality and barbarism.

The Joker is a distorted reflection. Joker is in many ways the opposite of Batman. While Batman seeks a kind of fascistic control over the criminal element in the city, the Joker is the anarchistic soul of crime. He is a villain and a murderer, but by defeating him, Batman has become a villain and murderer in the eyes of the public.

Finally, Batman must square off against Superman, the hero. In this confrontation, Batman must face the publicly accepted superhero as the public villain. In defeating Superman, he must himself be defeated. He beats Superman, but it costs him his life.

The most titillating aspect of the Dark Knight Returns, and many other comics for that matter, is how everything seems to represent something else.  Metaphors rule the superhero, and DKR is bursting at the seams with them.  While Miller discusses some of this in his interview, I wanted to try to walk through the narrative and pull out the largest ones and see what happens.

In the first book batman faces Harvey Dent, who Miller points out is a reflection of Batman because of his two-sidedness (Bruce Wayne & Batman).  In returning to the batman self, Bruce Wayne must face his own evil, represented by the bat, and not ignore it or silence it, but rather let it empower him so that he can fight for the weak and average human.  Batman sees his own reflection in Harvey’s vision of himself, as someone who has let the evil side of him rule entirely.  This one idea has many implications.  For instance, batman might have thought that by retiring for so long, he let his worst side of him (fear, laziness, old age) take over his persona to the point that he became a bystander in the increasingly chaotic city of Gotham.  Alternatively, he might have recognized that his own evil (the bat) had in the past taken over so completely that he let things happen that shouldn’t have.  I do not know what happened to the previous robin, but it’s obvious that whatever it was, Batman regretted his role in it.  When Batman faces Harvey Dent, then, he is facing the doubleness of himself, his good and his evil.

The mutant gang of book two seems to represent the anonymous group of mediocre villains, who are the same type of people who murdered Batman’s parents.  In facing them and finally taking out their leader, Batman has regained the power he lost when his parents died.  By killing the mutant leader and gaining the adoration of the mutant gang, Batman has essentially wrestled with the past, and then become the master of it.

Book three is Batman’s epic fight with his archenemy the Joker.  As Miller explains, the Joker represents chaos, and it is specifically this chaos that Batman, a control-freak, cannot stand.  It is also this chaos that killed his parents.  In facing the Joker batman is facing not only his past (like he did with the mutant gang), but also the larger universal force that ultimately lead to the murder of his parents.  In other words, the mutant gang was a replica of the type of people that killed his parents; the Joker is the puppet master that made them do it.

In book four Batman has to face Superman, and it is here that I get a little confused.  It seems that Superman is what would happen if Batman was all Bruce Wayne, in other words was all good.  Superman is not a complicated figure, but rather the simple easy example of pure good.  Batman is more complicated and so it seems that Superman might represent the other side of Harvey Dent – if Harvey Dent did see himself as his surgeons did.  Batman has to balance Bruce Wayne and the Bat in order to fully live out who he is.  If either the good or the evil was to silence the other, he would be out of balance and would become something akin to Superman – hired help who doesn’t think twice when asked to kill an old friend.

This is the second time I have read Frank Miller’s, The Dark Knight Returns, and, as is common when reading something a second time, I noticed aspects of the novel which were not apparent the first time around – in particular, Batman’s relationship to key characters in the novel. Though I believe the writing of this novel is excellent, I found the character development of almost all “secondary” characters to be lacking.

Miller undoubtedly provides the reader an intimate knowledge of Bruce Wayne’s emotional evolution, revealing a side of Batman the reader has never seen. He also provides us a decent view of Carrie Kelly’s/Robin’s growth as a person. However, I would argue that Miller could have provided additional development for characters like Harvey Dent/Two-Face, The Joker, Commissioner Gordon, Alfred, and Superman. After all, these are pivotal characters in a story that is, ostensibly, concerned with the development of these characters over the years and though Miller does give us insight into their emotions, personalities, etc., he seems to tease us by laying a framework of character advancement which never seems fully resolved.

By the end of the novel, Miller shows us that Batman will, in fact, continue fighting crime; albeit he will do so in a completely new way. Miller provides us closure and an ability to anticipate a path Bruce’s life may take. He does not, however, give us the same foundation to anticipate the other characters futures. Instead, we seem to be left in a state of Limbo.

The Joker, who we are led to believe has an almost supernatural tie to Batman, is simply killed off without providing the reader any real sense of closure. In fact, Batman seems to be disturbed by him even in death, asking The Joker to “stop laughing” even as he watches him burn. There is an undertone which implies that Batman’s struggles with the Joker are not over…but how could that be? The same can be said about Harvey Dent/Two-Face. Miller shows us that Dent falls into an even deeper state of psychosis, only leaving us to wonder what will become of him. Commissioner Gordon is left in a similar state of uncertainty; will he continue to help fight crime in Gotham City (possibly as part of Batman’s new “underground” force) or does his story end here?

The most interesting character development (or lack thereof), in my opinion, seems to be Superman’s. In this novel, Superman has become a type of pawn for the Government; a role which both Batman and Superman seem uncomfortable with. Not only is this a strange role for Superman, but it is a role which causes more problems than solutions – According to Batman, Superman has even become “A Joke.” Though there seems to be a hint of change in Superman’s demeanor by the end of the novel, again, the reader is left to wonder if anything has really changed.

Without a doubt, it is the participation of these characters in the overall plot of the novel that makes this story so intriguing. However, by expanding upon the development of each character individually, Miller may have been able to escalate the prestige of his novel, and his writing, beyond what he already has achieved in The Dark Knight Returns.

My previous experience with Batman and Superman was pretty simplistic. Superman was the one with the big S on his chest. Overall, he was a good guy, and I owned a Super-Girl hat at one time in my life. Batman was different. He was the rich one, the one with the underground layer. He had the cool car, and I didn’t think he had any real talent as a superhero, but he did have the money to make the powers that other superheroes have. After reading DKR, yes, things have changed as far as my perspectives go, and now I’m starting to like Batman more, in comparison to Superman, in large part because of how they look when the two are pushed together.

In DKR, when we see the first sign of the Superman S, I already wanted to paint Superman and Batman as opposites. The flood of media images on Batman, through the panels and panels of news feed, talk shows, and television commentaries, have Batman as the unruly vigilante who couldn’t be bothered to play by the rules because he had things that needed to be done. Obviously, he saw that the laws weren’t working; so why heed them? Superman, however, being called a “Good boy” by the government is shown, right off the bat, to be the errand boy who does play by the rules, and might just like it that way, arguably (Miller 84).

For a while, when I was reading, I wanted to say that Batman and Superman were like the two sides of the Two Face coin, but I’m at the moment not convinced that that’s good enough. It’s too simple, but at the time, I had believed that the theory could work. If they would be two sides of the coin, one constant would be that whatever side the coin landed on, good would prevail. The side chosen would only dictate the means by which the “overall good” would win over evil. Or, in even more simplistic terms, regardless of whether or not it is heads or tails, you would still have a quarter in your hand to buy something with at the end of the day.

Coming full circle, I want to attempt to give my overly simplistic evaluations of Batman and Superman an overhaul, in light of the DKR take on the Batman story. Batman is not the rich guy with a hobby of fighting villains; now, he is the gangster for the good of the people. Boichel describes it as Batman being the “figure who, like the criminals, operated outside the law and on his own terms, yet did so on behalf of the status quo…” (7). Conversely, Superman is now the morally obligated hired help of the powers that be, also known as the government.

If the coin analogy simplifies things too much, does anyone have something better to describe the Batman/ Superman dynamic? Would “more and less complicated shades of good” be any better?

~Kelley

The question of “evil” and what exactly we as society and as individuals are supposed to do about it is one that has haunted everyday conversations for quite some time now. In a post-911 world, replete with hooded POWs having their heads hacked off and humiliated Abu Ghraib prisoners having their genitals shocked, the Jack Bauer–fueled belief that “the ends justify the means” has never been more hotly debated.

Or has it? In truth, it was a bit of a shock to read Batman Begins for the first time this past spring and realize it was first published in 1986. An atta-boy president who loves his ranch? Check. Escalating class tensions? Check. And above all else, a constantly prattling, fear-mongering media? Definitely a check there.

It’s easy to see why the Batman franchise of the ‘80s was practically screaming for yet another big screen adaptation some twenty years later.

And yet, at the risk of sounding like some stuffy censorship bureau critic, I can’t help but wonder at the message that’s being discussed through our society’s current fondness for all things Batman.

But wait! I just uttered the dreaded “m” word. As much as postmodernists may want to distance themselves from the loaded term, “discussion” simply doesn’t do justice to the vigilantism-loving scenarios that Miller puts forth in Batman. Sure, Bruce Wayne’s a flawed hero, and both Miller and Nolan show us that he has to pay a heavy price for his actions. Sure, each facet of the story is supposed to convey at least some spectrum of moral ambiguity (the conventionally horrific appearance of many of the graphic novel’s villains aside, that is).

But at the end of the day, I can’t help but observe that the masses are titillated by the arc of blood streaming from the mutants’ bloody nose at the end of Book 1, fascinated by the gorgeous bokeh twinkling behind Ledger’s grease-painted face rapturously speeding down the city’s nighttime street…and rather powerfully seduced by the siren call of what Miller calls “the forceful, violent aspect of the will.”

Does that bother you? It bothers me.

Of course, we’re meant to be disturbed, on one level or another. (Sorry Heath, it was just the “price” you had to pay for our collective admiration, apparently). But in all seriousness, is it enough to just acknowledge the demons inside of us and herald the occasional flawed, po-mo hero who “sublimates” said banshees? Despite agreeing with Miller’s assertion that “we’re at our best when we’re autonomous,” when I look at today’s world, I’m not sure I’m comfortable with how easily that can lead to the worst kinds of endsjustifymeans excesses. I’m not even convinced that the average movie-goer (or graphic novel reader, for that matter) even processes the “thickness” of that discussion.

Should they? At point do we move the locus of responsibility from the audience to the artist? To the medium? Should we ever?

Miller certainly gives the reader a lot to discuss in The Dark Knight Returns, but one aspect of the work that especially interested me was his ongoing use of modern television media as a plot device.  While the constant flashing to Lola Chong and countless talking heads serves an expository purpose by giving the reader enough information to frame the story moving forward, there’s also a scathing undertone of social criticism.  The eyewitness interview accounts, along with the over-the-top behavioral commentators, point to the weakness, anger, and growing “smallness” of the public (as Superman describes it in Book 3). 

One of the reasons Miller’s use of the media really stuck with me is because I’m troubled by just how accurate his warped, sensationalist view of television news seems to be today, almost 25 years later.  While CNN was around in 1986, DKR was written in the days before the Internet and a multitude of cable news stations helped bring about the 24-hour media/spin cycle.  And while open access to information is obviously a good thing, I think Miller may have been keenly aware of the dangers we see in media today – when information is already so processed, manufactured, and commented on that it takes away all need for analysis or critical thinking on the part of the news consumer.  Who needs to go through the hardship of thinking about something for ourselves when we have Glenn Beck, Keith Olbermann, and everybody under the sun willing to tell us all we need to know? (Just my own two cents on how modern media may be contributing to our growing “smallness.”) 

Changing gears somewhat, I also really liked Miller’s recurrent use of the teenage gangs in Gotham.  What makes them so disaffected/alienated that they are willing to latch on to just about anything or anyone to create a sense of identity (the mutant leader, Batman, the Joker)?  Carrie’s leftover hippie parents are obviously not portrayed in a positive light, but that’s about the only insight the reader is shown into any problematic parenting.  Do the changing attitudes towards “heroes” that Miller portrays somehow take away from a collective societal identity?  Whatever the case, it’s clear that such extreme youth behavior is symptomatic of the troubled world Miller presents.    

John