Batman

Appeared in comic books published by DC Comics, Inc.

Originally referred to as "the Bat-Man" and still referred to at times as "the Batman," the character is additionally known as "the Caped Crusader," "the Dark Knight,"and "the World's Greatest Detective,"among other titles.

DC Comics, Inc.

one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media.

The initials "DC" came from the company's popular series Detective Comics, which featured Batman's debut and subsequently became part of the company's name.

Detective Comics is an American comic book series published monthly by DC Comics since 1937, best known for introducing the famous superhero Batman in Detective Comics #27 (cover dated May 1939).

That superhero would eventually become the star of the title, the cover logo of which is often written as "Detective Comics featuring Batman". Because of its significance, issue #27 is widely considered one of the most valuable comic books in existence, with one copy selling for $1,075,000 in a February 2010 auction

Batman's secret identity is Bruce Wayne, an American billionaire playboy, industrialist, and philanthropist.

Having witnessed the murder of his parents as a child, he swore revenge on criminals, an oath tempered with the greater ideal of justice.

Wayne trains himself both physically and intellectually and dons a bat-themed costume in order to fight crime.

Batman operates in the fictional Gotham City, assisted by various supporting characters including his crime-fighting partner, Robin, his butler Alfred Pennyworth, the police commissioner Jim Gordon, and occasionally the heroine Batgirl.

Unlike most superheroes, he does not possess any superpowers; he makes use of intellect, detective skills, science and technology, wealth, physical prowess, martial arts skills, an indomitable will, fear, and intimidation in his continuous war on crime.

Batman became a very popular character soon after his introduction and gained his own comic book title, Batman, in 1940.

The late 1960s Batman television series used a camp aesthetic which continued to be associated with the character for years after the show ended.

Camp is an aesthetic sensibility that regards something as appealing or humorous because of its ridiculousness to the viewer.

The concept is related to kitsch, and things with camp appeal may also be described as being "cheesy"

Various creators worked to return the character to his dark roots, with varying results.

The comic books of this dark stage culminated in the acclaimed 1986 miniseries The Dark Knight Returns, by Frank Miller, as well as Batman: The Killing Joke by Alan Moore and Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth, among others.

The overall success of Warner Bros.' live-action Batman feature films have also helped maintain public interest in the character.

Toward the end of the 1980s, the Warner Bros. studio began producing a series of feature films starring Batman, beginning with the 1989 film Batman, directed by Tim Burton and starring Michael Keaton. Burton and Keaton returned for the 1992 sequel Batman Returns, and in 1995, Joel Schumacher directed Batman Forever with Val Kilmer as Batman. Schumacher also directed the 1997 sequel Batman & Robin, which starred George Clooney.

As an aristocratic hero with a double identity, the Bat-Man had its predecessor as Zorro (created by Johnston McCulley, 1919). Like him he performed his heroic deeds in secret, averted suspicion by playing the fool in public, and marked his work with a signature symbol.

A cultural icon, Batman has been licensed and adapted into a variety of media, from radio to television and film, and appears on a variety of merchandise sold all over the world such as toys and video games. The character has also intrigued psychiatrists with many trying to understand the character's psyche and his true ego in society. In May 2011, Batman placed second on IGN's Top 100 Comic Book Heroes of All Time,[7] after Superman. Empire magazine also listed him second in their 50 Greatest Comic Book Characters of All Time.

Creation

William Finger, one of Batman's creators, said he devised the name Bruce Wayne for the character's secret identity: "Bruce Wayne's first name came from Robert Bruce, the Scottish patriot. Bruce, being a playboy, was a man of gentry. I searched for a name that would suggest colonialism. I tried Adams, Hancock ... then I thought of Mad Anthony Wayne."

Robert Kane, another creator of Batman, specifically noted the influence of the films The Mark of Zorro (1920) and The Bat Whispers (1930) in the creation of the character's iconography.

A mysterious criminal by the name of "The Bat" eludes police and then finally announces his retirement to the country, while a wealthy Cornelia Van Gorder takes up residence in the estate of a famous banker. Along with her maid Lizzie, her niece Dale, and a bank teller disguised as a gardener, she is terrorized by a series of strange events seemingly set in motion by the mysterious bat. Possible suspects include a doctor, an elderly police lieutenant, a butler, a handyman, and a big-city cop.

The Bat Whispers

Finger, drawing inspiration from pulp heroes like Doc Savage, The Shadow, and Sherlock Holmes, made the character a master sleuth.

Fictional character biography

Batman's history has undergone various revisions, both minor and major. Few elements of the character's history have remained constant.

The central fixed event in the Batman stories is the character's origin story.

As a little boy, Bruce Wayne is horrified and traumatized to see his parents, the physician Dr. Thomas Wayne and his wife Martha, being murdered by a mugger in front of his very eyes. This drives him to fight crime in Gotham City as Batman.

Characterization

Batman's primary character traits can be summarized as "wealth; physical prowess; deductive abilities and obsession."

The details and tone of Batman comic books have varied over the years due to different creative teams.

The driving force behind Batman's character is from his childhood.

Bob Kane and Bill Finger discussed Batman's background and decided that "there's nothing more traumatic than having your parents murdered before your eyes." Despite his trauma, he is driven to train to become a brilliant scientist and train his body into absolute physical perfectionto fight crime in Gotham City as Batman, an inspired idea from Wayne's insight into the criminal mind.

Another of Batman's characterizations is a vigilante; in order to stop evil that started with the death of his parents, he must sometimes break laws himself.

Batman is often treated as a vigilante by other characters in his stories.

Dressed as a bat, Batman deliberately cultivates a frightening persona in order to aid him in crime-fighting,a fear that originates from the criminals' own guilty conscience.

Bruce Wayne

The Batman is, in his everyday identity, Bruce Wayne, a wealthy business owner living in Gotham City. Wayne averts suspicion by acting the part of a superficial, dull-witted playboy idly living off his family's fortune (amassed through investment in real estate before the city became a bustling metropolis)and the profits of Wayne Enterprises, his inherited conglomerate.

Wayne supports philanthropic causes through his nonprofit Wayne Foundation but is more widely known as a celebrity socialite.

In public Wayne pretends to be a heavy drinker, using ginger ale to suggest champagne and liberally serving intoxicating beverages to guests that he never actually consumes himself.

In reality, he is a strict teetotaler concerned to maintain top physical fitness and mental acuity. In public Wayne appears frequently in the company of fashionable women to encourage tabloid gossip. In reality there is less than meets the eye: though he leads an active romantic life, crime-fighting activities account for most of his night hours.

Modern stories tend to portray Bruce Wayne as the character's facade and the Batman as the truer representation of his personality.

In Batman Unmasked, a television documentary about the psychology of the character, Associate Professor of Social Psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles, and an adjunct behavioral scientist at the Rand Corporation Benjamin Karney, notes that the Batman's personality is driven by Bruce Wayne's inherent humanity;

that "Batman, for all its benefits and for all of the time Bruce Wayne devotes to it, is ultimately a tool for Bruce Wayne's efforts to make the world better".

Skills, abilities, and resources

Batman has no inherent superhuman powers. To compensate for this, he relies on "his own scientific knowledge, detective skills, and athletic prowess."

In the stories, Batman is regarded as one of the world's greatest detectives, if not the world's greatest crime solver.

He is also a master of disguise, often gathering information under the identity of Matches Malone, a notorious gangster.

Additionally, the Batman has been repeatedly described as one of the greatest martial artists in the DC Universe; his skills in hand-to-hand combat are said to rival such notable martial artists

His batsuit also aids in his combat against enemies, having the properties of both Kevlar and Nomex. It protects him from gunfire and other significant impacts.

However, Batman's most defining characteristic is his strong commitment to justice and his unwillingness to take life, regardless of the situation he has faced. This unyielding moral rectitude has earned him the respect of several heroes in the DC Universe

Batman's costume incorporates the imagery of a bat in order to frighten criminals.The details of the Batman costume change repeatedly through various stories and media, but the most distinctive elements remain consistent: a scallop-hem cape, a cowl covering most of the face featuring a pair of batlike ears, and a stylized bat emblem on the chest, and the ever-present utility belt. The costumes' colors are traditionally blue and grey,although this colorization arose due to the way comic book art is colored.

Batman uses a large arsenal of specialized gadgets in his war against crime, the designs of which usually share a bat motif.

Batman's primary vehicle is the Batmobile, which is usually depicted as an imposing black car with large tailfins that suggest a bat's wings. Batman's other vehicles include the Batplane (aka the Batwing), Batboat, Bat-Sub, and Batcycle

A typical major exception to the range of Batman's equipment are conventional firearms, which he refuses to use on principle considering that weapon class was the instrument of his parents' murder.

Modern depictions of Batman have him compromise for practicality by arming his vehicles mainly for the purpose of removing obstacles or disabling enemy vehicles.

When Batman is needed, the Gotham City police activate a searchlight with a bat-shaped insignia over the lens called the Bat-Signal, which shines into the night sky, creating a bat-symbol on a passing cloud which can be seen from any point in Gotham. The origin of the signal varies, depending on the continuity and medium.

The Batcave is Batman's secret headquarters, consisting of a series of subterranean caves beneath his mansion, Wayne Manor. It serves as his command center for both local and global surveillance, as well as housing his vehicles and equipment for his war on crime. It also is a storeroom for Batman's memorabilia.

Commissioner James "Jim" Gordon, Batman's ally in the Gotham City police, debuted along with Batman in Detective Comics #27. Gordon has been a consistent presence ever since. As a crime-fighting everyman, he shares the Batman's goals while offering, much as the character of Watson does in Sherlock Holmes stories, a normal person's perspective on the work of an extraordinary genius.

Later the Batman gained a butler. Alfred Pennyworth serves as Bruce Wayne's loyal father figure and is one of the few persons to know his secret identity. The character "[lends] a homey touch to Batman's environs and [is] ever ready to provide a steadying and reassuring hand" to the hero and his sidekick.

In the 1970s, Lucius Fox appeared as Bruce Wayne's business manager and technology specialist.

widely recognized supporting character for many years has been the young sidekick Robin.

Batman co-creators Bob Kane and Bill Finger disagreed about adding Robin as a character.

That division has perpetuated itself among writers and fans ever since. For Kane, the Batman was by definition a solitary figure. Bruce Wayne is an orphan; the character is defined by an essential loneliness.

Keeping the Batman solitary keeps the Batman unique, his world clean of line, his world adult, and the stories more realistic. Modern interpreters such as filmmakers Christopher Nolan and Tim Burton have viewed the character the same way.

The practical need for allies and confidants for the character is for them adequately met by characters such as Jim Gordon, Lucius Fox and Alfred Pennyworth. For Finger, Robin introduced an element of fantasy and gave young readers a way to participate vicariously in the Batman's adventures.

In the years since, writers who have been attracted to the character, including Frank Miller, find that Robin adds a welcome sense of family for a lonely hero, a sense of fantasy in a gritty universe, and a slang-happy, wisecracking foil to world populated by noir-ish and even psychotic characters.

Bruce Wayne has been portrayed as involved romantically with many women through his various incarnations.

Some have been respected society figures: Julie Madison, Vicki Vale, and Silver St. Cloud.

Some have been allies: Wonder Woman and Sasha Bordeaux.

Some have been villainesses: the Catwoman and Talia al Ghul. With the latter he sired a son, Damian, and with the former of whom sired a daughter, Helena

While these relationships tend to be short, Batman's attraction to the Catwoman is present in nearly every version and medium in which the characters appear.

Writers have varied in the approach over the years to the 'playboy' aspect of Bruce Wayne's persona; some show his playboy reputation as a manufactured illusion to support his mission as Batman, while others have depicted Bruce Wayne as genuinely enjoying the benefits of being "Gotham's most eligible bachelor."

Batman faces a variety of foes ranging from common criminals to outlandish supervillains . Many of them mirror aspects of the Batman's character and development, often having tragic origin stories that lead them to a life of crime.

Batman's "most implacable foe" is the Joker, a psychopathic, clown-like criminal who, as a "personification of the irrational", represents "everything Batman [opposes]."

The Joker

The Joker is a fictional character, a comic book supervillain appearing in publications by DC Comics. The character was created by Jerry Robinson, Bill Finger and Bob Kane, and first appeared in Batman #1 (Spring 1940).

Throughout his comic book appearances, the Joker is portrayed as a highly intelligent, master criminal. Originally introduced as a psychopath with a warped, sadistic sense of humor, the character became a goofy prankster in the late 1950s in response to the regulation of the Comics Code Authority, before returning to his darker roots in the early 1970s.

Throughout the Joker's long history, there have been several different origin tales, but the most common has falling into a tank of chemical waste, which bleaches his skin white and turns his hair green and his lips bright red, giving him the appearance of a clown.

He has been repeatedly analyzed by critics as the perfect adversary for Batman; their long, dynamic relationship often parallels the concept of yin and yang.

The Joker is also often credited with popularizing the "Evil clown" archetype.

The Joker has appeared as an adversary for Batman across a wide spectrum of media in both live-action and animated incarnations, including the 1960s Batman television series where he is portrayed by Cesar Romero, and in film by Jack Nicholson in Batman (1989), and Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight (2008), for which Ledger posthumously earned the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

The Joker commits crimes with weaponized comic props such as a deck of bladed playing cards, an acid-squirting flower, cyanide-stuffed pies, exploding cigars filled with nitroglycerin, harpoon guns that utilize razor-sharp BANG!-flags, and a lethally electric joy buzzer.

His most prominent weapon is his Joker venom, a deadly poison that infects his victims with a ghoulish rictus grin as they die while laughing uncontrollably. The venom comes in many forms, from gas to darts to liquid poison, and has been his primary calling card from his first appearance.

The Joker is portrayed as highly intelligent and skilled in the fields of chemistry and engineering, as well an expert with explosives. From his first appearance onward, he has been consistently portrayed as capable of hijacking broadcasts - usually news programs - of both the television and radio varieties.

Joker's skills in unarmed combat vary considerably depending on the writer. Some writers have shown Joker to be a very skilled fighter, capable of holding his own against Batman.

His versatility in combat is due in part to his own extensive array of hidden gadgets and weapons on his person that he often pulls out on a moment's whim (rolling a handful of explosive marbles on the ground, retractable knives attached to his spats, etc.); other writers, on the other hand, portray Joker as physically frail to the point that he can be defeated with a single punch. He is, however, consistently described as agile.

The Joker has cheated death numerous times, even in seemingly inescapable and lethal situations. He has been seen caught in explosions, been shot repeatedly, dropped from lethal heights, electrocuted, and so on, but he always returns once again to wreak havoc.

Over several decades there have been a variety of depictions and possibilities regarding the Joker's apparent insanity. Grant Morrison's graphic novel Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth suggests that the Joker's mental state is in fact a previously unprecedented form of "super-sanity," a form of ultra-sensory perception.

It also suggests that he has no true personality of his own, that on any given day he can be a harmless clown or a vicious killer, depending on which would benefit him the most.

Though many have been related, a definitive back-story has never been established for the Joker in the comics, and his real name has never been confirmed.

He himself is confused as to what actually happened; as he says in The Killing Joke, "Sometimes I remember it one way, sometimes another... if I'm going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice!"

It depicts him as originally being an engineer at a chemical plant who quits his job to become a stand-up comedian, only to fail miserably. To support his pregnant wife, he agrees to help two criminals in a crime that goes wrong and sees him leap into a chemical vat when confronted by Batman.

When he surfaces in a nearby reservoir and removes the hood, the chemicals are shown to have given him bleached chalk-white skin, ruby-red lips, and bright green hair. Coupled with the earlier accidental death of his wife and unborn child, the engineer goes insane and becomes the Joker.

The Joker has been referred to as the Clown Prince of Crime (or Chaos), the Harlequin of Hate (Havoc), and the Ace of Knaves.

The Joker's victims have included men, women, children, and even his own henchmen and other villains. In the graphic novel The Joker: Devil's Advocate, the Joker is reported to have killed well over 2,000 people. Despite having murdered enough people to get the death penalty thousands of times over, he is always found not guilty by reason of insanity

He is then placed in Arkham Asylum, from which he appears able to escape at will, going so far as to claim that it is just a resting ground in between his "performances".

Batman has had numerous opportunities to put the Joker down once and for all, but has relented at the last minute. As an example, in one story line, Batman threatens to kill the Joker, but stops himself upon realizing that such an act would make him "a killer like yourself!"

Conversely, the Joker has given up many chances to kill the Batman because the Joker defines himself by his struggle with his archnemesis.